The new EA SPORTS NCAA Football 11 game goes on store shelves next week. I know a lot of people that produce the game... personally. All of them are great guys that work their asses off to make a fantastic game. I really hope their game fly's off the shelf because it is probably the best NCAA Football game...ever.
Another thing that will help sales this year is the new cover athlete for the game. This year the man on the cover of the game is Tim Tebow. Arguably one of the greatest and most acclaimed college football players ever. I am no college football fan. I cheer for the underdog in most games but I pay attention enough to it to be able to get about 4 questions deep when in a conversation. Then my eyes glaze over. So, I have no football fan bias against Tim Tebow nor do I know too much about him other then the typical things you my have heard and seen on the Internet. So when I was assigned to produce a "Day and The Life" Video with him during his game cover shoot and studio tour. I was intrigued. I always like to meet people that have one stigma in the media. I have met many "known" people who have been marked as mean or a jerk that have been extremely nice. Tim Tebow has a great image and is loved and hated by many so I wanted to see where I stood after personally meeting the guy.
I arrived at the cover shoot site around 8:30AM and tons of media were all around. This was Tebow's first big media day. Tebow was throwing the ball and already being shot by the game cover photographer. After a break in shooting I introduced myself to Tebow's crew first. Not a "crew" like what you may be thinking. It was his brother (who is also his agent) and his longtime friend Angel. Along with a camera crew who had been following around Tim since the end of the Sugar bowl which will be produced as a documentary later this year.. They were all cool down to earth guys. Everyone of them were really excited that Tim was a part of the game and all of them are big gamers. You can always tell a lot about a person after meeting their friends. I knew Tebow would probably be just like his friends, and he was. I then introduced myself to Tim and told him that "I would be annoying him all day" because of the video I was producing. He laughed and said "Cool man, make me look good." And he went back to throwing the ball a million more times over the head of a photographer for the perfect cover shot.
The shoot went great and everyone really enjoyed working with Tebow including myself. I always have more respect for the guys who not only star on the cover of the games, but they actually love playing the game as well. After the shoot he took a tour of the EA SPORTS Tiburon studios. He really looked like he was in awe of the whole day. He kept saying "How cool this was for all of this." He cut the famous "its in the game" line and was giddy about it. He took some pictures, checked out the game on the sticks and then he after taking a ton of pictures with the NCAA FB game time he said his goodbyes. I told him I would "make him look good" in the video. It wasn't to hard. Not like he started cursing at a media person and knocked over a craft services table. Then it might have been more difficult. I think I made him look good. Here is a link to the video. What do you think?
http://www.easports.com/media/play/feature-video/TEBOW_EAS_
Part One
http://www.easports.com/media/play/feature-video/tebow
Part Two
I never know if the athletes or people I produce videos about get to see the actual videos.I know that most don't. So to my surprise, about a month later in New York city at a NFL draft party I ran into Tim and his crew again. He immediately told me "He loved the video and thanks for making him look good." As much as every FSU fan would like me to say "He was a dick." sorry.. the dude is really just a nice guy, His entire crew was also very cool about the video and it was nice to get acknowledged.
For those wondering, he did not mention a word about religion nor did he preach from a soapbox. I respect that.
Who knows which way the Tim Tebow story will go? My bet is the guy will continue to do well because he seemed ultra focus to do well. I will cheer him on and hopefully the guy proves the critics wrong.
LOS
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