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It seems there was a little something called the Super Bowl this past Sunday, and it featured the Indianapolis Colts vs. the New Orleans Saints.Before this Super Bowl turned into a Who Dat getting crunked bacchanal on Bourbon Street, a lot of people thought the Colts would destroy the Saints because they had Peyton Manning. In fact, Peyton Manning elicited such glowing, giddy, and hyperbolic articles, that we actually thought he might levitate during the pregame ceremonies.
Then Peyton successfully impersonated Neil O'Donnell circa Super Bowl XXX. Surprised? You shouldn't be. If you look at his career in more detail, you'll see why we should have seen this coming.
Keep reading for a timeline of Peyton's epic FAIL.
In high school, Peyton lost 5 games! Everything on the Internet about Peyton during his high school days mentions how many touchdowns he threw (92) and how many yards he threw for (7,207). Yes, he went 34-5, but how many titles did he win? How many high school championships did Peyton Manning win? It's not possible to find the answer anywhere on the World Wide Web, which is remarkable in its own right. (Repeated calls to Isidore Newman High School went unanswered.)
We can answer how many titles Peyton won at Tennessee: zero. The closest he got was his sophomore season when Tennessee finished third in the nation. He even lost to Florida three years in a row. He ended his career against Nebraska in the Orange Bowl. Typical of Manning in big games, Tennessee lost 42-17.
He was drafted first in the NFL draft by the Indianapolis Colts in 1998 and again his teams won. He kept getting his team close, but not quite there (sound familiar?). People started to notice, but then came Super Bowl XLI. The Colts finally won and his place in history was secure. Peyton even clinched the Super Bowl MVP trophy with a staggering QB rating of 81.8. He was provided a gimme game by the football Gods and barely clinched a victory (witness the Bears leading 14-6 after one quarter).
Now, after this Super Bowl XLIV debacle, people are pointing fingers at everyone but him.
We get it -- he's a good ol' boy with an uncanny knack for making 3,000 adjustments at the line of scrimmage and leading his offense by himself. But those playoff losses on his résumé are starting to pile up. Peyton has no one to blame but himself for this Super Bowl loss, and all the earlier losses throughout the years.
Face it, he's just not a winner.
Spencer Lund is an Asylum contributor who thinks Peyton Manning is great, even though he doesn't win.
