Syracuse, N. Y. (NCC News) – “Tebow Mania” has officially hit Syracuse. The 2007 Heisman Trophy winner, ESPN personality, and “Million Dollar Mile” host added Triple-A baseball player to his resume Thursday when he made his Syracuse Mets debut. The highly anticipated arrival didn’t go as planned for the outfielder, who finished the day 0 for 4 with two strikeouts. The Mets lost 6-3 to the Pawtucket Red Sox in extra innings.
Tebow was not the only Syracuse debut being made. The New York Mets organization is now in Central New York, after the Syracuse Chiefs were the Washington Nationals Triple-A affiliate for 10 seasons.
Michael Tricarico, the Broadcast and Media Relations assistant for the Syracuse Mets, believes Tebow’s arrival will help the teams rebranding efforts.
“We’ve certainly seen a push towards our attendance sales, for a couple of reasons,” Tricarico said. “Tim being one of them, and also the New York Mets – having their top minor league affiliate here for the first time. That’s probably been the main reason for the push and just the anticipation of Tebow being here. It’s certainly going to help merchandise sales. We have shirts already on sale with his name and number on the back and those are flying off the shelves fast.”
Tricarico thinks that having Tebow on the team is not only big for the team, but for the city of Syracuse as well.
“There’s plenty of people that are going to be coming from out of town, whether it’s Mets fans coming from the city, or just people who follow Tim Tebow, deciding to spend a weekend here in Central New York,” he said. “That’s big for our organization, but it’s also big for the community because it brings all those tourists in.”
Syracuse native Mike Przybyzien has been coming to minor league baseball games in the Salt City for over 50 years. He’s looking forward to seeing what Tebow will do this season.
“He’ll do good,” Przybyzien said. “That kid, he’s a whole new breed of classy baseball players.”
