Doyel: Rooting for a storybook finish for Peyton Manning
The fairy tale doesn’t care who you are. The fairy tale sneers, says no, says: Watch this. The fairy tale puts Johnny Unitas in a sling, Joe Montana in a hospital, Brett Favre into a caricature of himself.
Manning, a son of New Orleans and a resident of Denver but a forever family member of Indianapolis, will try to win a Super Bowl on Sunday with the Broncos. And this is where I tell the fairy tale something:
Back off, fairy tale. Give Peyton what he deserves. Give it to us, too, and not just us in Indianapolis but us around the country. Peyton Manning is beloved nationally, a result of his excellence on the football field and his omnipresence on television commercials. We see him, we admire him, we like him, we root for him.
In appreciation of Peyton Manning
Here in Indianapolis, it goes deeper than that. We love Peyton Manning because he loves us, and if a sports writer isn’t supposed to write those words — we love Peyton Manning — then never mind the sports writer part. You’re not reading an employee of IndyStar. You’re reading a resident of Indianapolis, and this is what residents of Indianapolis do: We love Peyton Manning. You get what you deserve in life, and Peyton Manning deserves that from us.
And he deserves respect from the fairy tale. More respect than it gave Unitas, whose search for a happy ending took him to San Diego, where his career ended with a separated shoulder. It took Montana to Kansas City, where he suffered a concussion in his final game. It took Favre to New York and Minnesota and punch lines around the country.
But you know what? Even with the awful timing of an unfolding HGH investigation that has people picking sides — you can guess my side — I can see that fairy tale, that habitually heartless and cruel creature, nodding its head in concurrence.
Already we’ve seen Peyton Manning return from four neck surgeries that ended his tenure with the Colts to become an MVP in Denver. We’ve seen him endure a foot injury this season that sent him to the sideline and allowed for the rise of his eventual replacement in Denver, Brock Osweiler, and we’ve seen that eventual replacement be swallowed up by the moment late in the regular season. We’ve seen Peyton Manning coming off the bench, like this is a Disney movie or something, and leading the Broncos to victory in that regular-season game and then two more in the playoffs.
We’ve heard Peyton Manning utter the following words to New England coach Bill Belichick after eliminating the Patriots — the Patriots! — in the AFC title game: “Hey, listen, this might be my last rodeo. So it sure has been a pleasure.”
A microphone from NFL Films picked up their brief exchange after the AFC title game Jan. 24, and since then the Peyton Manning story — the fairy tale — has dominated the buildup to Super Bowl 50. Look at me here, more than 500 words into this story, and not yet have I written these two:
Carolina Panthers.
Or these two:
Cam Newton.
That’s the team, and he’s the quarterback, the Broncos will have to defeat Sunday in Santa Clara, Calif., and only one team has done it this season. The Panthers went 15-1, then beat the defending NFC champion Seahawks 31-24 in the Divisional Round and obliterated the Cardinals 49-15 in the NFC title game. The Panthers are the wicked witch of this story, the giant guarding the beanstalk Peyton Manning is trying to climb.
Get lost, giant. Peyton deserves this, and it’s not the football stuff, either. If it were the football stuff, or the commercial stuff — as if Peyton Manning deserves a Super Bowl send-off because he has all of us humming the Nationwide jingle — then this whole premise would be foolish. You don’t root for a player simply because he’s a great player or a funny pitchman. How superficial is that?
That’s not us here in Indianapolis, where tens of thousands of our adults drive within a mile every day of the Peyton Manning Children’s Hospital at St. Vincent off West 86th Street south of I-465, and where thousands of our children — and children around the region — have been treated inside that St. Vincent Health facility.
Doyel: Peyton Manning left a legacy of caring for kids
Peyton Manning doesn’t just put his name on that hospital. He steps into the huddle and orchestrates it. He knows what that place is doing because it does what he asks it to do. St. Vincent CEO Jonathan Nalli tells me that Manning gives him advice and direction, and that Manning gives something more to the families who spend time in his hospital. He calls rooms, unasked. He speaks to distraught mothers and fathers and assures them his hospital will do all it can for their child, and then he asks what more needs to be done. After listening, he asks to speak to their child and tries to comfort that terrified kid.
And we’re not supposed to root for Peyton Manning to win this game?
So many folks are, even folks outside Indiana. A presidential candidate he isn’t supporting, Donald Trump, knows Manning has donated money to Jeb Bush but says he’s rooting for Manning anyway "because he's a very, very good guy."
Fans of the team he eliminated in New England, proprietors of a Patriots sports bar in Springfield, Mass. John and Joe Sullivan, owners of Nathan Bill’s Bar, root for Manning because he immediately reached out to families of victims of a mass shooting at a U.S. Navy Reserve center in Chattanooga, Tenn. One of the U.S. Marines killed that day in July, Thomas Sullivan, was their brother. Peyton Manning called Gunnery Sgt. Sullivan’s family in July, helped raise money for his survivors, then last week heard the scholarship fund in his name wasn’t doing so well. So he donated $50,000.
"He didn't forget,” Joe Sullivan told Masslive.com. “He didn't just walk away.”
The best cornerback for the Panthers, Josh Norman, says he grew up a Colts fans because of Peyton Manning. Sorry, because of “P-freaking-M,” as Norman called him to reporters this week in Santa Clara. He also called him “the sheriff,” said he’s “the guy (I’ve) been idolizing” and concedes: “It's probably going to be his last game. I know he wants to go out with a bang. I'm rooting for him, but shoot, I want that ring."
Want what you want, Josh Norman, but the fairy tale is there for the writing, and you’re not holding the pencil. Only one man has wielded this particular pencil without needing the eraser. His name is John Elway. He won a Super Bowl, then retired, then went to the Hall of Fame. He is the only one of 20 Hall of Fame quarterbacks in the Super Bowl era to walk off as a winner from that glorious stage — and then onto another one in Canton, Ohio.
John Elway won it for the Broncos. He now runs the Broncos. Peyton Manning plays for the Broncos, plays with a surgically repaired neck and sore left foot and fading arm strength and even, he revealed this past week, a hip that will have to be replaced.
See? This can happen. This has happened. The story has been mostly written, and all we need is the finish. Give us what we want, fairy tale. Don’t tell us we’re asking for fiction.
Find IndyStar columnist Gregg Doyel on Twitter at@GreggDoyelStar or atwww.facebook.com/gregg.doyel.