INDIANAPOLIS — Sauce Gardner is used to playing lockdown defense. But having to defend his age is not a matchup the Indianapolis Colts cornerback envisioned five years into his NFL career.“I’m 24!” Gardner said on the last day of Colts minicamp, laughing as he shook his head. “It’s crazy that I’m even being asked this.”Is he sure?“Yes!” the two-time, first-team All-Pro said. “You can ask my mom!”Gardner was born Aug. 31, 2001, a date he swears he’s listed on every official document since starring at the University of Cincinnati, being drafted by the New York Jets and eventually traded to the Colts. His driver’s license confirms his age, he says. His passport does, too, the Colts confirmed.So, why, as he enters his fifth year in the NFL, does a large segment of the Internet believe he was born in 2000? ESPN.com lists Gardner’s birthday as Aug. 31, 2000, one year earlier than the date on his passport. Pro Football Reference, a website widely considered to be one of the most reputable in professional sports research, also lists him as born in 2000. So did The Athletic’s 2022 NFL Draft guide. Even EA Sports’ Madden NFL, a video game Gardner often plays, has his birthday as Aug. 31, 2000.“It’s wrong in Madden, too? That’s crazy because I never checked,” Gardner said after he was notified. “Because when it comes to the paperwork and everything I’ve signed, it all says ’01. So, I don’t know where or how it got messed up unless people just get it straight from Google.”That could be part of the problem. Until The Athletic recently raised public inquiries about Gardner’s age while sharing a video of one of his offseason training sessions, Wikipedia had him listed as being 25 years old rather than 24. Therefore, for most people, the first response they would receive via a Google search about Gardner’s age would be accompanied by Wikipedia assertion that he was born in 2000. Gardner’s Wikipedia page has since been corrected — well, kind of. In the “personal information” section, Gardner is listed as being born in 2001, but in the “early life” section of the Wikipedia bio, his birthdate still appears as Aug. 31, 2000. One website, two ages. Lots of confusion.