- Peyton Manning sat out all last season after 4 neck surgeries only to be released by the Indianapolis Colts at the end of it all. Last week he made his debut as the Denver Broncos QB with a big win at home over the Pittsburgh Steelers and everyone joined in the chants of "He's Back!". Everyone, that is, except Peyton Manning. Before the game he let reporters know that he still felt there was some rust to dust off and that he was not expecting this week, playing in Atlanta, to be anything like his home field opener. There is a reason Peyton Manning is so respected in this game, he knows his sh...um stuff. Much like his little brother, Eli, did on Sunday, Peyton threw 3 interceptions in the first quarter to give Matt Ryan and the Atlanta Falcons the opportunity to take an early 20-7 lead.
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| Nice one, Atlanta. Very nice. |
- On the other side of the ball, Matt Ryan completed 24 of 36 passes for 219 yards and 2 touchdown passes, including his 100th career TD pass (congratulations Matt Ryan!). Would the Falcons have won the game without the mistakes by Peyton Manning? I think so, Matt Ryan was efficient and made good key decisions that protected their lead when it looked like Peyton Manning was going to pull and Eli and try to win the thing in the 4th quarter.
- And the Broncos did make a run at it. Manning Broncos marched the Broncos down the field and completed a touchdown pass to Demaryius Thomas just before halftime to make it 20-7. In fact, Peyton got it as close as 21-27 and it looked like they were going to have another chance to score until Matt Ryan completed a pass to Julio Jones for a key first down that allowed the Falcons to run out the clock send the Broncos back to Denver with a 1-1 record. "Impress Him" Fact: Before Monday's game Peyton Manning was 11-3 on Monday nights. This has to be a loss that he will feel all the way home.
- There was all kinds of extracurricular activity during this game as well, it looked as if the inmates were running the asylum. The replacement refs turned over 3 calls after reviewing the replay in the first half. There was a little pushing a shoving show that took 6 minutes! After Knowshon Moreno fumbled the ball for Denver in the 1st quarter, the field was swarmed by Broncos and one Falcon, Ray Edwards actually bumped a referee! There was only one flag against Edwards, no one was thrown out of the game, and 6 minutes of everyone's lives, including mine, was gone. I said in my last post that frustration with the replacement refs is growing, that might be an understatement after last night's game. It's not the RR's (like that?) fault, they are out of their element and each week the pressure on them is going to grow. I leave you with this image of this poor guy, who is probably a used car salesman who coaches little league football on the weekend, getting his face blown off by John Fox, the head coach of the Broncos. Get the real guys back, NFL. Just get 'em back.
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| how'd you like to see this coming at you? |
