From ESPN's The Herd [YOUTUBE]NSEzHp0Zub4[/YOUTUBE] "Because I'm not ready to retire." sums it up. No hard feelings toward the Colts or Irsay - it makes too much sense on too many levels - but they've made a mistake here, I think.
Tough spot for the Colts. I'm not sure they had any alternative. Have never been a big Peyton fan - also never rooted against him, just never gave a damn either way - but I hope to see him lead his next franchise to a Super Bowl. Would be such a great story.
Just a business decision that had to be made. Peyton shouldn't come back and play with the neck issues.
Agreed. PR move by Irsay, I'd say. If Manning leads a team to the playoffs and the Colts go nowhere, he's going to get a lot of heat.
yup. the colts suck. luck isn't going to step in and be manning 2.0 from the go. Hell he may never be that good. Anyway i'm not sure even with a healthy manning that that colts team would have made teh playoffs last year.
I think they would have. I don't think that team was substantially worse than the 2009 or 2010 team. Beyond Manning, that might have been one of the healthiest seasons they've had in a long time.
so the players just mailed it in when manning went down? i know manning can raise the quality of play, but they should have at least been similar to say miami.
They maybe didn't mail it in right away, but once Collins went down and they lost around six straight I'm sure a lot of the drive was gone. Manning made a tremendous difference. Not too long ago they made the playoffs with pretty much no running game and a TE from Kentucky as their leading receiver.
i wouldnt' say they were particurally competitive the first 6 games either. I'm not discounting the difference manning made, but i can't believe that this would have been say a 10 win team. it's not unusual for teams to have the same or similar players and go to crap. hell it happens all teh time.
I suppose. But they just had the longest streak of making the playoffs ever. Without losing anyone major I've got to think that continues.