Alex Smith interviews in Miami .... Is Tim Tebow next?

Alex Smith appeared to be the odd man out in San Francisco. The Miami Dolphins were already one of the odd teams out in the Peyton Manning derby.

Sounded like a match made in heaven ... or at least a match made on the Island of Misfit Toys.

While free-agent quarterback Smith was considering a three-year offer from San Francisco, the team he led to the NFC championship game last season, members of the 49ers hopped a plane to North Carolina to watch Manning work out.

Meanwhile, Manning informed the Dolphins last week that they were no longer in the running for his services. Miami then made a run at former Green Bay backup Matt Flynn, who ended up signing with the Seattle Seahawks this past weekend.

All of which led to a 5 1/2-hour meeting between Smith and the Dolphins at the team’s complex on Sunday.

So it had come down to this for both parties. After a breakthrough season with the 49ers, Smith was left interviewing with a team spurned by Manning just in case the former Indianapolis Colts quarterback took his job in San Francisco. And after pursuing the top free agent quarterbacks on the market, the Dolphins were left looking at a player that may be cast aside by another team in favor of Manning.

As it turns out, they may have interviewed the wrong guy, seeing that Manning has apparently chosen the Denver Broncos over the 49ers and Tennessee Titans. Instead of Smith, the odd man out now appears to be Tim Tebow. ESPN, which broke the news about Manning and the Broncos on Monday morning, is also reporting that the Broncos are likely to trade their former starting quarterback.

So should Tebow book a flight to Miami? Maybe. But would he be an improvement over the Dolphins’ incumbent starter, Matt Moore? Tebow had a 7-4 record as the Broncos starter and led Denver to a first-round playoff victory, but his statistics were pretty shaky, He completed just 46.5% of his passes for 1,729 yards with 12 touchdowns and six interceptions.

Meanwhile, Moore actually had a pretty good year for the Dolphins last season, going 6-6 as a starter and completing 60.5% of his passes for 2,497 yards with 16 touchdowns and nine interceptions.

But Moore apparently isn’t considered a franchise quarterback -- and Tebow has a huge legion of fans who believe he is.

So while the Peyton Manning saga may be over, things aren’t going to get boring in the NFL just yet.

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Alex Smith interviews in Miami ... will Tim Tebow be next?