Reality hits home in a way that expectations never can. You can brace yourself for the bad news that is sure to come, but there is no way to duck the pain when reality strikes.
Fans in Indianapolis are feeling the agony of separation today with the reality of a day they knew was coming.
Peyton Manning and the Indianapolis Colts are parting ways. Manning’s 14-year run as one of the most celebrated and admired quarterbacks in NFL history is over in Indianapolis.
The announcement was made during a press conference Wednesday, in a joint appearance by Manning and Colts owner Jim Irsay.
What makes it worse for the city’s fans is that after today, Manning will begin making plans to continue his career with another NFL team.
Detroit fans have gone through this mourning period with their sports heroes departing and turning up wearing uniforms of other teams, but it seems different with the Colts and Manning.
Manning and the Colts were kings in Indianapolis. There is no major league baseball team to kindle the anticipation of spring training, and the city does not have an NHL franchise.
The Pacers of the NBA have not been competitive consistently enough to fill any emotional vacuum.
Only the Colts, since Manning’s arrival in 1998, have been able to stoke the competitive fires and keep them burning 365 days a year.
No matter what, Indianapolis always had Peyton Manning. And now they don’t. Worse yet, some other team will have Peyton Manning.
I wonder this: If you took a poll in Indianapolis and asked people to choose between having Manning for another five years or moving the Indianapolis 500 to Omaha, how many would choose Manning?
The Colts got a look at how the other side lives last year, when they went 2-14 without Manning. They lost their first 13 games and seemed certain to match the 2008 Lions as the only teams to go 0-16, until the Colts won two of their last three games.
Through all of last season and this offseason, the warning signs were becoming more obvious that a split was coming between the Colts and Manning.
A neck injury that called into question whether he will play again was one factor. So was the fact that Manning was due a bonus payment of $28 million on Thursday to trigger the last four years of his contract.
And so was the fact that by going 2-14, the Colts got the first pick in next month’s draft. Andrew Luck of Stanford is regarded by NFL personnel analysts as the best quarterback prospect in decades.
Despite a close personal relationship between Irsay and Manning, Irsay had to make a business decision to move the franchise along without Manning. They’re rebuilding without the pillar of their success for more than a decade.
Irsay and Manning arrived in Indianapolis together Tuesday night in Irsay’s private plane on a flight from Florida. Both men were smiling as they spoke briefly to reporters.
Realistically, there are no bad guys in this sports divorce. There are just bad circumstances and bad luck. Money, injury and a rebuilding cycle create issues that force franchises to make decisions every year.
But when it involves a man like Manning, a sports icon for an entire country who elevates his city’s profile, it plucks the heartstrings a little harder, and the melody is sadder.
There is no way to prepare a Colts fan for the emotional sucker punch of seeing Manning in another team’s uniform this year.
Sure, we’ve seen it with other great players — Brett Favre leaving the Packers for the Jets and Vikings — but that doesn’t lessen the impact.
In Detroit, was there anyone who didn’t gulp at seeing Gordie Howe wearing that goofy Houston Aeros uniform two years after announcing his retirement from the Red Wings in 1971?
Or after those great seasons with the Tigers, seeing Kirk Gibson with the Dodgers and Jack Morris with the Twins?
Or even Barry Sanders, the greatest Lion ever, in street clothes in a London airport the day after retiring from the Lions on the eve of training camp in 1999?
Those kinds of images are already haunting people in Indianapolis.
