Peyton Manning's Record-Breaking Performance Spawns 'H18TORY' T-Shirt

Sixteen years, two teams and one career-saving surgery after entering the league, Peyton Manning has thrown his way to the top of the quarterback mountain. 

The Denver Broncos signal-caller broke Brett Favre’s all-time touchdown record Sunday night with four passing scores against the San Francisco 49ers. Manning’s 510 career passing touchdowns mark a historic milestone in the game, which is being branded with the term “H18TORY.”

If you’ve turned on ESPN at any time in the last three months, you’ll notice the term is modeled after Nike’s “RE2PECT” campaign, which honored Derek Jeter by shoehorning the shortstop’s jersey number into a word. 

If people thought Nike stretched with “RE2PECT,” they may believe the mold has been broken with “H18STORY.” 

"

#RE2PECT #H18TORY Enough with the numbers in words already.

— Jon (@I35South) October 20, 2014"

Replacing letters with numbers isn’t a novel practice, and we’re establishing a dangerous precedent if merchandisers believe they can replace any letter with any number and call it a slogan. The road to banality begins by swapping “s” with “2” and ends with the Kansas City Royals wearing “ROY29TY” shirts at the World Series. 

It’s time to rein in the slogan-pitchers and take two steps back toward reality. Manning made history, and he didn’t get to this point by forcing the ball into triple coverage every time. 

Don’t force the number slogan, sports marketers. Read your options, go through your progression and let it happen naturally. That’s how the great ones come to be.

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