5 Impressive Things About Peyton Manning's Career
CENTENNIAL, Colo. (CBS4) - With Peyton Manning's football career now in the rear-view mirror, former Bronco Mark Schlereth was like many sports analysts on Monday who couldn't say enough about the quarterback's impact on the game.
Schlereth joined CBS4 on Xfinity Monday Live and shared his impressions about Manning's amazing 18-year NFL career. The following are five things he said on the show about No. 18.
1. Quarterbacks Will Never Be The Same
"He essentially changed the way we that rank the quarterback position with the skill and the preparation and the intelligence that he brought to the game every Sunday. ... He's one of the greatest not just quarterbacks but one of the greatest football players that has ever played in the National Football League."
2. 15 Playoff Appearances
"He had an 18 year career. He missed the 2011 season because of the neck injury and the surgeries. So that makes a 17 career where he played. He went to the playoffs 15 times as a starting quarterback. He didn't make it in his rookie year and he didn't make it in 2001. Other than that, he went to the playoffs every year. It's an incredible accomplishment: to drive your team and to be the leader of the football team like he was and to have the kind of football acumen that he had, to be able to have the presence to drive that team to the playoffs 15 of 17 years is remarkable."
3. Decision To Play In Denver Provides Major Dividends
"When he chose Denver, then there was a landslide, a cavalcade, of free agents that wanted to come here to possibly win a championship. ... Once we signed Peyton Manning free agents were lined up at the door."
4. Manning's Record Of 55 Touchdown Passes In A Season (2013)
"I don't know if this will be broken anytime soon. The way the league has gone now, everything is predicated on throwing the football, and it keeps getting pushed further and further into that realm, but let's face it: the quarterbacks coming out of the college game are not prepared to play at this level, the offensive lineman coming out of the college game -- because of the spread offense -- are not prepared to play at this level. Some of the receivers don't run the precise routes because of the college game. So I think it's going to be a tall task to hit that 55+ touchdown mark. But eventually if the rules get to the point where you can't actually touch people (where you legislate contact out of a contact game) then somebody will eventually break it."
5. Handing The Ball To Demaryius Thomas In Playoffs
"The one thing that resonates with me Peyton Manning during his course here as a Denver Bronco was this: To have the final season that he had -- to actually be pulled from a game with 4 interceptions against Kansas City, to struggle with the injury, to come back, to actually agree to be the backup to Brock Osweiler in Week 17 -- and then you're sitting there in a divisional playoff game against the Pittsburgh Steelers and you take the kneeldown, you win that game 23-16, and you have the wherewithal to take that kneeldown and then go hand the ball to Demaryius Thomas whose mother had just been released from prison who's seeing him play (in person for the first time) and say "This is a game ball for your mom"? To be thinking about that (is incredible) because you're so myopic in your focus as a player to get your job done and (focus on) the task at hand. To be able to think about your teammates in that situation? I guarantee you I don't have that wherewithal. I don't have that in me. I was so singularly focused on what I had to do that I wouldn't have been thinking beyond that and that just goes to show you the kind of teammate Peyton Manning is and he doesn't get enough credit for those things."
