FACEOFF: Who is the NFL's best QB: Brady or Manning?

Manning is the man you want

This is not about who's better looking or has won more Super Bowls or does the funniest TV commercials.

This is about when your team is down in the fourth quarter and needs to drive 80 yards for the winning touchdown to win a crucial playoff game.

That's when I want Peyton Manning as my quarterback.

Granted, Tom Brady is a heck of a player.

He's good looking, dates super models and has won three Super Bowls with the New England Patriots.

But when it matters most, I want the guy who was raised by an NFL quarterback to be an NFL quarterback.

Manning is a professional quarterback machine. What he's done from his days at Tennessee to his personal obsession in taking the Indianapolis Colts to a Super Bowl title (with more to come) is not only remarkable, but unbelievable.

Compare stats all you want. Indeed, these two men are almost identical in pass completion percentages (plus 60 percent) and both are natural-born leaders.

But with two extra years of experience and a work ethic beyond compare, Manning is the man I want next to me in the foxhole when the bullets start flying.

Reach Ken Burger at kburger@postandcourier.com.

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Brady, and it's not even close

By Gene Sapakoff

It's the player debate of a generation, which means Peyton Manning isn't bad. Just not as sensational as Tom Brady.

It was close before September, Brady's three Super Bowl rings and clutch performances vs. Manning's ring and statistics but lots of playoff disasters. Now Brady has fancy new New England receivers and playground numbers (30 touchdown passes, two interceptions).

Of course, Brady has Bill Belichick.

Or the other way around.

"The number one criteria for being a genius in this business is to have a great quarterback, and in New England he had one, and in Cleveland he did not," longtime Belichick confidant Ernie Adams said in the Belichick-authorized and edited "The Education of a Coach" by the late genius David Halberstam.

Brady, with 360-degree vision and bouncy feet, routinely makes nick-of-time throws.

Like Joe Montana noticing John Candy in the stands during the 49ers' game-winning drive against Cincinnati in Super Bowl XXIII, he can deflate intensity — long enough to chit-chat with foes between plays. Or perhaps Brady is just killing with kindness, another weapon.

Manning the man, the character and the commercials are tremendous. Peyton's place in the great sports debate of our time, however, is No. 2.

Reach Gene Sapakoff at gsapakoff@postandcourier.com