Peyton Manning gets all the commercials. Tom Brady had his pick of model girlfriends. Brett Favre makes his own rules.
For that matter, all NFL quarterbacks are privileged with their own set of rules.
Make no mistake, quarterback is the most glamorous position in sports, never mind football. Just don’t confuse a pampered, well-paid, celebrity lifestyle with soft wills and frail bodies.
From Favre getting hooked on Vicodin to overcoming painful bone spurs and chips in his left ankle to keep playing during his Super Bowl-winning season of 1996, to Philip Rivers having surgery to temporarily hold a torn ACL together so he could play six days later in the 2007 AFC championship game, NFL quarterbacks are some of the most uncommonly tough men around.
“Is there another position in all of sports where you know you’re going to get hit by people who are 260 to 300 pounds coming at full speed, and you’re going to stand there and you know it’s coming, but you still stay in there and do your job and then accept the punishment for it?” asked Broncos coach Josh McDaniels. “There’s no other position in all of sports where that happens. … Every player is tough to play this sport, but quarterbacks have to have a unique courage.”
Kyle Orton is the latest NFL quarterback to try to rewrite all medical logic by playing despite a left ankle so severely damaged he couldn’t put weight on it to practice this week. Orton is expected to at least dress today against the San Diego Chargers.
So, what’s new? Brady was wearing a walking boot on his right foot a few days before the Super Bowl in January 2008. Manning started the 2008 regular-season opener roughly two weeks after having a second operation in a six-week period on his left knee.
Broncos quarterback Brian Griese played several games in 2000 with torn cartilage in his right shoulder, then suffered a third-degree shoulder separation in the first half of a pivotal Monday night game against the Oakland Raiders. He played the second half and led the Broncos to victory.
“The doc told me there were no more ligaments in there to tear, so I took a shot and went back out there,” Griese said. “Every pass I threw, it seemed like my arm was going with the ball. I don’t recommend that feeling for any quarterback.”
When the going gets tough …
Many quarterbacks have experienced such pain, though. Asked to pick the toughest injury they had seen a player endure, Broncos running back Correll Buckhalter and safety Brian Dawkins mentioned former teammate Donovan McNabb, the Eagles’ quarterback.
McNabb played with a hernia for a time in 2005. Dawkins mentioned how McNabb played one of his best-ever games in 2002 on an ankle later revealed to be broken in three places.
Orton’s backup, Chris Simms, once played nearly three quarters with a ruptured spleen that a few hours later was removed through emergency surgery.
Said Simms, who will be starting in place of Orton today: “That was one time where you probably don’t want to be tough, and just say, ‘I’m hurt.’ “
Which leads to one of the most difficult decisions that confronts NFL players and coaches each week: How to determine the difference between playing in pain, or playing with significant injury?
“It’s as tough as it gets in the National Football League,” said Chargers tight end Antonio Gates, who only this season is playing well again after dislocating a big toe in 2007. “To me, if you want to be great, you sometimes should play when you’re not 100 percent. Every great player that I saw growing up and great player I ever knew always played when he wasn’t 100 percent and still had an impact on the game. Or else you wouldn’t be considered a great one. Anybody can go out at 100 percent and play well.”
Rivers converts his image
The dilemma of hurt vs. injury was never more pronounced than with the Chargers during the 2007 season’s AFC championship game against the 17-0 New England Patriots. Rivers, who until then had built a reputation as an immature, over-talkative quarterback, played despite a freshly torn ACL. LaDainian Tomlinson, who until then was considered the league’s preeminent running back, made a beeline toward the sideline on his second carry to protect a sprained knee ligament, never to return.
Even if Tomlinson’s reputation didn’t suffer to the degree Rivers’ was resurrected, neither was viewed quite the same way again.
“In terms of Philip, the way people perceived (it) was fair and deserving,” Chargers coach Norv Turner said. “At the time, it was made fairly clear they played different positions and had totally different injuries. That was hard because I have so much respect for L.T. and what he’s done and what he’s continuing to do, and it was just hard.”
Rivers and Tomlinson play different positions, all right. And it was the quarterback who stayed on the field.
“I think that was a key mark in (Rivers’) career,” Gates said. “Personally, he always had the respect from his peers and his teammates. But I think the world, outsiders if you will, gave him the respect that he deserved. It solidified him as a leader as well.”
Overlooked by Rivers’ remarkable display of courage, though, was the fact he didn’t play well. He threw two interceptions and no touchdown passes while posting a 46.1 passer rating in a game the Chargers were in all the way, eventually losing 21-12.
Uncommon valor?
Bravery is great, but did Rivers give the Chargers their best chance to win? Orton badly wants to play today against Rivers and the Chargers. But does Orton help by playing, or does he do more good by watching and healing?
“This sport, you’ve got to play when you’re dinged up, and the quarterback is no different,” Orton said.
Maybe that’s it. Quarterbacks try so hard to prove they’re no different than any other player, they are determined to demonstrate uncommon toughness.
“If I was to start a team, I’d look for a quarterback who is intelligent and who is tough,” Griese said. “Tom Brady’s one of the toughest guys I know. Same with Drew Brees. It’s not a contact sport, it’s a collision sport. And the quarterback is usually the pinball in that collision.”
Mike Klis: 303-954-1055 or mklis@denverpost.com
