Now that Peyton Manning is our starting quarterback, I wanted to delve into his numbers to find out more about him. His reputation preceeds him, yet I'm not sure some of us realize his importance to the offensive side of the ball...myself included. This is going to be the first in a three part series. In this article, I'm going to analyze his winning percentages in some situations, as well as his individual stats, and the Colts offensive rankings during his 13 year tenure. In part II, I will analyze first down and red zone numbers, and in the final installment, I'll analyze his playoff performance.

Peyton Manning, since his emergence into the NFL in 1998, has (with the exception of last year) started every game in his career. In these numbers, that accounts for 208 career regular season starts. After a lot of research and analysis, I'm excited to share his results with the rest of the MHR community---let's get to it.

There are a plethora of situations that one can analyze when trying to come to conclusions about a players' productivity. In this first analysis, I looked specifically at every outcome in every regular season game and categorized the results. The first analysis has to do with Peyton Manning's win/loss record as well as percentages in the category of point differential. In other words, how did he stack up in games where the point differential was 3 or less points, 4-8 points, and more than 9 points? My intention here is to examine how well he did in extremely close games, games that ended with the teams being within one score of each other,and games that ended with the teams being two scores or more with each other:

3 points or less	4-8 points	9+ points
32-19	40-19	69-29
62.7%	67.7%	70.4%

Here's what I gather from the data. Led by Peyton Manning, the Colts were remarkably consistent with their results in three various situations. In 51 games that ended with the score separating the Colts and the other teams by three points or less, they posted a 62.7% winning percentage. If you're not too into numbers, that means that for every three games that ended this way, about two were victories for the Colts. This ratio is similar in games that ended with the final score being 4-8 points apart (67.7). What is very interesting and indicative of the efficiency of the Colts offense under Peyton Manning, that of 98 starts that ended with a point differential of nine or more points, the Colts won an astounding 70% of the time.

What this tells me is that Peyton Manning is capable of winning in any type of game. It also tells me that in about a third of the games he started, the Colts won by more than one score. Before we get into a more team-oriented analysis, I want to examine Peyton's personal statistics.

Year	Comp	Att	%	YDS	TD	INT	FUM	F/LOST
1998	326	575	56.7	3739	26	28	3	1
1999	331	533	62.1	4135	28(2)	15	6	3
2000	357	571	62.5	4413	34(1)	15	5	2
2001	343	547	62.7	4131	30(4)	23	7	3
2002	392	591	66.3	4200	29(2)	19	6	2
2003	379	566	67.0	4267	29	10	6	1
2004	336	497	67.6	4557	49	10	5	1
2005	305	453	67.3	3747	28	10	5	2
2006	362	557	65.0	4397	35(4)	9	2	1
2007	337	515	65.4	4040	34(3)	14	6	1
2008	371	555	66.8	4002	28(1)	12	1	0
2009	393	571	68.8	4500	36	16	2	0
2010	450	679	66.3	4700	33	17	3	1

The numbers in parenthesis represent his rushing touchdowns. Aside from his rookie year, Peyton has never failed to attain at least a 62% completion percentage. Since the 2002 season, he has never failed to attain at least a 65% completion percentage. This is consistency of the highest degree. Notice also that Peyton has never thrown for less than 26 touchdowns in any given season, in seven of his thirteen seasons, he has thrown for 30 or more touchdowns. In his career, he has accounted for 419 total touchdowns and 216 total turnovers. So for about every two touchdowns he contributes to the offense, he contributes about 1 turnover. Since 2003, he averaged 34 TD's and 13 turnovers per season. Finally in 11 of 13 seasons, Peyton also threw for 4000 yards or more

Moving back to offensive output, I've seen some broad generalizations here that don't take into account specific scoring ranges. In other words, exactly how much does a Peyton Manning offense score 10 or less points? How about 32 or more points? Below, I broke down the points scored by Peyton's Colt offenses---included is how many times these offenses socred in a range, and what percentage that makes up of his 208 regular season starts:

0-10 points	11-17 points	18-24 points	25-31 points	32+ points
11 times	36 times	53 times	57 times	51 times
5.2%	17.3%	25.5%	27.4%	24.5%

In 208 regular season games, the Colts offense has failed to score at least ten points only 11 times (5.2 percent of games). They have managed to score 11-17 points 36 times (17.3%), 18-24 points 53 times (25.5%). Now what we have left is very exciting offensively. In over half of his starts, the Colts have managed to score 25 or more points---and in a quarter of his starts, the Colts offense scored MORE THAN 32 POINTS!!! Simply put, he is a quarterback capable of putting extreme pressure on opposing defenses. It is absolutely amazing that his Colts in 208 games, managed to score 32 or more points on 51 different occasions! Though all of this is very encouraging so far, I have saved the best for last: The Colts offensive rankings during his tenure---and if this doesn't blow you away, you have no hope.

Year	Overall Rank	Offensive Pass Rank	Offensive Rush Rank	Scoring Rank	Points Per Game
1998	12	6	26	19	19.4
1999	4	4	19	3	26.1
2000	3	2	16	3	26.9
2001	2	2	7	2	25.8
2002	9	4	26	16	21.8
2003	3	1	19	T-2	27.9
2004	2	1	15	1	32.6
2005	3	3	16	2	27.4
2006	3	2	18	T-3	26.7
2007	5	6	18	2	28.0
2008	15	5	31	11	23.7
2009	9	2	32	7	26.0
2010	4	1	29	3	27.2

All of the ranking numbers show the Colts rank out of 32 NFL teams. Since 98, a Peyton Manning led offense has placed top 10 in overall yardage eleven times. Out of these eleven occasions, they have been a top 5 team in yardage nine times. NEVER in his 13 year career, has the passing offense been ranked lower than sixth! They have been a top three passing team eight times----why is this important? Look at their ranks in rushing. ONLY ONCE has Peyton Manning ever had a running game that ranked in the top 10. They have been in the middle of the league five times, and have been in the bottom third seven times. You might be saying, "well that's all good Bronco Mike, but yards are meaningless without points." Remember how I alluded to their scoring efficiency earlier? Peyton Manning, with little help from his running game, has led the Colts offense to a top three scoring team TEN TIMES! Only three times have they finished outside of the top ten. Manning has shouldered the offensive side of the ball and more than carried his weight almost every season he has started. It is no doubt to me that with him at the helm, the Broncos are perennial contenders capable of winning double-digit games.

What does this mean for the Broncos? Even if Peyton Manning isn't quite at his elite status from the past 5 years, if he can get a little help from the Broncos running game, our offense should have no trouble being at least a top 10 offense this next year. In Indy, he had no help from the running game, and essentially carried all of the offensive burden. Not only did he succeed, he about blew every other offense out of the water on a consistent basis. While there is a lot to be learned about his capabilities post injury, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't extremely encouraged and happy to have someone the caliber of Peyton Manning as our next Broncos quarterback.

I sincerely hope that this analysis has helped you become more hopeful and excited about the upcomming Broncos season, join me for part two, and we'll get into Peyton Manning's first down and redzone output, thanks my friends!