Leftwich and Manning on opposite ends of learning curve

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- The season wears on, the turnovers mount and all his friends and coaches tell the rookie quarterback to hang in there.\nPeyton Manning lived through it five years ago. Byron Leftwich is going through it right now.\nWhen the Indianapolis Colts meet the Jacksonville Jaguars Sunday, it will be a matchup of quarterbacks who were highly touted coming out of college, expected to lead their struggling franchises to better days.\nManning and the Colts (7-1) took their lumps during his 3-13 rookie season, but now, they are reaping rewards. Leftwich, a rookie, and the Jaguars (1-7) are only beginning the rebuilding process.\n"I think for a quarterback -- not necessarily for the team, but for the quarterback -- it's the best thing to be in there and playing," Manning said.\nThe first pick in the 1998 draft, Manning started every game as a rookie and threw for an impressive 3,739 yards and 26 touchdowns. But he was an indiscriminate thrower, not yet comfortable with the speed and intricacies of NFL defenses. He threw 28 interceptions, which brought his passer rating down to 71.2, 23rd in the league.\nHe remembers things getting better as the season progressed.\n"It was still fast, but things started to slow down," Manning said. "We didn't win a lot, but we were in a lot of ball games. I think you'll probably see that with Byron."\nLeftwich has nine interceptions in five starts, and is on pace for 21 if he starts the rest of the season. Fumbles, however, are a bigger problem. His tendency to hold the ball low and with one hand, and to not step up in the pocket, have caused him to fumble nine times and lose six. Last week, he lost two fumbles and threw a game-clinching interception in a 24-17 loss to Baltimore.\n"I don't think I'm doing anything too bad," Leftwich said. "But for some reason, if I do something wrong, it goes very, very wrong."\nCoach Jack Del Rio said at least a subtle change in mechanics is needed, although he doesn't believe it would be appropriate to try anything too drastic until the offseason. Until then, Leftwich and the Jaguars will make small changes to try to patch things up.\n"They were slapping, slapping, slapping at me during practice," Leftwich said of the defense's newly concentrated effort to remind the rookie to hold the ball high.\nWatching Leftwich get better this year -- if he does -- figures to be one of the few highlights for Jaguars fans in what is turning out to be a miserable season. Jacksonville went 5-11 in its expansion year, and the Jags are going to have to make drastic improvements to hit that mark this season.\nWord is, the term "rebuilding" is finally being used in the front office, where they're realizing the free-agent signing of Hugh Douglas (15 tackles, once sack) is looking like a bust and the offense is having trouble finding receivers who can get open.\nIf rebuilding is the theme, it makes sense to give Leftwich his snaps. The quarterback, however, isn't using inexperience as an excuse.\n"I don't look at myself as a rookie," he said. "I look at myself as a player who has to help this team win games."\nManning quickly became that. He has thrown for 4,000 yards in every season since his rookie year. The Colts have made the playoffs three of the last four years (although they haven't won a postseason game). At the halfway point of this season, Indy leads the AFC South by a game over Tennessee, and Manning leads the league with 2,128 yards. He has thrown only six picks against 16 TDs.\n"When you draft a guy like Peyton Manning, or a guy who's going to be the quarterback of the future, usually the reason you're drafting him is because you need that productivity," said Colts coach Tony Dungy, who was in Tampa when the Colts picked Manning. "I think playing them and putting them in is the way to go. I think those guys benefit from playing and learning."\nWhile Manning stars on offense, second-year defensive end Dwight Freeney is making news on the other side of the ball. He has six sacks in the last three games, including three sacks and two forced fumbles last week in a win at Miami.\nIn other words, he is exactly the kind of player a turnover-prone quarterback like Leftwich doesn't need to be seeing this week.\n"Every time I go after the quarterback, whether he's holding the ball high or low, that's my thought process," Freeney said. "I'm going to go after the quarterback and the ball"