Where are MY Broncos? Manning and my operations are similar in needed time to heal.

The relatively small scars on the front and back of Peyton Manning’s neck are straight lines, but they serve as the biggest question marks in the Broncos bringing the four-time NFL MVP to Denver.

Manning, who has had multiple neck surgeries, missed the 2011 season because of a “single level anterior fusion,” a common procedure when a disc is removed and two vertebrae are fused using bone grafts to alleviate back-and-neck pain because the damaged disc had pinched a nerve.

But most patients are not soon-to-be 36-year-old NFL quarterbacks looking to put themselves into harm’s way. However, Manning’s neck isn’t the most significant issue as he recovers from the surgery and returns to the field. The biggest issue is the strength of his throwing arm.

“Once the fusion occurs, then really that fusion is going to be as strong as anything,” said Dr. Eric McCarty, chief of sports medicine at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus.

“You do have to make sure that it’s healed and that the bones are completely fused to each other. But once that occurs, that’s not going to break. But once you’ve had a nerve injury, nerves take a long time to regenerate, if at all, and if you’ve had a lot of compression on a nerve, you could have some permanent damage. Basically the nerve is the electrical power to the muscle, and sometimes that power gets crimped and it doesn’t regenerate all the way. And that’s the real issue in terms of recovery.”

“Not necessarily a catastrophic risk, but there is a risk, and that’s true of everyone. That can cause some pain and sometimes you have to go in and fuse those levels. But there have been a lot of athletes, football players, who have played with single level fusion and gone off and played successfully.”

Jeff Legwold: jlegwold@denverpost.com