25 examples of insane competitiveness that made Peyton Manning one of the best ever
In high school, Peyton would practice at 4:30 or 5:00 every morning with his father, Archie Manning, and his brothers, Eli and Cooper.
During Peyton's first-quarterbacks meeting as a freshman at Tennessee, the other quarterbacks were an hour late because Manning locked the doors to the building.
SOURCE: ESPN.com
He once showed up to the Indianapolis Colts practice facility at 4 a.m. after a night game because he wanted to get work in before an 8:30 a.m. charity engagement.
SOURCE: ESPN.com
Manning once trash-talked Tiger Woods on a golf course so badly that Woods used it as motivation to regain his No. 1 ranking.
SOURCE: The Golf Network
Manning started every game in 16 of his first 17 NFL seasons. Not only did he never miss a game, he rarely even took plays off, even in blowouts.
Data via Pro-Football-Reference.com
This was something Brock Osweiler (No. 17) learned the hard way during the 2014 season when he thought he was going into a blowout, but Peyton had other thoughts.
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Manning roots for rookie quarterbacks to do poorly so that somebody will break his record for interceptions in a season by a rookie (28).
SOURCE: TheMMQB.com
Prior to a season-finale game between the New York Giants and New England Patriots in 2007, Peyton called his brother Eli to urge the Giants' defense to keep Brady from breaking Peyton's single-season touchdown passes record. The Giants' defense was promised dinner if they succeeded. They did not.
SOURCE: Pro Football Talk
Instead of retiring at 35, Manning chose to relearn how to throw a football after his second neck surgery and even had secret practices so nobody would know how bad his throwing had become.
SOURCE: WashingtonPost.com
To prove he could still play after the neck surgeries, he had some then-Colts teammates fly to Duke University and they replayed every play from the 2009 AFC Championship Game win over the New York Jets.
SOURCE: NFL Network
He is a stickler for details. According to his former coach, Tony Dungy, if Peyton says he is going to do something at a specific time, "you can set your satellite by it."
Despite a friendly personality, he is not afraid to get in the face of a teammate, even Jeff Saturday, one of his good friends — at the 0:40 mark of this video.
At the end of his career, Manning was even more open about his emotion, chewing out teammates in front of everybody.
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During a preseason game, Manning received a taunting penalty and was later fined for getting in the face of an opponent who had put a helmet-to-helmet hit on one of the Denver Broncos' receivers. Manning later called the fine "money well spent."
SOURCE: ESPN.com
He asked networks to turn down the volume on field mics so that it wouldn't be so easy for people watching TV to hear his signals.
SOURCE: The Dan Patrick Show
When the Broncos played on "Sunday Night Football," Peyton would watch the NBC broadcast to see if his former coach, Tony Dungy, gave away any signals and then Peyton changed those signals.
SOURCE: The Dan Patrick Show
After throwing four touchdowns in a cold-weather game, Peyton addressed the critics of his cold-weather play by saying "Whoever wrote that narrative can shove that one where the sun don’t shine."
SOURCE: 850 KOA Radio
Before signing with the Broncos, Peyton asked for a media guide because he wanted to be able to recognize and know about not only potential teammates but also Broncos employees.
SOURCE: MileHighSports.com
Peyton cursed out Tampa Bay Buccaneers coach Greg Schiano after he rushed the Broncos on a kneel-down play. Michael Bennett told Mike Silver, "Peyton cussed him out. And I ain't never heard Peyton cuss."
SOURCE: NFL.com:
When Manning played the Patriots in Foxborough, he stepped into the hallway to discuss strategy because he assumed the locker room was bugged.
Even when he got a day off from practice to rest an injury, he still wore a helmet to listen to play calls and watched game film in the ice tub.
SOURCE: DenverBroncos.com
When he ran a bootleg he wouldn't even tell his teammates because he didn't want their actions to give away the play to the defense.
SOURCE: ESPN.com. GIF via Fox Sports.
He hated to alter his routine so much that he would make the media wait following a "Monday Night Football" game so that he could keep his regular Monday-evening date with a cold tub.
SOURCE: MileHighSports.com
Even competition between the Manning brothers was designed to make the other brother better.
Eli Manning on being tortured by Peyton, via Boston.com:
"[H]is most popular move, he would pin me down and take his knuckles and knock on my chest and make me name the 12 schools in the SEC [Southeastern Conference]," Manning said.
He is driven to be the best at everything, and is considered by many to be the best sports host "Saturday Night Live" has ever had.
His body was so beat up this season, he had an assistant remove his cleats because "it is a relief to not have to bend over that far," according to Kevin Van Valkenburg. And yet, Manning was still competing at the highest level at 39 and finally won that elusive second Super Bowl ring.
SOURCE: ESPN
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