Sad, disappointed and uncertain. Colts fans feel all of those.
They may also feel older.
For a few hours on cold-weather Sundays in Indiana, we lived in a time warp, where 2010 seemed no different than 1998. Life changed all around us, but, hey, Peyton Manning was still behind center for the Indianapolis Colts. Every week. He started 227 consecutive games. Hoosiers could confidently go to their closet, pull out that No. 18 replica jersey, throw it on, and look just as fanatically relevant as the year before, aside from the fading colors and tighter fit. Sunday after Sunday, “we” expected to win.
Manning was a model of consistency, changing plays before the snap, repositioning his teammates, and spiraling the football to his favorite receivers. Their names changed over 13 seasons — from Marcus Pollard and Marvin Harrison in the early days, to the current corps of Reggie Wayne and Dallas Clark. Manning remained.
Yet, as reliable as he’s been, time inevitably passes even more proficiently. The neck injury that threatens to sideline Manning for all of this season — and perhaps shorten his amazing career — makes that reality clear. Bouncing back from physical ailments is rougher for a 35-year-old than a 25-year-old.
Peyton Manning is indeed 35 and quite human. He’s had three neck surgeries since March 2010, including two this year. The most recent procedure, earlier this month, successfully fused his damaged cervical vertebrae. Still, he won’t play today when Cleveland comes to Lucas Oil Stadium in Indy. He won’t play next week or the week after. He may sit out till January to heal and recover. Meanwhile, we’ll turn on the TV or trek to Indy and see the oddity of a No. 5 — newly hired veteran Kerry Collins — playing quarterback.
This clearly isn’t 1999 or 2007 or 2010. Peyton is older. Accepting that means acknowledging the same for us. Sweet sixteen’s turned 31, as Bob Seger once sang.
It’s sobering, but hardly catastrophic.
“Aging isn’t for sissies,” Jay Olshansky, an authority on the topic, said last week. “That’s kind of a general rule I’ve developed in the field.”
Olshansky has studied mortality and aging since 1984, and serves as a professor in the University of Illinois-Chicago School of Public Health and a research associate at the University of Chicago Center on Aging. Like all of us, he lives with it, too. He’s 57 and recently had to alter a running regimen he’s practiced since his 20s because of a lower back ailment, spinal stenosis. (Ironically, Manning’s older brother, Cooper, ended his football career while still in college because of stenosis.)
The prognosis for Manning contains hints of optimism. Such surgeries have successfully allowed other NFL athletes to continue playing, and Manning could suit up until he’s 40 or older. With such glass-half-full hope, Colts vice chairman Bill Polian decided last week to leave his star on the active roster, just in case Manning beats the rehabilitation clock.
Polian also is shrewd. The Colts are pre-planning for Life After Peyton. “Peyton’s at the age now where he recognizes, and we recognize, that his career is in the homestretch,” Polian said on his weekly radio show, while adding that “we fully expect he’ll be back with us.”
Even if Manning does just that, he — and the franchise built around his talent, skills and savvy — must adjust to the effects of aging, year by year.
“There are changes that are happening that you have to adapt to,” Olshansky said in a telephone interview last week. “Are they all bad? Well, no, but you have to adapt to them.”
If you find the following list a revelation, you’re either too young to have experienced it or have an aversion to mirrors. As most people hit 30, it starts — hairs turn gray, eyesight gets fuzzier, and skin starts wrinkling. For some, joints move more stiffly while getting out of bed. (NFL quarterbacks feel that way in their 20s, let alone in their 30s or 40s.) At 40, bones become brittle, muscle mass starts deteriorating, and threats of various diseases increase.
The march continues into our 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s and, God willing, 90s. Spelling out the compounding changes, decade by decade, might make you pull the covers over your head and spend the rest of today in a catatonic state, so we’ll leave it at that. Relative to that scale, Manning is a pup. In NFL years, though, as Polian put it, he’s “in the homestretch.”
Assuming his neck heals as hoped, Manning’s game tactics may have to shift along with his aging body as he rounds his career’s final turn. Fewer deep routes for his receivers. Limited scrambling. For thirtysomething pro football players, “they can’t really have those explosive moves when they’re older,” Olshansky said, “so they have to do something different.”
Ideally, they’ll compensate with greater wisdom. Manning is off the charts in that category. Already a football genius fresh out of college, he’s now a gridiron Ph.D. That helps while trying to outfox stronger, faster 26-year-old opposing linebackers … to a degree.
“I’m sure all of these [veteran] athletes would love to have all the knowledge they have now in their [former] 20-year-old bodies,” Olshansky said. (Don’t we all?)
Crafty as those old pros are, “ultimately, you have to fall back on your ability,” Olshansky said.
Baby boomers — the “me generation” — tend to struggle with mortality more so than older or younger folks. “People born decades before you or I are more willing to allow the ravages of aging to take its toll,” Olshansky said. “There’s something very unique about ours.” That’s why anti-aging products and procedures comprise an $80-billion-a-year industry in America, and could grow to $114-billion annually by 2014, according to Global Industry Analysts.
Olshansky has some advice. “About the only equivalent of a Fountain of Youth that we know of today is exercise,” he said.
So, take a brisk walk in that No. 18 jersey today, accept Manning’s predicament, and wish him a long, pain-free life on or off the field.
Mark Bennett can be reached at (812) 231-4377 or mark.bennett@tribstar.com.
Mark Bennett Opinion
MARK BENNETT: Time waits for no Manning
Peyton’s absence a reality check for everybody — aging is inescapable
- Mark Bennett Opinion
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Mark Bennett: High-profile mural connects historical dots from city to river
At 96 feet wide and 2 stories tall, the power, impact and value of the Wabash will be evident.
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MARK BENNETT: Life at face value: Mom’s simple advice still presents a valuable daily challenge
Most moms don’t base their advice on scientific research.
(Unless, of course, your mother is a scientific researcher. If so, carry a No. 2 pencil and take good notes.) -
MARK BENNETT: Should I stay or should I go?
Some have their Bill Clinton-era Cavalier packed (with the trunk bungee-ed shut), apartment cleaned (except for the fridge), and iPhone GPS locked onto the fastest route out of Terre Haute. Others are staying — until they find a better job, or because they’re starting a career here, or because this town feels like home. In each case, a new stage of life begins today.
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College Class of '13 gets a little extra advice
Local college grads will hear commencement speakers offer life and career advice this month. We’re offering them an extra dose here from folks who’ve found success in various vocations and regions of the nation. Many have Terre Haute roots.
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MARK BENNETT: Spirited response to a rising river
The power within the Wabash revealed itself last week.
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MARK BENNETT: Littered with irony: Why do people callously discard their trash, and who are they?
Though they aren’t acknowledged by the U.S. Census Bureau, there are basically two demographic groups of people … Those who would dump their old toilet on the banks of the Wabash River or a rural roadside. And those who wouldn’t.
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MARK BENNETT: Performing under the radar: Toiling for years behind the scenes, Terre Haute native J.T. Corenflos finally earned a splash of musical recognition
People who diligently work to make others shine are a rare breed.
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Season of Day 2s arrives
Calendars in Cincinnati contain one extra holiday — Opening Day, traditionally the first Monday in April.
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MARK BENNETT: Amid tragedy and chaos, the hopeful smiles of youth could not be repressed
The image jars the viewer. On its own, the old photograph appears ordinary. Three smiling kids.
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MARK BENNETT: A century later, ‘On the Banks of the Wabash’ still rises above Indiana politics
Music and politics share one commonality — people who like a style different from yours are nuts.
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MARK BENNETT: Digit dialing a thing of the past, but telephoning is still a numbers game
You’ve heard of child prodigies who can play Mozart on piano or perform calculus at the age of 5.
That wasn’t me. -
MARK BENNETT: After years of preparation, 60 immigrants will gather in Terre Haute on March 14 to pledge their allegiance to the United States of America
It will have been a long and difficult road, but it will be an emotional moment when they raise their right hands and begin the oath of citizenship
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MARK BENNETT: The fall and rise of a ‘Young Titan’
Broken. Humiliated. Discarded. Finished.
Few of us think of Winston Churchill in such bleak terms. -
MARK BENNETT: Trying to keep momentum of acceptance within the community a key part of Jeff Lorick’s job
Second-graders’ eyes and minds function differently.
They see the future unjaded. Their possibilities stand tall, not yet choked by the adult weeds of prejudice and bitterness. -
MARK BENNETT: For Glenda Ritz, being educator, ‘not a politician’ still makes good political sense
Educator, not a politician.
Glenda Ritz emphasizes that distinction about herself. -
MARK BENNETT: Falling short of the big prize will produce lessons nonetheless
This is a day for Roman numerals.
Americans seldom use them. And when we do, humility is not our purpose. -
MARK BENNETT: Forgotten Message: Advice from ‘The Mick’ should be remembered in wake of Lance Armstrong’s troubles
The two comments were almost identical.
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MARK BENNETT: A sense of Americana constant passenger as iconic Corvette motors through milestone birthday
On my last ride at the wheel of a ’Vette, I was a wide-eyed teenager, guiding my brother’s almost-new, orange 1976 model.
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MARK BENNETT: Sculptor from North Carolina to capture image of Indiana’s first black state legislator
Well-meaning parents try to instill strong character in their kids.
“Don’t be afraid to stand up for your beliefs,” moms and dads will insist, “even if you stand alone.” -
MARK BENNETT: Heart ailments, avoidable health issues affect high numbers of Vigo residents
Many folks in Vigo County will analyze digits on their bathroom scales this month. After all, January and fitness resolutions are traditional partners.
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MARK BENNETT: For some people in the Wabash Valley, happy holidays require a little help
Picture yourself as a kid, not yet 5 years old, growing up in a small house in Terre Haute.
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MARK BENNETT: Beware Ignorance and Want and reap the benefits of early education
Pretend that Charles Dickens is about to become Indiana’s next governor.
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MARK BENNETT: In spirit of season, calculate your fiscal cliff impact, then argue
Envision “chestnuts roasting on an open fire.”
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MARK BENNETT: Members of Congress should be free to consider all sides of an issue
Attempting to trump the U.S. Constitution requires some nerve.
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MARK BENNETT: An unbudging Congress standing on opposing sides accomplishes little
Sausage patties, hugging a scoop of scrambled eggs and a couple slices of toast on a plate, and chased with nearby steaming black coffee.
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MARK BENNETT: Hoosier voters issue mandate on Bennett’s school reforms
Mike Pence, Mitch Daniels and Indiana legislators should respect the votes of 1,315,026 Hoosiers.
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MARK BENNETT: Elections, governing would look a lot different if everybody voted
A raffle ticket purchase usually comes with a disclaimer — “you must be present to win.”
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MARK BENNETT: On Election Day, as Vigo County goes, so goes the United States
Hempstead sounds like a fine place.
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MARK BENNETT: Upcoming PBS documentary focuses on nation’s voting irregularities, through Hoosier eyes
As America prepares to choose its governmental leaders, voters are being relentlessly asked how much they trust elected officials.
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MARK BENNETT: Quest for knowledge keeps going as Elliott Gould prepares to speak in Terre Haute
As our conversation began, Elliott Gould was in the midst of learning. He was reading a book.
- More Mark Bennett Opinion Headlines
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