INDIANAPOLIS — Well, you saw his face, right?
You saw how angry Peyton Manning looked last night, across most of the final 20 minutes of the Jets’ season-saving, 29-15 win over his Colts. You saw the sneer. Manning is a student of NFL history, and there may never have been another player ever born who would’ve wanted a piece of history the way he wanted it.
Manning knows that Tom Brady hasn’t ever gone 19-0, that Joe Montana never went 19-0, that Troy Aikman and Roger Staubach didn’t, that Terry Bradshaw and Johnny Unitas and Otto Graham didn’t. All of them won championships, but Manning has one of those, too.
Even the ’72 Dolphins can’t be credited to one quarterback; Bob Griese started and finished the year, but Earl Morrall held the fort in between when Griese broke his leg. There was a job opening for the first perfect quarterback in NFL history.
And now there still is.
“This was an organizational philosophy,” Manning said when the game was over and the perfect record soiled forever and the 23-game winning streak — longest regular-season streak in NFL history — was snapped. “We stuck with it.”
He didn’t betray any more disappointment than that with his words, any more anger, and you can understand that. If there is one player who can fire the shot on Fort Sumter that will tear a team asunder, it’s Manning. He wouldn’t do that. Certainly not over this.
“I’d be careful analyzing my facial expressions,” Manning said later on, when he was called on the way he looked after Colts coach Jim Caldwell pulled him for good with 5 ½ minutes still remaining in the third quarter yesterday and the Colts clinging to a 15-10 lead.
“I wouldn’t do that. I was not surprised. I knew potentially that was part of the plan.”
And then: “We’re on the same page.”
The crowd at Lucas Oil Stadium was incredulous at first, and furious later on, watching their team all but lay down their arms at the line of scrimmage. Each time Curtis Painter trotted back onto the field he was greeted by a wave of boos — and it got even louder after the Jets re-took the lead thanks to a Painter fumble. You could sense the fans begging for their quarterback.
Caldwell never blinked.
“No, sir,” he said. “Every guy, you ask them if they want to go the distance. It’s up to us to make the decisions, so we did. The main focus for us is just to make certain that we’re ready to go. The most important season is the one that’s coming up.”
And by the time Manning reached the postgame podium, he’d reached a similarly Zen place. It wasn’t only he who’d been given much of the second half off. Reggie Wayne joined him. So did Dallas Clark. But Manning makes the Colts go. Taking him out is like jamming a stick in a carburetor.
“We still had our chances,” Manning said. “But we’ll get past it. We have no choice.”