The degree of difficulty is about to get higher for Tim Tebow.
The New York Mets announced Tuesday that the erstwhile quarterback will report to the Arizona Fall League this weekend and begin play for the Scottsdale Scorpions.
Tebow has been playing in the instructional league, which mostly features young players getting in additional reps before shutting it down for the winter. But the Fall League is a finishing school for high-level prospects. Among the notable names to play in the AFL last year were a pair of catchers who made an impact in the majors in 2016 — the Cubs' Willson Contreras and the Yankees' Gary Sanchez, an American League Rookie of the Year candidate.
The Scottsdale roster, managed by Tom Goodwin, features prospects from the Mets, Yankees, Giants, Angels and Phillies organizations. The most well-known player on the roster besides Tebow would probably be Greg Bird, who made his big-league debut with the Yankees last season but missed all of 2016 after having surgery to repair a torn labrum in his right shoulder.
Tebow went 1 for 4 with a walk and played five innings in left field Monday in the Mets' final instructional league game. He didn't speak to the media afterward, according to Newsday.
The 29-year-old signed with the Mets on Sept. 8 and hit a home run on the first pitch he saw in an instructional league game less than three weeks later. Mets general manager Sandy Alderson had said when Tebow signed that his plans for the coming months would depend on the Heisman winner's progress once he took the field. Obviously, the Mets feel like he's ready for a step up.
