Quotes of the day: Grantland version

To err is human, to forgive divine, and to be a fan is to never forgive. It is to remain scornful and withhold forgiveness until someone proves his or her own divinity, or demonstrates some fundamental unwillingness to err.--unattributed

Was Billy Beane just a lucky stock-picker? Somewhat.--Tyler Cowen and Kevin Grier

On one pole, you have people who hate [Tim Tebow] because he's too much of an in-your-face good person, which makes very little sense; at the other pole, you have people who love him because he succeeds at his job while being uniquely unskilled at its traditional requirements, which seems almost as weird. Equally bizarre is the way both groups perceive themselves as the oppressed minority who are fighting against dominant public opinion, although I suppose that has become the way most Americans go through life.

...

the real reason this "Tebow Thing" feels new is because it's a God issue that transcends God, assuming it's possible for any issue to transcend what's already transcendent. I'm starting to think it has something to do with the natural human discomfort with faith — and not just faith in Christ, but faith in anything that might (eventually) make us look ridiculous.

...

My guess is that Ryan Fitzpatrick or Aaron Rodgers would blow him away on the GRE, but Tebow has profound social intelligence, at least when he speaks in public. It's not that he usually says the right things; he only says the right things, all the time. As a result, he fuels a quasi-tautological reality that makes his supporters ecstatic, even if they don't accept it as wholly valid.--Chuck Klosterman

It's easy to understand why Elway refuses to embrace Tebow. Elway came to the Broncos as the most pro-ready quarterback of his generation, yet people in Denver hammered him for 10 years. They were still making fun of his teeth in 1998. He must look at Tebow's fan base and think, Why do they love him so much? I was more polished than this guy as a senior in high school. This is insane. What am I not seeing?--Chuck Klosterman

(Table courtesy of Cav, who will be rooting against Tebow on Dec 18 for a few hours)

"I wouldn't say it's a lying game, but it's game of words. A lot of people get into politics because they'd like to change something. I think even Barack Obama is realizing you can have all these lofty goals, and people can buy into them, but at the end of the day the system's not changing for anybody. As a 21-year-old, I have no political goals. Maybe when I'm 40.

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With the NFL, if they come knocking at your door, you're not going to tell them no. But it's a tough business. The NFL doesn't like it when they have a smart guy who knows how much he's worth. The NFL now, it's about talent, and if you have talent, it doesn't matter what's going on. That's why you get a lot of guys who get in trouble who are still playing, and things happen and they do illegal stuff and they still get to go out and play, because as long as they can get people to watch them play, the NFL's making money. It's just about the spectacle. That's all it is.--Robert Griffin III

Dr Pepper was invented in Waco, and there is a Dr Pepper museum downtown. The first two floors are a perfectly normal, if you consider paeans to carbonated sugar water to be normal; the third floor is something called the W.W. "Foots" Clements Free Enterprise Institute, with quotes on the wall like "The first thing a genius needs is to breathe free air." It's all very Sean Hannity & the Chocolate Factory.--Michael Weireb

Image links here, here and here.