Later, Gator

Where college football is concerned, I'm all Alabama all day, but two stories have come out about people from the University of Florida football team.  

For one, their one-time Heisman trophy winner, Tim Tebow, whose pro football career resembled nothing more than a great dive into an empty pool, now has declared that, twelve years since he last played baseball in high school, he now wants to play professional baseball.  Uh huh.  Like any 29-year-old, he sees 30 through the windshield, and is reaching for one more blaze of glory before settling down into the anonymity that surely lies ahead.  I'd say I wish him well, but I'm too busy making plans to do brain surgery or design a skyscraper.  I can't decide which.

But there is a guy on the current UF roster who did something great, and he deserves all the acclaim we can offer him.  Cristian García, a linebacker, works at a bar in Gainesville called the 101 Cantina.  Last month, one night at closing time, he was taking out the garbage when he witnessed a man and a woman coupled, and it took him about .3 of a second to realize that he was interrupting a rape in progress.

Christopher Lee Shaw was in the act of sexually assaulting a 19-year-old woman when García came along and had the opportunity to take out even more trash.  

García

“I turned around and pulled the guy by the shoulder and said, ‘Get off.’ That pretty much ended the situation then. He was intoxicated and attempted to throw some punches, but he slipped and busted his face on the wall,” García told GatorSports.com.

That's right.  Let the wall take credit!

Of course, Shaw told the police that the woman was coming on to him, a claim belied by surveillance video of the bar property. Gainesville cops got a search warrant and used their findings to state they have reason to believe that Shaw might be responsible for other sex crimes in the area. They also say he had a battery charge two years ago from a time when he hit an officer during a bar fight. 

Fine fellow.

Meanwhile, García is a walk-on to the UF team, a Miami native who earned a spot on the roster by working for it. "I hold strong moral values and I don’t think anyone should be taken advantage of in that kind of way," he told First Coast News.

Gee, it was really too bad that Shaw accidentally ran into a wall. I hope he will feel better by October, 2044.