From today's Clarion-Ledger.
Mannings endure boos, slurs and media criticism ... and life goes on
By Rick Cleveland
rcleveland@clarionledger.com
New York calls itself the Big Apple. Willie Morris, the late, great Mississippi writer who spent years there, called it the Big Cave.
I thought about good ol' Willie at last weekend's NFL Draft, held in the theatre at Madison Square Garden. I knew what Willie would have called the cretins who rained down boos — and worse — on all folks named Manning. For if New York is the Big Cave, as Willie called it, then these were surely the cavemen. They were mostly gruff, burly men wearing size XXX Jets or Giants jerseys, which sometimes covered their bellies, but just as often did not.
It came as no great surprise that they booed the Mannings. Six years ago, they booed Indianapolis Colts first choice Peyton Manning because he hadn't come out a year earlier when he would have been a Jet, instead.
They booed Phil Simms when he was the first choice of the Giants. They booed Donovan McNabb when he was the first choice of the Eagles. Eli Manning is in good company. The cavemen boo at least one somebody every year. That's what they do.
It's funny really, and Eli Manning, to his credit, laughed it off.
Shoddy reporting
Not so funny — at least not to me — was the harsh criticism in the national media of all things Manning. Don't get me wrong. Every pundit — indeed, every person — can decide for themselves whether the Mannings were right or wrong in what they did. What bothered me was that so many newspaper columnists and talk radio types chose to vilify, based on incomplete and/or shoddy reporting. They simply didn't do their homework.
Several examples:
Many wrote that Archie Manning was playing the same role as an intrusive little league parent. That he was butting in where he had no business. That he should let Eli handle his own business.
The truth is, for anyone who wanted to make a couple calls and find out, Archie Manning didn't enter the picture until he was asked to by first the NFL commissioner and then the Chargers themselves. And even then, he did so reluctantly. This was never Archie Manning's decision. This was Eli's decision, which Archie Manning supported, just as he supported Peyton when Peyton chose Tennessee over Ole Miss. Remember? Archie was vilified for that one, too.
Others wrote that the Mannings should be ashamed for trying to change a system that has made them — Archie, Peyton and Eli — rich men.
That's stupid. Part of the system is that a player has the right to sit out an entire season and re-enter the draft. Not many players have the wherewithal to do that. John Elway did. Eli Manning does. Pro football is a business. The owners are rich men, too. In business, you use leverage when you have it. Eli had it. He used it. It worked. So be it.
Still others chose to compare Eli's supposed selfishness with Pat Tillman's ultimate sacrifice.
That's ridiculous. That's connecting dots that simply aren't there. One has nothing to do with the other. Making such a connection is more than a stretch; it's lazy journalism.
"I knew it was going to happen," Archie Manning said. "I told Eli that people were going to take shots if he chose to go through with it. He said he could handle it, and I think he did. The criticism doesn't faze him. He doesn't blink. Frankly, I think it took a lot of courage.
"Eli did what I have always suggested in making big decisions," Archie Manning said. "I'm a legal pad guy. He took out a legal pad, drew a line down the middle, and put the pluses on one side and the minuses on the other side. It wasn't even close, so he went with it."
Next generation
If you know Archie Manning, you know the criticism — especially of his son — does bother him. It showed, but he weathered it, and life goes on.
Archie and Olivia Manning were back in New Orleans this week. On Tuesday, oldest son Cooper Manning's wife, Ellen, gave birth to a 101/2-pound boy, Archibald Charles Manning, named for both grandfathers. They will call him Arch.
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