Tim Tebow was a surprise first round selection of the Denver Broncos, and Sam Bradford the obvious first pick for the St. Louis Rams. Both teams will benefit from the talent infusion these two athletes bring to their new squads.

My father went to Notre Dame, the grade school, during the time his Dad worked on the campus. The school was for the children of university workers, and two of the boys my father attended classes with were Knute Jr. and Billy, the sons of football coach Knute Rockne.

Rockne’s drive and focus along with the old Irish, ‘Go, Go, Go,’ he cried to motivate his championship Notre Dame teams, inspired my father. Rockne’s sudden loss in a plane crash in 1931 rocked my father’s world.   His alignment with Notre Dame was evident throughout his life, and three songs greeted, honored, and bid farewell to him at his funeral in 1990; After When Irish Eyes are Smiling and Ava Maria were complete, the processional hymn out of the church found the choir singing ‘Cheer, Cheer for old Notre Dame.’

That said, you can understand why I can be fairly certain that my father’s allegiance with Notre Dame would have tipped his support to Jimmy Clausen; who is now a Carolina Panther after completing his career with the Irish.

On this one, I don’t agree with my Dad, I think the quarterback that is going to go on and have the most success in the National Football League is the fourth one chosen in the 2010 Draft, Colt McCoy. The University of Texas alum was picked by the Cleveland Browns after compiling more wins than any quarterback in college football history.

He brings this winning quality to his new team, and may get into action early in his professional career. There is no incumbent signal-caller currently with the Browns. The quarterbacks who had most of the starts over the past few seasons are gone. Derek Anderson is now with the Arizona Cardinals and the Brady Quinn experiment ended when he was recently shipped to the Denver Broncos. Quinn never returned any dividends for the Browns investment in him, and he is now competing with Kyle Orton for the Mile High City starting job.

Before adding Colt McCoy with their third round draft selection the Browns had three quarterbacks on their roster; Seneca Wallace, Brett Ratliff and Jake Delhomme. That combination of players while trying to win in the NFL is akin to having a wheel barrel, pogo stick and car out of gas in the garage while needing to get to the airport.

McCoy, even as a rookie, is an upgrade.

Cleveland’s talent is better than public perception. They closed out the 2009 season on a seven game point spread winning streak, a run that included straight-up victories in the final four weeks of regular season play. While some might read that as a precursor to good things to come for the Browns, statistically, a team that closes out the regular season with three or more consecutive victories, and doesn’t make the playoffs, has an 83% chance of having a worst record the next season.

If the Browns fall into the minority, like the Washington Redskins did in 1982 after closing out the 1981 season with five straight wins in Joe Gibbs’ first year as head coach, and winning Super Bowl XVII the following season over the Miami Dolphins, they could be in position to offer the Dawg Pound a lot to cheer about this season.

Are the Browns Super Bowl contenders, or should we rely on the 83% edge that suggests they will have a record worse than their 2009 mark of 5-11?

If Delhomme doesn’t win the job, McCoy could move into the starting position at the start, or early, in the 2010 campaign. From purely a percentage play position, I wouldn’t give the Browns a great chance to overcome a number of talent deficiencies that seem to preclude them from moving up in the standings.

But, in Mike Holmgren’s initial year of running the Cleveland organization, he has already surprised most of the football world by opting to retain Eric Mangini as head coach. The tide turned in favor of Mangini when he had a successful second half of the season, almost certainly he would have failed to gain a second year at the helm of the Browns had the second half of the campaign been as pathetic as the first nine weeks.

If the working partnership of Holmgren and Mangini meshes, maybe a miracle is in-store for the team that plays on the shores of Lake Erie. One thing for sure, the chances of this team catching lightening in a bottle and skyrocketing to success is made a lot more likely now that Colt McCoy is in town to pull the trigger on the Browns offense.

NEXT WEEK: Another New York Crash