Mark Kiszla - No Plan B: Most Valuable Peyton—Mannings Comeback with the Denver Broncos

No Plan B

Mark Kiszla

TAYLOR TRADE PUBLISHING

Lanham Boulder New York London

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Available

ISBN 978-1-63076-036-6 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN 978-1-63076-080-9 (electronic)

TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

Printed in the United States of America

Who was the clown who thought throwing a pie in the face of a muscular 330-pound man would be a smart idea?

Peyton Manning.

Only the mind of Manning could hatch such a goofball prank, punk an unsuspecting Denver Broncos teammate on live television and live to laugh about it.

His touchdown passes will someday earn Manning a place in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. But a pie in the face might paint a more revealing portrait of Manning, a pain-in-the-butt perfectionist who is also Americas best-loved quarterback.

Im joined by right tackle Orlando Franklin, in the house, Root Sports sideline reporter Jenny Cavnar informed her TV audience, as she stood alongside the 25-year-old Broncos offensive lineman in the owners suite at Coors Field during the middle of the fourth inning of a scoreless game between the Colorado Rockies and the New York Yankees. Im told this is your first baseball game. What do you think so far?

I think, Franklin excitedly said, its definitely a great experience.

Well, this was destined to be a rainy evening that Franklin will never be able to forget. More than 30 teammates, rounded up by Manning for a guys night out at the ballpark, stood behind Franklin on the club level, where buttoned-down bankers and beautiful people alike hang out.

Cavnar asked: I heard that Peyton Manning got you all together for a little field trip. Is he as bossy on the bus as he is on the field?

With reverent praise for his veteran quarterback, Franklin earnestly replied: Not at all....

Then, in an instant, the joke was on Franklin. All over him, in fact. Whipped cream was everywhere, splattered on Franklins big, startled mug.

A mysterious, mischievous left hand had reached around from behind Franklin, and in the grand baseball tradition of interrupting a TV interview with pure slapstick, Denver receiver Eric Decker slammed home a pie to the offensive linemans face.

Direct hit. Welcome to the major leagues, kid.

That was my first baseball game, said Franklin later, chuckling. Bad experience. Definitely a bad experience.

It was a beautiful trick play. It was designed by Manning, instigated by Manning, masterminded in every detail by Manning. But, like any savvy leader in need of plausible deniability, Manning persuaded somebody else to do the dirty deed. And it was a secret so perfectly executed Manning confidently let teammates shoot video of the whole stunt on cell phones as Decker ambushed Franklin.

Before the interview, Peyton Manning was right there in the room talking to the crew, directing, orchestrating, doing what he does best: setting it all up. I mean, the guy could be a producer on television when hes done with his football career, I guarantee it, Cavnar told me the morning after Franklin caught the cream pie in his eye, up his nose, and on his chin.

Manning practically drew up the whole scene on his hand. He was telling me where to stand next to Orlando, and he was telling Decker where to come in the shot and telling our cameraman, Ooh, dont forget to get the baseball field in the background, because that would look nice!

Steven Spielberg has nothing on Manning. Whenever or wherever Manning shouts Places everybody! people not only listen, they jump.

Franklin never saw it coming. But, in the instant his ego was buried in whipped cream, Franklin knew exactly where it came from and who gave the order to punk him.

It had to be Manning. Peyton Freaking Manning. Hes pretty much got everybody on the offense, said Franklin, noting his quarterbacks proclivity for practical jokes. It was bound to happen sooner or later.

So here is a book about football that begins with a food fight at a baseball game, with grown millionaires giggling like grade-schoolers as they pulled off a practical joke that bonded the team with laughter. Why try to describe how Manning has changed the culture of the Broncos through the anecdote of a field trip to a ballpark that was organized from the tickets to the hot dogs by a veteran quarterback?

Heres why: During 30 years of covering sports for the Denver Post, on assignments from Beijing, China, to Chadron, Nebraska, whether the event I chronicled was a state championship won by the Columbine High School football team in the same calendar year as a deadly massacre at the school, or a bitter defeat as numbing as the overtime loss to the Baltimore Ravens that brought Mannings first season with the Broncos to an abruptly unexpected end, it seems to me the bigger truths are most often found in a small frame.

A pie in the face is what makes Manning one of the greatest quarterbacks who ever lived.

Although the beauty of the scoreboard is how unflinchingly it tells the story, what fascinates me about sports is all the ambiguity between the numbers. While advanced metrics offer new insights into the intricate machinations of the game, what has always interested me more is the raw look in the eye of a quarterback after he gets sacked and knocked hard to the ground.

John Elway retired as an NFL champion, a Broncos hero riding off into an orange sunset. Then Elway began to lose much of what he lovedhis marriage, his twin sister, his fatheruntil the old quarterback needed to find a new passion in rebuilding the franchise that had slowly fallen into disrepair after he left it as a player.

While Tim Tebow became a polarizing cult hero during his brief but loudly sensational stint with the Broncos because he was Gods quarterback, Manning presented a far more compelling protagonist in the love story between Denver and its NFL team, because Manning demanded to be drawn in shades of gray. While filling what is undoubtedly the most high-profile, most scrutinized job in Colorado, Manning privately dealt with his own ego-rattling blow of being cast out by the Indianapolis Colts. He had to quiet his own doubts that lingered from a serious neck injury and looked every day for signs to restore faith that he could again throw a football with the Pro Bowl effectiveness everybody in Denver expected.

Has there ever been a more beautiful mind in pro football? I wanted to take a peek inside the obsessive curiosity, the cornball humor, and the quirky insecurities that make Manning tick. Telling the story of a teams season has been done, and done deftly, by authors whose work I admire, from John Feinstein in A Season on the Brink