You may need to fix the link about Moss. It took me to an error page.

And now I’m thinking: was that poor route run a result of his recent injury (don’t remember where, but he had one a few days before the big game) or like some people brought up here, an ego matter? We need to remember the AFCCG post-game, when Peyton talked about how Wayne teached Collie and Garçon so they’d come up big while rookies in the playoffs, maybe even trying to cheer him up for being pratically shut down by Darrelle Revis.

Still makes me sad.

but if the Colts are ever 14-0 again and have everything locked up, should they rest their starters or go for 16-0? Also what if this scenario played out and we didn’t have as many players injured as we did in 2009, what would you want the Colts to do?

The last two screenshots do show what I thought I remembered. If you look, you’ll see that the coverage had followed Collie and Clark across the middle and left Porter alone back there on the proverbial “island”. Hey, my memory’s not so bad after all!

Also, I agree with his assessment (below, in bold):

At this point I am guessing Peyton doesn’t think he has to worry about what the extra defender is doing because he knows 1. he is getting rid of the ball as quickly as possible on a 3 step drop, and 2. his receiver is in a matchup he should win every time. So he doesn’t care about reading the entire defense, and he really doesn’t have the time. We do.

To put it in plain language, he read the defense keying in on Clark and Collie, and leaving Porter one-on-one with Wayne. Manning is supposed to make that throw. But with Reggie not in the right spot… well, we know what happened.

As a final topper on this: Remember what that idiot Peacesign kept on blathering about? Manning supposedly staring Reggie down the whole time? No: He stared Collie down. He had to be; that’s the only explanation for the other defenders flowing towards the middle (plus, it’s the only way he could’ve cheated a look at Clark): They were chasing Collie. The Colts 3rd down possesion receiver running a route towards the middle on a play that looks like it’s just a plain “moving the chains” route was ripe for Manning to read a one-on-one matchup elsewhere and gain a touchdown where one wasn’t readily available at first. Manning made a terrific read, and Wayne being out of place for probably the only time that game ended up being painfully costly.

Most of the time, a small mistake like what Wayne made is nothing more than an incomplete. And we all know that little mistakes like that happen somewhere every game. This one was painful because it was ill timed. But what it was not was a bad read by Manning. On the contrary, it was a brillliant read. But it was a brilliant read that got outplayed by the defense. Porter was still smart enough to jump the route, because all he saw was an inside pass and a receiver not breaking towards it properly. Pro-caliber corners will always react instinctively to that. But at the same time, Porter only had two players to read. Manning had however many where on Reggie’s side of the field.

I’m going to bookmark rufio’s post. If anyone brings up the stupid “choke” meme, I’ll steer them towards it. If they still keep on with Manning “choking”, then it’ll be beyond obvious that they don’t care about the truth, they’ll only be caring about blathering on stupidly.

Cue Peacesign with his stupidity in 4… 3… 2…