Roundtable's Marc Cherabie discusses the Denver Broncos' regular-season finale victory and looks ahead to the playoffs.
The Denver Broncos ended the 2025-26 NFL regular season with a win over the Los Angeles Chargers, securing a 14-3 record on the year and the American Football League title -- leading to a first-round bye.
Sunday's game was a spectacular showing for the Broncos, who won 19-3. Despite the Chargers benching quarterback Justin Herbert, this was still a great win for Denver and it helped the club earn the first-round bye.
Marc noted that regardless of the personnel used by Los Angeles, Denver could not take their foot off the gas and still had to take the field with the same mentality that they have had all season long.
On the Chargers' defense, the team still used the majority of its starters, meaning the Broncos' offense didn't necessarily get the day off. Seven out of the 11 starters were used all season long, so Denver's offense still had to fight to earn every point.
All of this is to say that Sunday's game was still a legitimate win for Denver, despite the overarching storyline being that the Broncos won against backups. Marc makes a great point to compare this game to the end of last season's game against the Kansas City Chiefs, who actually rested their starters.
Marc makes an argument that neither Week 18's game nor the Christmas Day game against the Chiefs should be analyzed too deeply for how far Denver can make it in the playoffs, as both matchups came at difficult times for each respective club. Marc explains that to accurately predict what this Broncos team can do, we need to look back earlier in the season.
Looking ahead at the playoffs, Denver will be facing off against either the Houston Texans or Pittsburgh Steelers, with fans and the club itself glued to their televisions for Monday night's game, which will decide our fate in the Divisional Round.
Marc ends this week's episode posing a question for anyone to answer in the comments below, asking what is our biggest concern for Denver as we head into the playoffs? Leave any thoughts on this below as we all await the results of Monday's game, and shift our conversation toward how we prepare for the Divisional round!
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