Eli Manning Discusses One of the Most Notable Visuals in Sports: The Manning Face
On today's Pardon My Take... ELI MANNING! The former New York Giant joined Mr. Cat and Mr. Commenter to chat about his great career in the National Football League, his two wins in the Super Bowl over the New England Patriots, how he is getting into the NFT world, and much more. If you are into the meme business, you know about the "Manning Face." Here are some screen grabs from Eli's career:
As for this interview, the guys would not be doing their job if they did not ask about these faces that the Ole Miss grad made throughout the course of his career. Here is how that conversation went down:
Mr. Cat: So, the other signature thing from your career, besides the two Super Bowls, which we should note that, in the longevity, which, it's still incredible whenever a quarterback plays for any type of streak in terms of starts because it's such a difficult position and you get hit so many times, was your face. The Manning Face. Do you know when The Manning Face would get captured?" Were you like, "Oh, crap, I had my mouth open there and I was staring off into space, the camera probably got that one." Because I know you probably didn't pay a lot of attention to social media, but it is a phenomenon and it is something I dearly, dearly miss from both you and your brother after you retired.
Eli Manning: No, I never noticed it. And you know, social media wasn't always around and there weren't always these memes and there weren't these pictures of it. So, you know, I had a good 10 years of playing football, whether it's college, or my first years in the NFL where that stuff really wasn't out there. I had already got into my habits of kind of standing there, watching the game, or reflecting of a play. And you're not thinking about the face that you're making, whether your mouth's open, or you're kind of wandering off for a little bit. It was never a concern that, you know, I think once it kind of came out and you see it, you're like, "Well, it is what it is."
Eli Manning: You know, I got too many things to worry about during a game. I can't worry about my face that I'm making at every moment when the camera could be on me. It usually catches you when something good is not happening. When something bad is happening, that's usually when it's like, "Alright, let's pan, see what Eli's face he's making here. Mouth open, you know, no emotion, face going on."
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Mr. Cat: Yes, you know it! If you had taken my phone in the year 2014 or 2015 and looked at the pictures, you would think I was your stalker, because you're like, "Why are there so many pictures of my face in your phone?"
Eli Manning: (laughing) Yes, that could be a great collection.
Mr. Cat: Oh, we should NFT it! Wait, give us one real quick. Give us your best interpretation.
Eli Manning:
Mr. Commenter: Actually, you know what, I guarantee you every football writer would vote for you to get into the Hall of Fame if that was your bust. We would all love to see it. And it's funny, because obviously, if you were to take a picture of me at any given moment of any given day, the face that I'm just casually making probably looks a million times stupider. But it just, you know, it happened to be you on the sidelines. I think that cameras actually, the producers would tell the camera guys, "Instead of trying to find an attractive woman in the stands to zoom in on, just keep this camera, this is going to be the Eli camera for the afternoon." But yeah, it was a fun part of our Sunday's.
Eli Manning: And then there's just one camera on me and they're like, "Alright, we got it! He's making it! Zoom in! Go, go! Camera two, on it live!"
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After all of the unique faces that Eli Manning has made during his career on the gridiron, it is very cool to see that he could have fun with a conversation like this one. If and when he makes it into Canton one day, we can only hope that we get a bust similar to the pictures above revealed during his enshrinement ceremony.