A Rivers Runs Through It*

 (*A play in one act)

Morning. The head coach's office at the Indianapolis Colts complex. In a panicked frenzy, Shane Steichen is tearing open drawers, rummaging through cabinets, flinging clipboards and tablets and tattered  copies of "Football For Dummies" out of the storage closet onto the office's blue-and-white carpet.

Steichen: Dammit! Where is he? He's got to be SOMEWHERE!

Offensive coordinator Jim Bob Cooter: Who, Coach?

Steichen: Our other quarterback! You know, what's-his-name!

Cooter: Um, Coach, we don't have a what's-his-name.

Steichen: You mean ...

Cooter: Yup. We're fresh out of quarterbacks.

Wide receivers coach Reggie Wayne: Fresh out.

Linebackers coach Cato June: Cupboard's bare, boss.

(Steichen bends over in anguish, presses his hands to his head, utters a sound halfway between a moan and a growl)

Steichen: Gaaah! You mean we've got NO ONE? Danny's out for the year, AR's on the IR with the eye thing, and now O'Riley Leonard's hurt, TOO?

Cooter: Um, that's Riley Leonard, Coach.

Steichen: Oh, yeah. Right. Anyway, he's hurt, too? So what do we do now?

(Cooter, Wayne, June and the rest of the coaching staff shuffle their feet, clear their throats, stare at the carpet)

Cooter: Well ...

Wayne: Well ...

June: There's always ...

Steichen: You mean Peyton? Come on, he's too busy making many commercials and yukking it up with Eli on Monday nights. 

Cooter: No, not Peyton.

Steichen: Jeff George? I mean, he still lives in town, but he's so ancient there are drawings of him on cave walls.

Cooter: No.

Steichen: Who, then?

Cooter: Well ... we could give Philip Rivers a call.

Steichen: PHILIP RIVERS?? Man, he hasn't played in five years, and he was old then. What is he now, 75? Hell, he's got grandkids, for cryin' out loud!

Cooter: Now, wait a minute, he's only 44. And, yes, he hasn't taken a snap in five years, which in NFL years is more like 30. But he knows the organization. And some of the guys he played with are still here -- one or two, anyway. And it's not like he's got anything better to do.

Steichen: Well, hell, neither does Cam Newton. I mean, have you seen him on TV?

Cooter:  Have YOU? The other day he showed up dressed as William Tecumseh Sherman, only with a pith helmet and a riding crop. I think he might have been sporting a monocle, too. We sign him, the clothing allowance alone would break us.

(Steichen sighs)

Steichen: Well ... I guess it's Gramps or nobody, then. Unless we can figure out a way to raise Unitas from the dead, that is.

(Pause)

We can't do that, can we?

(The next day, the Colts announce they're adding Philip Rivers to the practice squad. America reacts with a chorus of "What th-?" Occasionally someone is heard to say, "Philip Rivers? You mean he's still alive?")