ATHENS, Tenn. - Jason Estes and his family wanted so badly to see Peyton Manning speak at the ninth annual Athens Chamber of Commerce's Benefit Dinner on Saturday night that they successfully encouraged the owners of the Myrtle Beach vacation home they're visiting this week to switch from a Saturday start to a Sunday-Sunday contract.
"My wife (Karen) gave me this for Christmas," he said. "And there was no way I was going to miss this."
But Estes is almost as excited about his beloved Tennessee Volunteers switching their apparel contract from Adidas to Nike this week.
"I feel about Adidas like I do our football team," he said. "We've been in second place for too long. Time to be a winner again, and that's what Nike is. They're the best in the business."
Manning, of course, arguably has been the best in the quarterback business ever since his freshman year at UT, regardless of what brand of uniform he was wearing.
Five times the most valuable player of the NFL, he heads into his 18th season in the world's most physically demanding professional league hoping to win his second Super Bowl, and his first with the Denver Broncos.
But as he addressed more than 3,500 of his most loyal fans inside an overflowing McMinn County High School gym - some of whom had been there since 2 p.m. for his 7 p.m. talk - he spent as much time discussing life and leadership as football.
"I've learned to thrive on being uncomfortable," he said. "Life isn't a straight line. It's more like those scribbly lines my 4-year-old twins draw that my wife and I put on our refrigerator. Don't be stymied by change. Be stimulated by it."
It wasn't all serious, of course.
Referencing Colorado's recent leniency on marijuana use as he discussed his partial ownership in several Papa John's Pizza franchises, Manning noted, "Due to some recent law changes in Colorado, the pizza business is pretty good. Lots of late-night orders out there for some reason."
Regarding his Nationwide Insurance ads, he told of how everyone now addresses him with the "Nationwide is on your side" jingle.
Recalling a particular video session last season in Denver in which the coaches told him he'd forced a ball into double coverage, Manning said as soon as the coaches finished embarrassing him, wideout Demaryius Thomas began chirping behind him, as if writing new words to the jingle, "No. 18 screwed it up."
Added Peyton: "Though he might have used a different word or two than that."
Then there was his memory of his famous "Saturday Night Live" faux commercial for United Way, the skit in which he curses the kids and hits one of them in the head with a football.
"First of all, people don't believe me, but it was a Nerf football," he said. "The sound effects they added later made it sound a lot worse than it was. Second, I didn't want to do it. I kept thinking, 'My mom is going to be so disappointed.'
"But the director kept insisting. Then one of the mothers of one of the kids said she wanted me to hit her kid first. So I said I'd knock her kid out."
On stage for an hour, he certainly seemed to deliver a knockout performance for all those folks who paid as much as $75, including dinner, to hear him. He remembered the afternoon in 1994 that his high school coach at the Newman School in New Orleans, the since-retired Tony Reginelli, told him not to worry about beating out Branndon Stewart at Tennessee because all the weight he could put on at the training table "could probably make me a tight end."
Instead, he's become so popular since beating out Stewart his freshman year that someone probably could make him Tennessee's next governor, if he so desired. Or perhaps the next UT coach following Butch Jones.
Not that Manning seems too interested in either job.
"I have a lot of friends here right now," he said. "If I became the UT coach, you could cut those in half. The first time we lost a game, they'd call the radio shows asking, 'Why'd he call that play on third-and-1?' No thanks. I'd like to keep all the friends I have in Tennessee."
Of course, Manning's biggest ovation of the night may have come when he said of his former UT coach, Phillip Fulmer: "As loyal a coach as anyone could ever ask for."
Said Krista Roller, a 24-year resident of Knoxville as she soaked it all in: "This is awesome."
Added fellow Knoxville native Brian Davis, who brought his 9-year-old son Aiden to the event, both of them clad in Nike-produced Broncos gear: "I first saw this on Facebook and thought it was a joke. Why would Peyton Manning come to Athens, Tennessee? But then I found out it was real and I had to see him. I love the Vols, but I've also always been a players' fan. I follow Peyton wherever he goes."
You could make an argument that few folks have sacrificed more for the Vols than Kevin Fritts, who has a checkerboard Power T tattooed on his right calf and the word "LoyalTy" inked to his right forearm, the "T" another Power T.
"Had them for six years," said Fritts, whose wife Lori gave him a ticket to hear Manning for his Christmas present. "I've been a Tennessee fan all my life. But to see Peyton in person, this is a once-in-a-lifetime moment."
Perhaps that's why the second biggest ovation of the evening came following Peyton's introduction, when Athens businessman Hugh Cantrell said of the Volunteer State's favorite adopted son:
"I've always enjoyed watching you play, but I've enjoyed watching you be a true Southern gentleman just as much, if not more so."
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com