{"id":129909,"date":"2012-02-20T15:10:46","date_gmt":"2012-02-20T20:10:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.prosebeforehos.com\/?p=129909"},"modified":"2012-12-26T21:56:10","modified_gmt":"2012-12-27T02:56:10","slug":"entering-the-mind-of-peyton-manning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.prosebeforehos.com\/sports-editor\/02\/20\/entering-the-mind-of-peyton-manning\/","title":{"rendered":"Entering The Mind Of Peyton Manning"},"content":{"rendered":"

Imagine you woke up this morning as Peyton Manning: your neck is killing you and you can\u2019t feel your triceps. Four surgeries in nineteen months. Nothing has changed. <\/p>\n

You split open the curtains. The news vans are already parked out front. It was fun while it lasted. The anonymity of it all. The quiet morning reps with Todd Helton. The incognito rehab. Then that Dukie kid tweeted about stretching next to you and ruined everything.<\/p>\n

You can\u2019t watch SportsCenter anymore. Your last name its own category on the ticker. You are the soup du jour for starving sports writers in the most desolate of sports months. <\/p>\n

This is what your muse Favre must have felt like. Except his boss didn\u2019t send drunken tweets about him at 4 in the morning. Some nights you\u2019re family and on others you\u2019re a calculating politician. But every night you\u2019re the subject of a bi-polar billionaire\u2019s warped ramblings for all of the world to see.<\/p>\n

\"Jim<\/p>\n

Your company is in shambles. Your mentors have been fired wholesale. Senior management already anointed your successor: a scruffy, cerebral twenty-two year old kid from Stanford who\u2019s the most breathlessly ballyhooed college quarterback since, well, you. <\/p>\n

On the bright side, your baby bro slayed your arch-rival in the House That You Built. You\u2019re proud of him, of course, but inside it grates at you. That the Saints pick-six denied you your own second ring. And that The Onion published those snarky headlines<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Then there\u2019s the arm again\u2026 it\u2019s worse than people think. You can\u2019t get the giddy-up on the deep ball like before. You can\u2019t throw left. You can\u2019t throw across your body. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The receivers don\u2019t say it. They sprint their routes, ply you with “attaboys,” but you can tell. Their fingers aren\u2019t swollen over after your fusillades anymore. The deep ball doesn\u2019t whistle like it used to. <\/p>\n

You shake it off. Pull your visor down low and hit the weight room. Hope that tomorrow will be a better day. Like you have every yesterday since December.<\/p>\n

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * <\/center><\/p>\n

Peyton Manning woke up this morning as a victim. <\/p>\n

Tossing and turning about fitful what-ifs: what if the league let him work with trainers during the lock-out? What if the neck is never right again? What if Andrew Luck went pro last year? <\/p>\n

Peyton Manning is, for the first time, America\u2019s sweetheart. But the truth is that it took America a while to warm up to him. Manning spent the first half of his career as the self-entitled villain, always on the wrong side of the game\u2019s purest rags-to-riches parable. We savored the schadenfreude. We looked forward to the lip-biting Manning Face each and every January. <\/p>\n

\"Manning<\/p>\n

Peyton Manning was groomed for football royalty: the son of a Pro Bowl quarterback, a collegiate national champion and the first overall pick in the 2008 NFL Draft. He was the heir apparent. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Yet, there he was: the brooding prince. Sulking on the sidelines in the snow banks of Foxborough. Bested once again by his nemesis Tom Brady.<\/p>\n

\"Manning<\/p>\n

Brady shouldn\u2019t have been there. Ringed by police officers and doused in confetti, he was the anti-Manning. Drafted in the sixth round. He barely eked out Tim Rattay. He rode the bench, Bledsoe got hurt, and Brady was ready. <\/p>\n

Where Manning released herky-jerky pre-snap audibles, Brady remained cool and composed. He kept to himself while Peyton Manning never met a commercial he didn\u2019t like. DirecTV, MasterCard, Gatorade, Oreos, you get the picture. The ads were funny, yes, but there were too many of them. The Patriots linemen chanted his \u201ccut that meat\u201d commercial catchphrase right back at him.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t until January 2007 that Manning finally vanquished Brady and won back America. He roared back from a 21-3 AFC Championship deficit and stunned the Patriots on their own turf. Manning conquered his demons before silencing Brian Urlacher and the Dan Marino whispers in the Super Bowl. <\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the Golden Boy lost some of his luster. SpyGate happened. And slowly but surely, Brady went Hollywood. He married Gisele. He grew out the Justin Bieber haircut. He showed up in glossy girly magazines in Uggs. He lost to Peyton\u2019s younger brother. Twice. <\/p>\n

\"Manning<\/p>\n

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * <\/center><\/p>\n

You could retire. You\u2019re one wrenching Ray Lewis hit away from paralysis. America would understand. Go home, play with the twins. Write that book divulging your QB secrets you\u2019ve always kicked around. Or pick up the acting classes again. You can be a funny guy:<\/p>\n