No matter what Dan Grossman and Archie Manning thought before the NFL playoffs started, they knew perception was winning the argument with reality in most discussions about their sons.
Peyton Manning can’t win a big playoff game, critics said. Rex Grossman can’t win a playoff game, period.
For different reasons, both Super Bowl quarterbacks had accumulated almost enough doubters entering the postseason to form a single-file line along the 185 miles of road between Indianapolis and Chicago.
Manning and Grossman don’t have much in common at this stage of their careers. But they do share the experience of having recently shed labels that identified them almost as much as their jersey numbers.
So right after Manning had rallied the Colts from an 18-point deficit against the New England Patriots in the AFC championship game for the right to play the Bears in the Super Bowl, Dan Grossman called Archie Manning to share a moment of deliverance between dads.
“When I finally reached him, we were both celebrating that we got through all the battles and got there [to the Super Bowl],” Dan Grossman said. “As Archie likes to say, people don’t understand the emotions these quarterbacks go through. We relate to each other pretty well because we both know what it’s like, so it’s never a bad idea to reach out to people like that.”
One Super father just felt like he was returning the favor to another.
After Rex Grossman posted a 1.3 passer rating Dec. 3 against the Minnesota Vikings to unleash a late-season torrent of criticism in Chicago, it was Archie Manning who called Dan Grossman because he had “empathy” for the Grossmans. When Rex returned to form against the St. Louis Rams with his job on the line, Archie Manning sent a text message to the elder Grossman the next day expressing his joy and relief.
Bob Griese won two Super Bowl rings playing in the city where his son, Brian, arrived Sunday night with the Bears hoping to add to the family collection. Emery Moorehead, a tight end for the ’85 Bears, will root for his son, Aaron, a receiver for the Colts, and risk alienating potential clients of his Deerfield real-estate business.
But the biggest Super Bowl subplot about dads this week involves Dan Grossman and Archie Manning reveling in their sons’ success as NFL quarterbacks, which both know came only at a high emotional cost.
“It’s tough as parents to hear those things said about your kid,” Manning said. “That’s your son out there. It hardens you a little bit, honestly. Even with Peyton, my big football-playing son, you still think of him as your little boy sometimes when he gets attacked. So I guess I called Dan [in December] because I knew misery loves company.”
The Grossmans and Mannings became friends when they met at an Ole Miss tailgate party when Eli Manning was the quarterback for Mississippi playing against Rex Grossman and Florida. Each family had little doubt, given its pedigree, that it would raise a quarterback.
When Archie Manning was finishing third in the Heisman Trophy race in 1970 as Ole Miss’ quarterback, Dan Grossman was a sophomore quarterback at Indiana–just like his dad, Rex Sr. Just as Manning’s sons gravitated toward the game, Rex was born into such a football family that his mother, Maureen, once recalled the day she told her son while he was still in diapers to “grow up big and strong because they’re going to want you to play football.”
The fathers developed a rapport following their future NFL quarterbacks around the Southeastern Conference and got reacquainted this season as Grossman’s inconsistency became one of the most polarizing issues around the league.
Manning has enough NFL action to follow, with Peyton playing at a Hall of Fame level in Indianapolis and Eli awkwardly finding his way with the Giants. But his relationship with the Grossmans and in the past with Bears quarterbacks coach Wade Wilson–they had been Minnesota Vikings teammates in 1983-84–gave Manning enough reason to keep track of Grossman’s development.
“Rex just went through the yo-yo year that young quarterbacks go through, but he’ll be fine,” Manning said. “That’s why even though it was hard for me to see my old team, the Saints, lose, I was happy for Rex and his family because I know what they’ve been through.”
Most people relate Grossman’s struggles to Eli Manning’s because of their closeness in age. But Peyton Manning’s similar struggles in his first season as an NFL starter in 1998 began to prepare Archie and Olivia Manning to be adversity experts.
After Peyton threw 11 interceptions in his first four games that year, fans wondered if it was time for the Colts to bench him the way the Chargers benched the quarterback picked after Manning, Ryan Leaf. Manning improved steadily over the season and set several rookie passing records, but his 28 interceptions still left some concerned about his decision-making.
Sports Illustrated even speculated that Manning’s uneven season might not have prepared him as much for the long haul as sitting behind John Elway with the Broncos had groomed fellow rookie Brian Griese.
The lesson Archie Manning took from that? It takes more than one season, perhaps several, as an NFL starter before a quarterback fully evolves into the player the team drafted him to be.
“I’ve seen Rex play enough that you can just tell from his makeup that he’s a special quarterback,” Archie Manning said. “He’s got the best arm of any of the Florida quarterbacks. It’s an experience game. It just takes time to adjust.”
Dan Grossman’s biggest adjustment this week might be hearing people say nice things about his son for the first time in a while, not that he plans to pay attention. After a season in which the criticism of his son made Grossman grow increasingly frustrated with the Chicago media, he vowed last week to “refuse to let the press bug me.”
More than 40 Grossman family members are expected to keep him in a good mood. And Grossman has a good friend only a phone call away if he needs an understanding ear.
“Archie’s first-class,” Grossman said. “He’s been a big help. I consider the Manning family role models for the rest of us. Because sometimes, it’s not easy.”
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dhaugh@tribune.com
