Peyton Manning: Colts QB Deserves Props for Putting Phil Simms in His Place

Thank you, Peyton Manning, for finally doing what Jim Nantz has never had the courage to do—get Phil Simms to shut up.

Well, the injured Indianapolis Colts star didn't exactly do that to the former NFL veteran, Super Bowl champion and bumbling CBS color commentator. Simms has been a news maker of late, mouthing off about how he doesn't think Stanford's Andrew Luck, the consensus top pick in the 2012 NFL Draft, is all that he's cracked up to be as a surefire, superstar quarterback in the NFL, nor does he think Manning will allow the Colts to select Luck if they have the opportunity to do so.

All Manning did was respond to a simple statement by Phillip B. Wilson of the Indianapolis Star with just the sort of surprisingly sharp yet muted wit you'd expect from a man of Manning's acute intellect:

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“Yeah, I don’t talk to Phil. Phil doesn’t talk to me. He did text me after that, saying ‘Hey, sorry to drag your name into this.’ I wrote back, ‘Phil I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ He said, ‘Well on my show, Inside the NFL, I made this statement.’ I said, ‘Phil, I hate to break it to you, but I don’t watch your show, along with a lot of other people that I don’t think watch that show.’ Giving himself a little more credit than probably was merited."

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My thoughts exactly. Who watches Phil Simms' show on Showtime anyway? And is it on before or after Dexter? Or is it an adjunct to Weeds? 

So why in the world would anyone bother with what Simms has to say? Sure, Phil had a pretty good career—two Pro Bowls, two Super Bowl titles, his No.11 retired by the New York Giants—but he's hardly been lauded as an insightful analyst or a sharp judge of talent.

And don't get me started about how his sons, Chris and Matt, have fared thanks to daddy's advice.

This latest manufactured fiasco smacks of the same sort of drivel that came out of ESPN when in-house analyst and Where the Wild Things Are monster look-alike Merril Hoge came out bashing Tim Tebow...except Hoge knew what he was talking about, and no one other than ESPN gave his remarks (or the supposed backlash) much coverage.

You'll inevitably see Manning's comments misconstrued as him calling out Simms or going out of his way to insult the guy whose son currently rides the pine at Tennessee, Manning's alma mater.

But Manning wasn't trying to put Simms down. He wasn't going out of his way to make Phil look like a fool.

He was merely stating the facts and insinuating the obvious—that nobody watches Simms' show and nobody cares about what Simms has to say anyway.

Especially not Manning, and definitely not Luck, who will probably be twice the quarterback Simms could ever have hoped to be once he hits the NFL.

Either way, I think we all owe Manning a smidgen of gratitude for silencing Simms, at least long enough for him to stumble over his own words while sitting next to Nantz in the booth on Sunday.