As Peyton Manning was pulled from the game with 5:36 left in the third quarter and a 15-10 lead Sunday, he and Reggie Wayne, Dallas Clark and Joseph Addai could only watch from the sideline as their Indianapolis Colts’ NFL-record 23-game winning streak ended.

Their quest for a perfect season — which they’ve insisted was never a priority – diminished with the New York Jets’ 29-15 victory.

Mike Ditka, whose 1985 Chicago Bears started 12-0, is not impressed.

“Play your people. Play to win,” Ditka fumed. “If you’re afraid of injuries, you shouldn’t play football in the first place. If a coach doesn’t learn one thing from their history, every time they’ve sat their players, they’ve lost. What do you got to do? Get hit in the head with a bat to understand that? They’re going to have one week off anyway; they got a bye. They’re going to take two weeks off? You watch them play defense. You think that defense can afford to take two weeks off? I don’t know. … If you have a chance to make history, you certainly take a shot at it.”

The majority of Colts fans in attendance weren’t impressed either. They booed and shrugged, but their quarterback defended coach Jim Caldwell’s decision to rest his starters.

The loss may have been insignificant for Indy, but it was crucial to the now 8-7 Jets, who are officially in control of their playoff destiny. They’ll have a shot at making the playoffs for the first time since 2006 with a home victory over the AFC Champion Cincinnati Bengals next week.

There was a highlight to the game for Indianapolis however, as Manning (14 of 21 for 192 yards) joined Brett Favre, Dan Marino and John Elway as the only other member of the 50,000-yard club… as if things like that matter to the Colts.

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