Sorry it's late, I finally found the ESPN I was talking about. This was the issue that came out last week, prior to the Super Bowl™.
Can one win save Peyton Manning's rep? It shouldn't have to.
The "choker" saved the Colts' season, and maybe his legacy, with a late drive and 32 second-half points against a defense that hadn't given up that many in a game all season. Afterward, he described the tension as fun. The "winner," meanwhile, had a chance to counter with just less than a minute remaining and two timeouts but threw the interception that ended New England's season. One bad break - the Colts' not recovering a fumble in the end zone, a failed two-point conversion - and Peyton Manning would still be stuck with the haunting "can't win the big one" tag that unfairly suggests mental frailty or, worse, cowardice.
Succeed early, though, and exceed expectations, and we'll crown you with such permanence that not even evidence to the contrary will sway us from our position. Tom Brady will always be a poised winner, even though he has thrown crippling interceptions in three of his past four season-on-the-line playoff games (Troy Brown's forced fumble bailed him out of one). Dwayne Wade will forever be clutch, even though he has missed nearly a half-dozen game-winners already this season. And it hardly matters that Derek Jeter hasn't won anything in a good long while, and made a crushing error the last time the Yankees were closest.
Your eyes play tricks on you once you've already made up your mind about whether an athlete is a winner or a choker. Manning has won big games before; any playoff game is a big one. And Manning's postseason résumé includes a 458-yard game and a five touchdown game. But who remembers that? He was, until recently, in the unwinnable position of having those games count as big only if he lost.
This, because he had the misfortune of falling short in his first three, while Brady got a tuck-rule reprieve in his first playoff game before riding the Patriots to a Super Bowl win while throwing all of one postseason touchdown pass. One. That's a passenger, not a driver. But surprise us, as Brady did, and we'll knight you anyway. It’s the beauty of low expectations, and it's why Sean Payton and Eric Mangini have been anointed as smarter than everyone else. It's easier than admitting we were wrong about them or their teams.
Manning was 22-for-38 for 290 yards with 1 TD and no interceptions against the champion Steelers last season in the AFC divisional game. Not overwhelming, but certainly not awful. No QB was better against the champs that postseason, and that's just the kind of stat line that got Brady noticed. Entering these playoffs, the two QBs' postseason numbers were virtually identical. Only our creative math found a difference. Besides, there are 52 other players on the roster. How many people would argue that champion Franco Harris was better than Barry Sanders?
Luck has a lot to do with it, even though we tend to call it "know-how" or "leadership" or "clutch." We assign ability to chance. We aren't comfortable with "I don't know why that happened," so we find answers in intangibles like "heart." Really, though, the most valuable intangible in sports is luck. It was the difference between Bill Buckner and Mookie Wilson, between Bill Parcels and Marv Levy, and maybe between Manning's erasing his bad rep now instead of earlier. This postseason, Pats WR Reche Caldwell dropped crucial passes. Last postseason, Colts corner Nick Harper might have returned Jerome Bettis' fumble for a game-winning score if he hadn't been stabbed, allegedly by his wife, the day before. That's a long shot, but it's what luck is all about.
You earn a lifetime of benefit of the doubt once you've won. It's how Parcells can punctuate his career by going eight years without a single playoff victory yet go out a winner. Doesn't matter that Brady had Adam Vinatieri to finish game after game for him, while Manning had one ended by Mike Vanderjagt. Both QBs set up field goal drives. The rest was out of their hands.
Admit it. You were calling Manning a choker when he was down 21-3. You had no problem climbing into his helmet and deducing he was scared, frail. Well, he didn't get unscared at halftime. He didn’t change or grow. You were just wrong.
But God help him if the reverse played out. If the Patriots had rallied from 21-3, if Brady had led a final drive and Manning had thrown an interception to end the season. One more victory, Peyton. That’s all it takes. One more victory, and you silence the haunting forever.
I think the author makes an excellent point. Manning has been spectacular in his career. People point to the fact that he seemed to crumble in some big games like the Steelers game last year or the national championship game in college. But every quarterback has had bad days, even Tom Brady. But no one calls Tom Brady a choker. It's because of expectations, like the author says. Manning is a proven winner. The Colts have been a juggernaut ever since he came into the league. But he also played at a very high level in college and was drafted high.
Brady on the other hand was a former backup that came out from the shadow of Drew Bledsoe and went on to a championship. The same thing would have happened with Tony Romo if Dallas somehow went to and won a Super Bowl, even if Tony Romo was merely above average the rest of his career.
In any case, I don't think you can legitimately say Peyton Manning isn’t as good as people make him out to be. I mean he hold how many NFL records for quarterbacks now? And he’s got that ring now, too.
Oh yeah, an ESPN would probably rest a little easier if I told you to buy an Ölevia HDTV, sponsored by ESPNHD and available at Circuit City. Aparently this TV is the "official unofficial HDTV of sports fans everhwhere.™"
