SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - While fans from Denver are already picturing Peyton Manning hoisting the Lombardi Trophy in their team's jersey just as he did for Indianapolis five years ago, history offers a cautionary tale.
No quarterback in NFL history has ever won the Super Bowl for two franchises and only Kurt Warner has gotten back there with another team after winning his first.
The Broncos beat out Tennessee and San Francisco to win the Manning Derby. Now they must hope he will be able to do what Johnny Unitas, Joe Namath, Joe Montana and Brett Favre couldn't.
Manning is one of 29 quarterbacks to start for the winning team in the Super Bowl, having won it with the Colts in 2007 against the Chicago Bears.
Seventeen of those quarterbacks didn't play for another team after winning football's biggest prize, including five active players.
Of the 11 who moved on to new teams, their experiences varied widely.
There was Unitas and Namath stumbling to the finish of Hall of Fame careers in unfamiliar uniforms with the San Diego Chargers and Los Angeles Rams, respectively.
There were journeymen like Trent Dilfer and Brad Johnson, who bounced around after their surprising titles with Baltimore and Tampa Bay. Then then was Favre, who after twice coming out of retirement almost got back to the Super Bowl with Minnesota.
Perhaps the most similar case to Manning's is that of Joe Montana, the iconic quarterback in San Francisco who led the 49ers to four Super Bowl titles.
Injuries cost him almost the entire 1991 and `92 seasons and by the time he was healthy again, the Niners had moved on with Steve Young as their starter, just like the Colts appear ready to do with presumed No. 1 overall pick Andrew Luck.
San Francisco traded Montana to Kansas City, where he led the Chiefs to their first division championship in 22 years in 1993 and took them to the AFC championship game, where they lost 30-13 to Buffalo. He played well again in 1994, beating the 49ers in the regular season on the way to another playoff appearance, where they lost in the wild-card round to Miami in Montana's final game.
Montana was one of the four of these quarterbacks who won a playoff game with another team.
Jeff Hostetler split two playoff games for the Los Angeles Raiders in January 1994 - three years after leading the New York Giants to their second Super Bowl title over the Buffalo Bills.
Favre, who failed to lead the Jets to the playoffs in his first time out of retirement in 2008, joined Minnesota in 2009 after retiring again. The Vikings went 12-4 and made it to the NFC title game, where they lost in overtime to New Orleans. Favre stepped away again after a disappointing 2010 season.
Warner had perhaps the most success after leaving his title team. After an ineffective stint as Eli Manning's tutor with the New York Giants, Warner had a late-career revival in Arizona.
In 2008, he helped one of the league's most inept franchises come within minutes of a Super Bowl title. The Cardinals beat Atlanta, Carolina and Philadelphia in the NFC playoffs to reach the Super Bowl against Pittsburgh.
He then threw a go-ahead 64-yard touchdown pass to Larry Fitzgerald with 2:37 remaining only to watch Ben Roethlisberger lead the Steelers back with a 6-yard TD pass to Santonio Holmes with 35 seconds left. Warner lost a fumble in the closing seconds to seal a 27-23 loss.
He went back to the postseason the next year and was brilliant in the wild-card round, throwing five TD passes in a 51-45 overtime win over Green Bay before being knocked out in a loss the following week at New Orleans in the final game of his career.
Five of the movers-on never started another playoff game after leaving their Super Bowl team: Unitas, Namath, Dilfer, Johnson and Mark Rypien.
Two lost in their only playoff appearances, Ken Stabler with Houston against his old Raiders in an AFC wild-card game in 1980 and Jim McMahon lost an NFC wild-card game following the 1993 season for Minnesota against the New York Giants.
It remains to be seen where Manning will fit on this list.