Tebow to Jacksonville.

I really hope he goes to Jacksonville, because we really need to hear about Tebow again every three seconds on ESPN.

ESPN needs a new Favre.

I hope that Payton does well in Denver. It sucks how it went down here in Indy, but it was the only feasible option for the colts. On the other hand, the suck for Luck 2012 campaign was a true success.

@putin: Payton is no farve. He never waffled on his choices. Farve (originally) chose to leave the packers so the went with Rogers. The colts had to capitalize on the first pick and there is no room for two overall first pick qbs on one team. Not to mention that Payton handled it in a much more professional way than farve (throughout his whole career he carried himself in a much more professional and mature way than farve).

He also isn;t the most highly overrated professional athlete of all time, like Favre.

Peyton doesn't matter. His little brother is better and has more Superbowl rings. Eli will be better than Tebow or Peyton next year and Giants will be world champions.

Who agrees?

I don't, I think Superbowl rings are overrated for individual performance, and I think peyton has always been more central to the colts than Eli is to the Giants. Eli is getting better though, but i still think Peyton's only true peer is Brady. In the end I think Peyton is personally better than Brady as well.

Nobody. Payton is by far a better, smarter qb. He just has not had as good of a supporting staff to prop him up throughout his career. Eli is good, Payton is great. Superbowls are not won by a QB, they are won by a team. MVPs *are* won by individual players.

@Jersey Shore: I completely agree and +1ed you.

I meant @ jerseyshorowitz, sorry.

Better coaching staff?! Do you understand how many times Tom Coughlin's name has come up on the list of coaches to be fired. Payton is good but Eli is great. Funny how Archie's words can be switched around like that.

Peyton should have retired with dignity. I do not look forward to watching them carry him off the field sometime in the near future. The next time he may not recover.

Good luck to Tebow, I wish more of us could be like him...selfless, not selfish.

By supporting staff I meant the player surrounding him. And that is just false, who has more overall league MVPs?

League MVPs are for people who can't win Superbowls.

Riiight. You are one of those people who think that Eli could go on the field by himself and win a game without anybody else. When the colts won the Super Bowl, they did it with an at best mediocre defense (although they did turn it on in the playoffs). The fact remains that Payton has done more with less than Eli ever could. (fuck that hotty totty bullshoi)

Payton has Reggie Wayne and Dallas Clark. Eli had a wide receiver dumb enough to shoot himself in the foot and a rookie who will soon be an all-star. Eli has had it harder. He makes lemonade out of lemons... or should I see Superbowl champions out of rookies. My bad.

Peyton
Completion %- 64.9
Yads Per Game- 263.6
TD/INT- 399/198
QB Rating- 94.9

Eli
Comp %- 58.4
Yards Per Game- 227.9
TD/INT- 185/129
QB Rating- 82.1


Care to respond?

'nuff said.

Congrats, you found the stats from lets say about 6 years ago. Eli was sure in his prime then wasn't he.

those are career stats..., you think a QB throws 185 TDs a season?

Just admit that Payton is the better QB and that Eli had a better team. Not every starting QB can be like Payton. Look at the bright side, at least he doesn't suck like Tebow.

"Good luck to Tebow, I wish more of us could be like him...selfless, not selfish."

He was fined by his teammates, repeatedly, for not decrying the "Start Tebow" signs in Denver, but letting that situation simmer to his betterment. It's considered bad form to not give a statement of support for the starter when you're in a position like that.

if you want i could compare their best seasons, or go season by season comparison, but you'd probably like that even less

Even in his good seasons, Eli was hella streaky. Peyton's always been pretty consistent.

Unless Eli goes the way of Brady and out of nowhere exceeds even the overblown hype, Peyton will still be the better of the two.

While QB is maybe the one position where there could be an exception, the stat du jour of recent years, "Superbowl Rings" is ridiculous. there are 22 starters on every team, one person does not claim a superbowl ring. That's why it is a team game, and there are too many variables to suggest one player can be credited with them. If you want to see the importance of peyton look what his injury did to his team

There are more than 22 starter, special teams.

And yes look at what it did. SUCK FOR LUCK 2012.

I wasn't saying Peyton was Favre, I was saying Tebow was Favre. Not because of their comparable talents either, but only in that ESPN needs someone new to obsess over.

The idea that Peyton hasn't had a good supporting staff is horsepuckey. Peyton has just had a habit of choking in the big games.

" If you want to see the importance of peyton look what his injury did to his team"

Peyton didn't play defense, so I don't know how he was responsible for Bob Sanders and most of the defense being injured. Oh well, we need a simplistic answer for everything.

Guess he wasn't praying hard enough to keep his job.

I am not saying that Payton did not have anybody, just nowhere near the all-around talent that Eli was surrounded with.

I never thought I'd ever be typing this...

I was relieved to hear the 49ers didn't get Peyton...because I want Alex Smith back.

And if you'd ahve told me a year ago I'd be saying that...
That Peyton wouldn't be a Colt...
That I'd be an Alex Smith fan after being fed up with him...
That I'd see Alex as one of the gutsiest, do-what-ever-it-takes QBs in the league...
That Alex would throw more than twice as many TDs as INTs and run with it...
That Harbaugh and Alex would have that 49ers offense working...
That we'd be in the playoffs...
That Alex Smith of ALL QBs would throw to Vernon Davis for The Catch III...
That but for two fumbles we'd have made the Super Bowl...

Hard to imagine it, but it's true--

Alex has won me over, I was TERRIFIED we'd go and pay Peyton a huge sum and lose Alex, who's still young enough to have a good career with Harbaugh, and instead overpay for a WB who's one the best of all-time, yes, but in all likelihood will be a Brett Favre-in-New-York/Minnesota or Montana-in-Kansas-City QB now, just not what he once was.

Interesting signing by the Broncos.

I'm not a Tebow fan, but he DID win that playoff game, have to give him credit there...

But then, their GM is JOHN ELWAY...so I guess Bronco fans have to trust his judgment on QBs, just a bit... ;)

But now, we HAVE to sign Alex...that was just an odd, off-putting thing they did, laying Alex out like that in going for Peyton after all that, but then, Alex has had so many bad years, and you only get one shot at an all-timer like Peyton...

But now it's time for both sides to kiss and make up--

Mario Manningham, Randy Moss, Michael Crabtree, Vernon Davis, Kendall Hunter, AND Frank Gore...

AND ALL OF THE STARTERS FOR THE #1 DEFENSE IN THE NFC RETURNING...

SIGN ALEX...

I'M ROOTING FOR LOMBARDI TROPHY #6!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

THE NINER EMPIRE IS *BACK!*

SIGN ALEX ALREADY, AND LET'S GET IT GOING! :D

Please Put Put-

While the colts defense did get worse, to the tune of allowing 7 more TDs and 400 more yards than the year before, the difference was in the offense which gained 1500 less yards and scored 26 less TDs

I take back my Manning is better than Brady comment though, I looked at Brady's stats and there is no doubt he is the QB of the generation, no matter how much it pains me to say it. But I think Peyton is close.

i am not from the states, so i dont follow all of the NFL. but how does Aron Rodgers fit in on the stats compared with Brady and the manning brothers?

@ democ, it's a bit harder to compare Aaron Rodgers's stats to Brady and the Mannings because he's only started for a few seasons and doesn't have the years under his belt that the others do. He has played really consistently so far and stood out, but so has Drew Brees and I think that Brees is a bit over-rated and suspect that he will fade away as the years go by.

I also have to +1 Peyton over Eli. As a QB, Peyton is much more solid in the pocket, can read a defense far better, has much more command over his team as a coach on the field while Eli struggles in those areas and has the coach calling more of the shots. His on-field performances turn out better and the overall end result is a stronger QB. Eli has always been the popular underdog. Good, but I wouldn't say he's HoF material. Sure, Super Bowl rings account for a lot in that factor, but I don't think Eli should have been MVP in the last year's Super Bowl, either. I think his wide receivers did better than he did. It's just a popular decision to typically pick a QB for the spot.

In terms of Tebow, I do think he has much better character in the NFL than most other big-name people, but as a QB, he's really lacking heavily in the passing game, which is a must-have in the NFL today. Running the ball by a QB is a good capability to have, heck Elway scrambled all the time, but it was only when he had no passing options and he showed that he could make the completions necessary to keep the drive going. Tebow doesn't have that. He's like Vick in that he gets nervous in the pocket and feels like he has to hang onto the ball, but even Vick could throw.

Tebow sucks as a QB, but is a great leader. It amazes me that a guy with hardily any real talent (in the NFL at least) can take a team that is down and motivate them to elevate their game and win. So even though I think he sucks as a QB, I have to hand it to him because of his leadership abilities. He will be an asset wherever he goes.

If we regard rings as the true measure of QB ability, then we say that Trent Dilfer is better than Dan Marino and Jim Kelly. And I don't think anyone, especially Trent himself, would say that.

thx for the clear explanation @tru Ninja

well the talking heads need something to talk about for 24 hours so the build this strawman that even if a guy is phenominal in every way, if he doesnt have a ring, he is suspect for the hof and all other honors. Then you get to kill time in a talk show going around in circles on that topic. Its been done so much now that it s orthodoxy and the analysts and fans who tend to believe in the mystical aspect of sport see a lack of rings as a personal fault.

@ Sacred Digits, my point exactly. We can't boil the game down to who holds rings and who doesn't. Some excellent players (including several members of the '83 draft) don't have rings but were clearly excellent quarterbacks, while others merely had a ton of HoF support to surround them.

Favre was great, but he also had Sterling Sharpe and Reggie White early on who were both HoF players, as well as a ton of pro-bowl caliber talents. Heck, after 1998, Favre didn't do anything really noteworthy.

@ democ, no problem :)

Happy for Peyton
Wish he had gone to the 49ers - better chance for rings
Now we see how good Luck really is (don't ever tell me "sure thing" again if he isn't)
No one outside Indy is entitled to an opinion :)

^+1^

lol. I used to live just north of Indy and my wife has family in Fishers.

well the talking heads need something to talk about for 24 hours so the build this strawman that even if a guy is phenominal in every way, if he doesnt have a ring, he is suspect for the hof and all other honors. Then you get to kill time in a talk show going around in circles on that topic. Its been done so much now that it s orthodoxy and the analysts and fans who tend to believe in the mystical aspect of sport see a lack of rings as a personal fault.

whoops sorry about that double post, clicked refresh from before

I'll add that i think watching Peyton on the Broncos is going to be alot of fun. With that running game to support him difenses are going to have to take alot of advil