Peyton’s Place (In History) February 8, 2007
Posted by Neil in : Uncategorized , add a commentMy co-host Paul asked every guest on Tuesday’s show whether winning a Super Bowl makes Peyton Manning a better QB than when he woke up on Sunday morning before the Colts took on the Bears in South Beach. Physically, the 6′ 5′’ Southern gentlemen will still have the same attributes (strong arm, pinpoint control, ability to sidestep the rush despite being rather pedestrian), he did prior to Indy’s 29-17 victory that night. However, Archie’s son woke up on Monday (if the Colts ever went to sleep) a different NFL player than he started Sunday as. Holding a Vince Lombardi trophy aloft may not make him a better maestro at the line of scrimmage than the incredible conductor he already was, and he may not become any better at reading opposing defenses, but he will carry around the confidence of a Super Bowl champion for the rest of his Hall of Fame career.
Peyton has been the face of the Colts franchise since he was drafted with the first overall pick 9 years ago. He was thrown into the fire right away and struggled mightily. It almost seemed that Peyton was destined to follow his father’s footsteps in being a very good NFL quarterback that did not have the pieces around him to make the postseason and eventually the Super Bowl. However, unlike his talented father’s career in the Crescent City, this Manning son is clearly different than the other progeny of Archie. While all the Manning children are physically blessed, even some more than Peyton perhaps, the Colts signal caller has been bestowed the drive and hunger of a champion. He has the “it” factor that makes a great player a legendary one. It is the desire to spend all night breaking down opponents defensive schemes, or shoot those extra 200 jumpers after practice, or keep a detailed notebook of each pitch you have made to each hitter you have faced throughout your decades long career. It’s the need to not just be one of the boys who come to work and collect $5 million dollars a year in your chosen trade, but to spend those extra hours dedicated to becoming a champion rather than throwing back a bunch of brew and chasing tail at 2 am. Everyone in professional sports is talented, but only a few in each sport have the drive to not be content with their already prestigious lot in life, and take it to the highest levels possible.
With all this being said, it did not seem that Peyton was destined to be a champion. Maybe the Manning family had a loser’s curse on it. Archie couldn’t march the Saints into the playoffs, Peyton couldn’t get past the Pats, and Eli can’t walk, talk, and chew gum at the same time much less lead one of the NFL’s most storied franchises in the world’s biggest media market to prominence despite all the talented offensive weaponry around him and an NFC conference so weak that the recently crowned Florida Gators would even like to take a bit into it.
Over the last 7 years or so, Jim Irsay, Bill Polian and Co. began to acquire the pieces they felt were needed to win the ultimate chess game. They tapped into the Carrier Dome in Syracuse and got Starvin’ Marvin Harrison and Dwight Freeney. These two men from the ‘Cuse were used to playing on a fast track and along with Peyton have been the building blocks to the Colts domination in the Dome. Polian realized that if you built the team around speed in the track meet atmosphere and conditions that the RCA Dome provides, Indy could amost chalk up 7 to 8 wins a year just at home and would annualy be playoff particpants. This theory worked to perfection. The Colts have been crowned AFC South champions every year, as you can count on them clinching the division in the early stages of December much like you can count on Pete Carroll’s USC team to win the Pac-10, Tiger Woods to make a clutch putt on the back 9 of a major on Sunday, or Roger Federer to carve his way through 7 opponents en route to another Grand Slam title at least 3 fortnights a year.
Despite the regular season success of the Blue and White, Peyton was labeled as the player who could shatter records but not put a ring on anybody’s finger (he also spent so much time trying to win he didn’t have time to try and find a Mrs. Manning either). Peyton, Marvin, Reggie “John” Wayne, and Co. would win 12-13 games a year but be bounced when they had to encounter the elements in late January. The first debacle was when the Colts headed to the Meadowlands on a blustery day to face a good, but by no means spectacular Gang Green in an AFC Wild Card Matchup. Peyton and the Colts had to go back to Indy with their equine tails between their legs after a 41-0 humbling by Chad Pennington and Co. The next year the Colts made it all the way to the AFC Championship game before getting embarrased in Foxboro as Bill Belichick and Tom Brady began to assert their dominance over their AFC rivals to be. The next year was the same as Peyton turned the pigskin over multiple times in another playoff debacle at NE in an AFC Divisional playoff game. Each of these two years Peyton had to grin and bear it while the “Playboy” Tom Brady picked up rings 2 and 3, assert himself into the discussion of best NFL QB of all-time, and pick up Hollywood starlets along the way.
The pinnacle of playoff frustration was in 2005 for the Colts. Peyton’s cast and crew had started a magical 13-0 and the media began to buzz about an undefeated season that would make the 1972 Dolphins keep their champagne bottles on ice forever. The question was not if the Colts would win the Super Bowl, but would they not lose at all. Tony Dungy rested some of his key players and the Colts ended up losing in the regular season, but with home-field advantage and the Super Bowl indoors in the Motor City, the Colts championship run to be was built up more like a coronation than a contest. Jerome “The Bus” Bettis and the #6 seed Pittsburgh Steelers rolled into the RCA Dome and with Bill Cowher’s attacking defense led by Joey Porter and Troy Polamalu the new version of the Steel Curtain harassed #18 in blue and left with a win en route to their own almost divine Super Bowl win as Bettis rode off into the sunset in his hometown of Detroit.
After losing to Pittsburgh last year, Peyton entered the 2006 season with a chip on his shoulder but a sense of uncertainty surrounding him. Was he destined to be Dan Fouts, a great player numbers wise, but a guy who couldn’t lead his team to the Super Bowl? Would he be placed alongside top notch players like Dan Marino who had all the records and football immortality except the biggest thing of all a Super Bowl title? After all, Peyton had been in the league for 8 years and would never be set up for a better opportunity than he was before losing to the Steelers. Once again, the Colts raced out to a 10-0 mark this year becoming the only NFL franchise to have back-to-back 10-0 starts. Along the way to this impressive ledger, the Colts won at Gillette Stadium, twice at Giants Stadium including an opening night win over his physically talented, yet mentally deficient younger bro Eli. Add a win against a rather tough Mike Shanahan led Broncos squad in the Mile High City and the Colts had a quartet of impressive wins away from the friendly confines of Market Street and downtown Indianapolis. However, there was a feeling around football circles that this was all fine and dandy, but the Colts had won on the road in tough places like New England in the regular season before, but still couldn’t get it done in the playoffs. Then, the Colts defense fell apart in the absence of “The Eraser” Bob Sanders and gave up rushing yards like Jenna Jameson and her compatriots give up their body at a gang bang. The worst humiliation was in a blowout loss at Jacksonville where the Colts gave up 375 yards on the ground and made Fred Taylor and Maurice Jones-Drew look like Gale Sayers and Jim Brown. Indy limped into the playoffs losing 4 of their final 6 and slipped to a #3 seed in the playoffs and staring down the gauntlet of Larry Johnson and the Chiefs in a 1st round encounter.
The trendy upset pick by a lot of NFL pundits on Wild Card weekend was to pick the Chiefs, a flawed but capable team, to run all over the Colts and add to Peyton’s legacy of playoff disappointment. However, with Bob Sanders back and a renewed sense of urgency according to Tony Dungy, the Colts stifled LJ and despite Peyton throwing three picks the Colts survived on the strength of their running game and defense.
Surely, this was a one game aberration most thought. The Colts next had to go back to the city they had deserted in the dead of night some two and a half decades ago, with Jamal Lewis and the fiercest defense in the NFL ready to take Peyton’s head off. If Peyton thought there were problems in protection at home against Pittsburgh in the Divisional round last year, he undoubtedly would be pointing the finger again at Tarik Glenn, Ryan Diem, Jeff Saturday, and Co. after Terrell Suggs, Ray Lewis, Ed Reed and crew came raining down on him for 60 minutes. Once again though, Indy’s defense stepped up the plate, kept Jamal Lewis under wraps, and flustered Steve McNair into an early evening he will never forget. Adam V. kicked 5 FG’s and the Colts once again left Baltimore in the dead of night, this time with a birth in the AFC Championship game.
As our protaganist and his teammates watched the next afternoon to find out who their opponent would be, they must have been as torn as Natalie Umbruglia was a couple of year ago. Who would they rather play? A trip to sunny San Diego to get the final and toughest test to their newfound yet still wholly unproven run defense by matching up with Lorenzo Neal and the man that can find a hole better than a groundhog looking for its shadow, the best running back in the NFL (maybe ever) in LT. The alternative is to sleep in their own bed all week, stay home and play in the RCA Dome where they were 9-0 at that point, yet have to get past the ultimate playoff competitor in Gisele Bunchen’s beau Tom Brady and the playoff guru Bill Belichick. Thanks to a costly fumble by Chargers safety Marlon McCree folowing a rare Tom Brady pick and some more than questionable coaching by the playoff bufoon that is Marty Schottenheimer, the Patriots were headed to Indy.
Peyton woke up on Sunday morning before the AFC Championship and must have realized that he stood at the crossroads of his career and legacy as an NFL quarterback. He had the big bad Patriots and his own personal kryptonite in Tom Brady in his building for a chance at playing in the greatest event on the American sporting landscape. It must have felt like a bad nightmare for the Colts as the Patriots jumped out to a 21-3 lead the last of the points coming on Manning’s pass that was picked off by Ashanti Samuel and run back for six. This was the low for Manning’s career. The next 35 minutes of game action will go down as the most important no matter how many Super Bowl titles or record breaking accolades Peyton achieves from now on. He marched the Colts down before halftime for a critical FG to get some momentum. Then by using all of his weapons like “Debby Does” Dallas Clark, Ben Utecht, and Joe Addai, he led the Colts to 32 2nd half points including a career defining drive capped off by Addai’s TD run and after Marlin Jackson picked off Brady with under 20 seconds to go, the entire Colt nation led by their cult hero could breathe a sigh of relief.
After passing the biggest test of his career (i doubt his professors at Tennessee ever gave him anything too difficult as they wanted him helping the Vols in the film room rather than the library in Knoxville), it almost felt like a formality that the Colts would beat the Bears. Sure it was raining and no dome team had ever won a Super Bowl outdoors, but the Colts had overcome so much that bad weather and a 14-6 deficit were just mere road bumps for Tony Dungy’s crew. Peyton didn’t play his best as he dinked and dunked and feasted off what the Bears gave him in their relatively too lax (just ask Brian Urlacher) Cover 2. Maybe Peyton should have been the Super Bowl MVP, maybe not, but the only thing that matters is that Peyton Manning’s name is synonomous with the word champion right now. Maybe it’s unfair because a QB is largely dependent on the other 52 active players on his squad for his ultimate success, but I feel you need a Vince Lombardi trophy to validate a historic career. This is an unfiar standard but one that permeates the way we think about great athletes. Is Dan Marino, Charles Barkley, Karl Malone, Barry Bonds, and so many others not all time greats because they were only able to reach the championship series in their respective trades but never able to reach their sport’s pinnacle? Clearly no. However, these gentlemen will always have something missing from their careers. They are not only missing the trophy and recognition of being called a champion, but more important that special moment right after you know you are the best in your chosen sport and that feeling can never be taken away. They also will never know what it’s like to wake up the morning after you win that final game and know your legacy is complete.
This Super Bowl will be remembered for three things, and I’m not going to give Rex Grossman the credit of naming his debacle of a 4th quarter as one, becuase his legacy will be as a footnote in NFL lore as the failure that not only couldn’t help a superb Bears team win a championship, but in fact hindered them from doing so. The game will be looked back on for the rain, Tony Dungy being the 1st African-American head coach to win a Super Bowl as he beat his great friend and protege Lovie Smith, but most of all for Peyton. Paul, Peyton may not be a better QB than he was when he put his jockstrap firmly in place on Sunday, but he is a different QB. Whether a newfound confidence is able to lead him and the Colts to more championships is still unknown as so many factors come into play as shown by the resurgence of the Colts D this year. One thing is for sure. He is a different quarterback now. Peyton’s Place in history is secure.
