Lowell Cohn: Peyton Manning guts out a perfect Super Bowl finish

SANTA CLARA

Peyton Manning had been consistent all week, consistent when reporters bombarded him with Cam Newton questions. As if Newton were a Ferrari and Manning a used Buick with fins.

Manning didn’t take offense. But he didn’t grant the premise that Newton was state of the art and he, Manning, was yesterday’s news. He kept saying the matchup was between two great teams, the Broncos and Panthers. Not between the quarterbacks. And he stressed Newton is at the beginning of his career. The submerged message was something like, “Let’s see what happens Sunday. Let’s see what Newton has. Let’s see what he has against our defense.”

When you get down to it, Newton had nothing. Oh, that’s harsh. He had very little. He led the Panthers, who had seemed unstoppable, to one offensive touchdown. He got stripped twice near his own goal line leading to two Denver touchdowns. The difference in the game. Newton lost the game.

Not to say Manning won the game. His defense did. But he won the game anyway. Won his second Super Bowl. This game meant everything to his legacy. By winning, he made his record 2-2 in Super Bowls. If he’d lost, he would have been a Super Bowl loser, and he would have had a losing record in postseason games and he would have been a great regular-season competitor with a shadow over his career.

But he won and he beat Newton, the league MVP, the anointed one. Manning won on an upset late in his glorious career, after his talent had fled. There is something wonderful in that.

He looked fragile the entire game as if the Panthers defense could run him down and hurt him. Really hurt him. Young men roughing up an old man. But that did not happen. He hung tough. He refused to give in. he played on with dignity and honor and grace.

He did some things well. Started the game off with a nice drive that confused Carolina and he led the Broncos to a field goal. Nothing great. But something. Landed the first blow. Drew first blood. Made a statement. You assumed Carolina would roar back and negate the statement. Not so.

And leading off the second half - after the self-destructive Panthers missed a field goal - Manning led the Broncos to another field goal and put them up by nine points and that was the game right there.

So, yes, Manning did some things well. And he did some things not so well. He could not put away the game in the fourth quarter. This is important to acknowledge. If his story were a movie, he would have rallied the Broncos for one astonishing bruising fourth-quarter drive and he would put an exclamation point on this season and on his career.

But this was not a movie and he did not put down an exclamation point. It was more of a semicolon. In the first drive of the fourth quarter, he fumbled and lost the ball to Carolina and looked aged. Carolina scored a field goal and cut the Denver lead to six and the game was on. Might have been on.

Denver got the ball and went three and out. In his diminished capacity, Manning took about a minute off the clock. Did everything to keep Carolina in the game.

In his next series, Manning went three and out again, never passed the ball. It’s like the coaches didn’t trust him to pass. You get the picture. He wasn’t the team leader. He was an adjunct. But he won, anyway.

Afterward, he came to the interview area. Never had he seemed so humbled. He actually stuttered. The words were hard for him. Maybe because he had won and the emotion stopped his tongue. Maybe because he had run into his limitations and that took away his speech.

“I talked to the team last night,” he said, “and thanked them for letting me be a part of the journey. It truly was a team effort.”

Meaning he had become a passenger. No longer the driver.

“I certainly knew with this defense,” he said, “this team would have a chance. I told the guys I had great thoughts about what was going to happen. I was just glad I was on the same team as our defense and I didn’t have to play against them.”

Did he watch Newton?

“I was keeping up with the game. I was watching our defense, obviously. I was watching the score. I was watching field position. He’s had an unbelievable season. He’s got a heck of a future ahead of him, but like I said, our defense was awesome tonight.”

Again the major themes: 1) The game wasn’t about Manning and Newton. 2) Newton has a lot to prove.

I asked if he was pleased how he played. More stuttering. “I knew it was going to be tough. The first drive was important. It really was. This team (Carolina) has had the lead in a big way in the last two playoff games. And for us to come down in the first drive and get a couple of first downs and get in the red zone and just to get a field goal. And to have a good drive at the beginning of the second half was significant as well. They had a little momentum at the end of the first half and I think we answered that. We were facing our toughest challenge, this Panthers defense, without a doubt. I thought we did our part.”

He is a man who does his part. That’s who he has become. We salute him for understanding that. And for his humility and his hard-earned, late-life wisdom. He needs to retire now. He has struck the right note and the righteous note. Anything else would be wrong.

For more on the world of sports in general and the Bay Area in particular, go to the Cohn Zohn at cohn.blogs.pressdemocrat.com. You can reach Staff Columnist Lowell Cohn at lowell.cohn@pressdemocrat.com.