PEYTON MANNING’S SPECTACULAR season was every bit the record-breaking sensation it appeared. The NFL said Tuesday that Manning’s single-season mark of 5,477 yards passing will stand.
Elias Sports Bureau, the league’s official statistician, reviewed a 7-yard pass from Manning to wide receiver Eric Decker and determined it will remain a forward pass and not a lateral, which would have made it a 7-yard run.
That would have subtracted seven yards from Manning’s total, leaving him with 5,470 yards, six shy of Drew Brees’ 2011 record.
“The stats crew at the game scored this play as a forward pass. During the course of a season, there are many similar plays which could be reviewed by the Elias,” NFL spokesman Michael Signora said. “In this case, the determination of Elias is that the fairest resolution is for the ruling of the on-site stats crew to stand.”
The play in question occurred with just over a minute remaining in the first quarter of Denver’s 34-14 win at Oakland on Sunday.
Remember that camera angles can be deceiving, depending on where the camera is located. But there were two angles that would back up whichever argument one wants to make.
Manning’s pass clearly looks like a lateral in one camera angle. Another angle, from above, however, appears to show Decker gathering in the ball at the Denver 48-yard line with Manning about a foot deeper than that.
Manning finished with 266 yards passing before sitting out the second half, and his final throw was a 6-yard TD toss to Demaryius Thomas which gave him 5,477 yards for the season and also 55 TD passes, five more than Tom Brady’s record set in 2007, considered a much more significant achievement that the single-season yardage mark.
With Denver safely ahead 31-0 at halftime and the home-field advantage throughout the AFC playoffs secured, Manning watched backup Brock Osweiler play the entire second half in his place.
