The Denver Broncos' brain trust of Payton & Paton made an appearance at the NFL combine this week, and most of coach Sean Payton’s comments were about handing over the play-calling chores to new offensive coordinator Davis Webb, with GM George Paton chipping in with some personnel-based comments.
Their track record of success has been both surprising and impressive, and some of the comments they offered were nearly as surprising at the Broncos landing just a field goal short of a Super Bowl berth.
Start with Sean Payton. He’s obviously aware that there’s always some football luck involved in the 11-game win streak that helped get the Broncos to the AFC championship game, and he began by focusing on a couple of issues related to that luck.
“From my lens,” Payton told reporters at the NFL Combine Tuesday in a piece written by Luca Evans of the Denver Post, “we won a lot of games by one score or less, right? And I’m not naive to think those games couldn’t have swung.
“Where’s the meat on the bone?” the head coach continued. “The meat on the bone exists with our takeaways. That has to improve. Our run-game consistency. Our meat on the bone, relative to a number of things that we won despite maybe not being as good as others.
“And I think that’s the only way to look at it, relative to this team writing its own chapter, and getting us to where we want to go. Which is obviously, a game and a half further than where we went.”
Payton’s comments about the running game weren’t surprising, and he’s also harped on takeaways before. But the coach also mentioned linebacking as a big need, which was surprising given the strength of that particular group for the Broncos.
That’s where George Paton got involved. He said this is a “pretty good linebacker class,” but the GM added that inside linebacker is a tough position for a rookie to step in and play well right away, which is especially interesting given that linebackers Justin Strnad and Alex Singleton are both free agents.
“We’d love to have those guys back,” Paton said of Singleton and Strnad, who were key contributors in 2025 but now hit free agency. “We’d love to have them back, regardless of what’s in the draft. We see those guys as Broncos. If we let those guys leave, what are we doing?”
But Strnad has also reportedly told the Denver Post that he wants to start, and both linebackers could be worth $5-7 million on the open market, according to Evans. Logic says that Dre Greenlaw is a cut candidate at linebacker after his disappointing initial season, but Paton still referred to Greenlaw as “a tone setter …when he played.”
The running back question is familiar, albeit just as tough to answer. Payton mentioned the game slowing down some for RJ Harvey, but that doesn’t mean he’s a three-down back given his size, and this year's starter, J.K. Dobbins, comes with injury risks that played out in the worst possible way this season.
The rest of their comments were about other position groups, and they were more on the generic side. The Broncos don’t have a lot of problems and issues, but they do have some important issues to address at linebacker and running back.