But for 90 seconds just before kickoff Sunday night, the roar of the crowd was too loud to ignore. Manning removed his helmet, raised his right hand to wave, and slowly turned to acknowledge the fans in every corner of this stadium that he used to call home.
"It's something I'll always remember, and I'm very grateful for that," Manning said.
The next 60 minutes of the Colts' 39-33 win showed that however much the fans of this city might still revere Manning, Indianapolis has moved on.
For much of the night, Andrew Luck was the better quarterback, and the Colts were certainly the better team as they handed the Broncos and Manning their first loss of the season, their first regular-season loss since Oct. 7, 2012 — a streak of 19 consecutive games.
"Andrew's a stud," Indianapolis safety Antoine Bethea said. "I don't think he gets enough credit for what he can do on the football field, the way he leads this offense. What he does for this team, it's huge. On this stage, he handled it well. It's his team now."
This certainly was a night for nostalgia, and time for some closure for fans who never got a real chance to say goodbye to Manning before the series of neck surgeries that sidelined him in 2011 and his subsequent release in March 2012. Lucas Oil Stadium was full of folks in No. 18 jerseys, many of them Colts blue, others in Broncos orange, and plenty of others in half-and-half jerseys made especially for this occasion. Source and More Details
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