Peyton Manning is coming out with a full-throated defense against accusations that he took HGH sent to his wife by Charlie Sly, whose name lends about as much credibility to the story as writing a promissory note on the back of the Comics section. Unfortunately, Peyton’s defense isn’t great. He curiously doesn’t deny that his wife received HGH— he just says he never took any medicine prescribed for his wife, as if being sent HGH is about as routine as a Z-Pak prescription. He hired former Bush pitchman Ari Fleischer, no stranger to whitewashing dubious history, for his public defense. And, like most of the NFL elite, relied on Chris Mortensen to do his bidding, which Mort did this morning, in quite possibly the most inelegant way imaginable. Mort sounded like he was hitting the leftover eggnog a bit hard late last night:

Side note: Not calling Peyton a liar. The story may well be false. But not because Mortensen and Fleischer helped him say so.