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"&lt;p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;DENVER -- There are these moments, these stretched-out, slow-motion moments, when the stadium seems to swirl around him. Fans mill and teammates swarm, ticking off their pregame checklists. Cameramen in their neon vests swoop and crouch, flitting from star to star, smile to smile.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;And he stretches, and he doesn\u2019t quite scowl, but he acknowledges nothing. He claps. He stands. He paces, stepping square on each hash, slowly, precisely, somehow apart. A half-hour later, his teammates bounce out of an inflatable, horse-shaped tunnel. There are bursts of fire, gestures and dances. It is pure pageantry. He comes last.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Peyton Manning runs in a straight line, helmet on, eyes ahead, as if this is any other game.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;NFL Week 1 coverage hub |&lt;/strong&gt; &lt;strong&gt;Challenge friends in weekly fantasy game&lt;/strong&gt;\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;On Sunday night, the Broncos eked out a 31-24 win over the Colts, Manning\u2019s first victory over his former team. What looked to be a blowout at halftime -- the Broncos were up by 17 -- left Denver holding its breath at the two-minute warning, and it was a rookie cornerback, not the best quarterback in the game, who saved the night.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Sure, Manning finished the game with 269 yards and three touchdown passes, but his receivers seemed to miss a beat without Wes Welker. The Broncos\u2019 heralded, new-look defense also wavered at times, and maybe the game was closer than it should have been -- or maybe Andrew Luck is just that good. Regardless, the Broncos are who they claim to be. They are Super Bowl contenders. They are a defense rejuvenated, with a chance to be among the NFL\u2019s better units.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;They are, finally, the team that Manning built.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;***\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;An hour south of Denver, in Colorado Springs, Madi Zawacki monitors her eBay listing. She wants to go on a trip with her high school biology class, you see, but it\u2019s a pricey proposition -- so pricey, in fact, that she listed a jersey on the auction site to raise funds. It\u2019s one of those half-and-half creations, one side Colts blue, one side Broncos orange, No. 18 -- and it\u2019s autographed. Zawacki is asking $750. She won\u2019t part with it lightly.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Zawacki found the jersey last winter, and she took it home thanks to a trade at a sports collectibles shop in Denver. It cost her a Julius Thomas autographed football and $200, and it was worth it, she thought, a good luck token for the Super Bowl. About that, she was wrong -- but she\u2019ll still be sad to part with it, she said.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Eleven months ago in Indianapolis, craft-project jerseys similar to Zawacki\u2019s abounded. They belonged to Colts fans whose allegiances swayed with Manning, to universal supporters of the quarterback, no matter the team. They were everywhere. On Sunday in Denver, though, such creations were harder to spot. They popped up in every couple of sections, maybe, just a smattering. And yet, not one was quite like Zawacki\u2019s.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The Colts blue is a little off, a bit too dark. And wait -- the collar is ringed in orange, not white. This isn\u2019t a Colts half. It\u2019s a Broncos alternate jersey stitched together with a road white, because it\u2019s been three years, because Manning versus Indianapolis is last year\u2019s news, because the Colts are Luck\u2019s team.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Because Peyton\u2019s city is Denver now.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;***\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;When Demarcus Ware signed with the Broncos in March, it ended the defensive end\u2019s nine-year tenure in Dallas. The Cowboys were the only team he\u2019d ever known, and he was their king. Injuries slowed Ware in his final season in Texas, and just like Manning two years before, he had questions when he arrived in Denver.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;How could he make this new place his home? How would he become a leader within months? There were smaller concerns, too: where to live, where to grocery shop. Where would he feel comfortable?\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;So Ware turned to Manning. &lt;em&gt;Live in this neighborhood,&lt;/em&gt; the quarterback suggested, &lt;em&gt;you\u2019ll be comfortable&lt;/em&gt;. Manning covered the logistics, but he also left the defensive end with a better sense of how to become Demarcus Ware, Denver Bronco.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CI think the main thing is to just be you,\u201D Ware recalled Manning telling him. \u201CWe\u2019ve been playing for so long -- me 10 [years], him 17 -- and so it\u2019s a new color, a new jersey, a new atmosphere, but he told me that if I go out and play with the same tenacity as I did with the Cowboys and he did with Indy, the sky\u2019s the limit.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CPeyton\u2019s done it really well in being effective,\u201D Ware added. \u201CAt the end of the day, it\u2019s all about how you play. \u2026 If you can be effective and still be a great leader, eventually the guys corral around you and make you really comfortable. They know you\u2019re the guy they look up to, the guy who\u2019s going to help out, the leader that they need.\u201D\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Ware\u2019s transition has been seamless. He\u2019s the smiling, soft-spoken captain who still leaves younger players in awe -- and he has Manning to thank, at least in part.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;***\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;In Denver, it\u2019s possible to eat your dinner at John Elway\u2019s restaurant and buy your car at a dealership bearing his name. It\u2019s as if No. 7 sprung out of the Rockies, as if Stanford and California never happened, because Elway is Denver, through and through.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Manning will never be that, which is understandable. The Broncos were Elway\u2019s career, and they are Manning\u2019s retirement home, the team with which he\u2019ll spend the admittedly awesome twilight of his career. Even so, Manning in Denver feels like more than just a late-career rental, and never more than on Sunday, thanks to the phenomenon that is Andrew Luck.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;On Sunday, Luck stomped into town and made an offense that would be mediocre at best without him look excellent.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CHe\u2019s at the top,\u201D Broncos safety Rahim Moore said of Luck. \u201CI see his growth. I\u2019ve been playing against him since college. I\u2019ve known him since high school. \u2026 He\u2019s at the top of the game. When Manning retires, Andrew Luck, I believe, is going to take over the game.\u201D\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Indianapolis has moved on, with good reason, and somehow, that makes No. 18 in orange seem that much less jarring. It makes four years ago seem like 14, and when Manning refers to the Colts as \u201Cthey,\u201D it flows easily off the tongue. &lt;em&gt;Their&lt;/em&gt; offense, &lt;em&gt;their&lt;/em&gt; game plan, &lt;em&gt;their&lt;/em&gt; attack. There\u2019s no being rattled this season, not like last year, when playing in the stadium he built proved to be more than Manning bargained for. Now, though, with a Super Bowl trip behind him and a revamped roster, Manning will take the stadium he built and raise it a team. This season, Manning may just have the deepest, most complete roster he ever has, and that trumps nostalgia a thousand times over.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;With the win Sunday, Manning added the Colts to the list of NFL teams he\u2019s defeated. Thirty-one became 32, a feat only he and Brett Favre have accomplished. It\u2019s a feat of greatness, but it\u2019s also a feat of permanence, a fact that doesn\u2019t escape the Broncos\u2019 quarterback.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\u201CI think it means you have to be old,\u201D Manning said. \u201CYou have to be 38 years old, at least, to beat all 32 teams. I don\u2019t think I\u2019ll put that up on my mantel or anything.\u201D\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;In moments like these, he\u2019s all too willing to embrace his age and the miles he\u2019s put on his arm. Manning doesn\u2019t want to admit to the emotion in this, to acknowledge that his place has changed, and his legacy, too. So he\u2019ll joke about being 38, a full 14 years older than Luck, and he\u2019ll play the cranky old man. He\u2019ll play it -- but only when it\u2019s convenient.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;A few moments later, Manning is asked about his successor. &lt;em&gt;Luck is good. Among the best. Some might say he\u2019ll be the best to ever play. &lt;/em&gt;\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Manning laughs. The subject, he said, is \u201Ca little deep for a Tennessee graduate.\u201D But there\u2019s a nanosecond before the joke, when those five words come at him. His eyes flash. &lt;em&gt;The best to ever play&lt;/em&gt; -- Manning isn\u2019t having that, not yet, not when he\u2019s got a few great seasons left. Not when he\u2019s out for that second Super Bowl and armed to do it.\r\n\r\n&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;And when he glares for that blink of a moment, before he cracks his signature joke, Manning is the purest form of himself. He\u2019s determined, focused, hungry, and maybe Madi Zawacki shouldn\u2019t sell her jersey, not quite yet. It may just be worth twice as much come February.\r\n&lt;/p&gt;"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.si.com/nfl/2014/09/08/peyton-manning-denver-broncos-indianapolis-colts>