This isn’t the first time I got over a Peyton Manning
playoff loss within a day. This happened once before, back in January 2008.
That was a time before I had DVR, and I came back home from a Regional
Orchestra Concert to check my computer and see that the Chargers had upset the
Colts 28-24. I was stunned, left to live with another January failure for
Peyton. I didn’t even care enough to read about how he lost; good thing, since
I didn’t have to worry about the gory details (picks that were screen passes
batted up in the air, drops on 3rd and 4th down on the
final drive, top-ranked defense blows lead twice and gives up TD to Billy
Volek). Then, within a day I got over it.
The 2007 Colts were the 2nd best team in the AFC
by any measure, and getting one-and-done’d by San Diego was most certainly a
disappointment. Still, while they were quite clearly the 2nd best
team, they were equally clearly not the 1st best. They wouldn’t have
come close to the 2007 Patriots in Foxboro without Dwight Freeney and with
Robert Mathis nursing his own injury. That team would probably have put up less
of a challenge than the frisky Chargers did. It added up to another
one-and-done, but it at least spared myself the ignominy of Peyton losing to
Brady.
This year was different. I entered the weekend hoping the
Ravens could knock off New England, and while they didn’t in their own crushing
way, they exposed some flaws that I thought the Broncos could expose. Then I
saw Peyton play, I saw him struggle to move, misfiring throws because he couldn’t
step in to them. I was sure he was hurt, that something was wrong. That team,
even if they eeked out a 17-14 win (you know, if that #4 ranked defense decided
to show up), would have lost to New England. Word came out a day later that
Manning’s thigh injury was worse than initially reported or thought, that he
was really struggling all over the place since the San Diego game. Coupled with
Manning’s diminished arm strength post-neck surgery, and the fact that he
relies on his legs to generate power, it made sense that he was spotty. I was
relieved to not have to deal with Broncos – Patriots (and, honestly, I can’t
even talk myself enough into the Colts winning to care), but also saddened by
the thought that seeing an injured Manning was my last sight of him.
Given the dramatic events that have transpired over the past
40 hours since the game ended, including the injury reports, to the millions of
columns and tweets written his way calling for him to step aside (which I’m
sure will burn him even more), to the firing of Fox and the uncertainty in the
coaching staff, I was like a pendulum swinging between the idea that he was
gone to he is coming back. I’ve know stuck on the ‘Manning is coming back for
2015’ side of the dial, but the fleeting moments where I thought he might have
played his last game really got me thinking about my relationship with sports.
You always hear the phrase that you root for laundry, that
the team is, and should, be more important than the players. That is a noble
and serene frame of mind, held up rightfully as how to go about sports fandom,
but it is a lie. It is a lie at least for someone my age. I’ve come to the point
in my Sports fan life that I am seeing a full cycle of great athletes, but more
importantly, a full cycle of favorite athletes, come and go. It started with
Roy Oswalt, then it became Marty Brodeur leaving New Jersey, now it could be
Peyton Manning. Rafael Nadal has seemingly been one bad slip away from the same
roster for a few years now. I don’t remember watching football without Peyton
Manning in the league, or watching the Devils without Marty. If I really am a
sports fan, if I really will root for laundry, I can move on. As weird as it
sounds coming from someone who has written primarily a sports blog for five –plus
years now, maybe I am not.
When Peyton Manning left for Denver, I decided that while I
will still follow and care for the Colts, my main goal as a fan will be rooting
Peyton on to a 2nd Super Bowl, the one thing he deserves. I told
myself that Peyton will play 3-5 years, after which I get prime-Luck for 10+
years. Now that I may be facing that scenario within a month, I’ve realized
that I’m not ready for that world. I’m not ready for Peyton Manning to not line
up on Sunday’s. I’m not ready for having a Manning-Brady debate that uses retrospective,
instead of perspective and prospective. I’m not ready to root fully for Andrew
Luck. I’m not ready to move on.
No athlete is as meaningful for me as Peyton Manning, mainly
because no one combined so many interesting qualities. Manning was a
perfectionist, a savant, a genius, but also deeply troubled in terms of his
team’s inability to win in the playoffs. He was lauded and stoned by the media,
by fans, by critics and appraisers. I always loved and will love him; I will
put him up as the best QB in the history of football, and in my heart I know
that is true, but I’ve never wanted other people to accept that fact more with
any other athlete. Peyton was the life-force that drove my involvement. I do love
football beyond Peyton. Certainly, if I have to rewatch a game, there are many
I’ll choose ahead of games he was involved with; but Peyton drove me to know,
watch, love and live the game. He may not be gone yet, but he will be within 24
months, I’m sure of it. Am I ready for that brave new world?
I was in hockey. I still love the game, if not the Devils
less. I was ready in baseball, as I still love the game, and still love the
Astros, that weird concoction of a Master Plan set to work by 2018. I don’t
know if I’m ready for football. I’ve spent so much time and effort defending
Peyton Manning, gathering evidence and counter-evidence, I feel like a lawyer
who spent years working on one major case, or a writer doing the same for a
book.
I knew this day would come with Peyton Manning, and I know
it will for all athletes, but it actually happening is one of those interesting
fork-in-the-road moments for a sports fan. Coming to face-to-face with your
favorites star’s career mortality makes you investigate your own fanhood’s as
well. I’ve already past the first test with no issue: having and starting to
root for players who are my own age, if not younger. I can do that without any
problem. But can I replace the first wave of favorites, of stars, of idols? Can
I do that and continue to love this game, or any game?
He may return. He probably will return. He may return and,
with a new aggressive coach, and some new pieces, and a full healthy thigh and
a knock-on-wood healthy year ahead, go 14-2 and ride off into the sunset with
that 2nd trophy. That could happen, but even then I’ll have to face
this problem, I’ll have to move forward knowing that the most important piece
of my life as a sports fan, the man that has lorded over my fandom and that
league with equal importance for 15 years, is no longer there.
I once envied that day. Assuming he could win another ring,
I couldn’t wait for both Peyton Manning and Tom Brady to retire. Then I could
enjoy games against major rivals, I could stand to listen to sports talk radio
toss up silly ‘who’s the best QB?’ questions. I can go back to doing what a
sports fan should do: watch the game without alternating between gnawing off
every fingernail in anxiety and gnashing your teeth to every inane argument.
That day seemed so bright, but faced with the reality (or half reality,
assuming Brady stays longer), it loom’s like a dark cloud.
This isn’t only about Peyton Manning. As stated, I faced a
similar reality with Marty Brodeur, and I don’t know if I’ll ever care about
hockey as much. It happened with Oswalt, the first of my sports heroes to exit
the limelight; he was an even more tortured soul, someone who never got even 1%
as many glowing career obituaries that Marty did and Peyton will. I’ll face it
with Rafael Nadal, who will likely be forced into retirement. I root for
laundry, sure, but I also openly, unabashedly, root for people. I got invested
in Peyton Manning more than I got invested in the Colts. I got invested in Roy
Oswalt more than the Astros. I got invested in them as people, to get the
recognition they deserve, the get the success and joy they deserve even more.
Through that, I lost some touch with the laundry, and with my own joy that I
deserve as a fan.
I’ve cited a concept introduced to me by a Colts blogger
(and somewhat e-friend through the years on various sites) Nate Dunlevy, that a
team should be judged by how many ‘Happy Sunday’s’ they give you, not if they
ultimately win a title. This was in backlash to the Manning era, on his release,
that they only went to 2 Super Bowls, and only won one. He said that we didn’t
appreciate the Manning era, as year after year, the Manning-led Colts gave us
12 Happy Sunday’s out of 16. It was a great point, and so true with those
teams. They went 12-4 or better for seven straight years. They also lost a
playoff game in all but one of those seasons. Did that make them failures? Even
if the answer is yes, the better question is should that make them failures?
And that answer is most certainly no.
Peyton Manning gave me more happy Sunday’s than any athlete
ever will. Even this year he gave me a bunch, including him beating a TD record
few thought he could three years ago when he was throwing so badly Todd Helton
was embarrassed. The Colts gave me a bunch, and now the Broncos did as well. I
have to embody that spirit of the ‘Happy Sunday’ as I move forward into the
inevitable Manning-less NFL. Remember those days, bank those memories. Not the
memories of promising seasons lost, but how those promising seasons were
created in the first place – the games, and joys, laughs, cries, and heartburn
that combined to make them something special.
The goal for a sports fan is to root for laundry, and I’ll
have to do that to keep going. Everyone’s career will be shorter than your life
as a fan. Laundry is the only thing that won’t. But I won’t feel bad for not
doing so in the past, or continuing to attach myself to great athletes that
intersect with teams I am passionate about. That is going against what gave me
so many Happy Sundays in the first place. Sports life without Peyton Manning
will be a hard place, but it will still be sports, it will still be there. To
capture my future as a sports fan, I do have to enjoy the past more. Those
memories are banked, from Manning, to Brodeur, to Oswalt, to Nadal, to even
Duncan and Zidane and Ed Reed. I have to appreciate all that they gave me, but
also all I learned from them about the games they mastered. Their lasting gift
to their fans were the memories, but also the knowledge and excitement they
gave us for the games they played, gifts that will carry on long after they’re
gone.
