The Denver Broncos have a lot of cleaning up to do on Sunday, and these four steps could help them get there.
The Denver Broncos were embarrassed by the Kansas City Chiefs on Monday night, and they’ve been dealing with that level of humiliation and fending off a growing wave of criticism all week long.
No one knows what the plan is going to be to rebound and get a win against the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sunday, but Parker Gabriel of the Denver Post took a shot at running through four steps that need to happen.
Get Bo Nix in rhythm
Nix looked completely out of sorts on Monday night, and that needs to be change. He often looked like he had no idea where Chiefs pass rushers were coming from, and the result was confusion and poor throws, particularly in his opening drive interception where he floated a pass over the middle and cornerback Mansoor Delane picked it off.
You didn’t need to be a lip reader to interpret Nix saying “I can’t believe I made that throw” on the bench shortly afterward, and he never did get in rhythm. The closest he came was during Denver’s lone touchdown drive, when he found receiver Pat Bryant for three first downs and hit tight end Evan Engram in the front corner of the end zone for the TD.
There’s no magical formula, but Gabriel also noted that Jaylen Waddle was open several times, but the Broncos couldn’t get im the ball, and he wound up catching just one pass for two yards.
Commit to the run
The Broncos vowed to become more balanced this year, but lead back J.K. Dobbins became the forgotten man. It seemed like new offensive coordinator Davis Webb was so eager to make plays that he forgot about the vanilla ground game, which kept the Broncos playing from behind.
Coach Sean Payton told a story about playing the Pittsburgh Steelers one time and the running game got stuffed three straight times, which ended the effort for the night. It’s a fair point, but it would have been nice to slow the pace of the game for Nix, and Payton also pointed out that the run game wasn’t always sequenced well in terms of the way specific plays were set up.
Win first down on defense
One of the big advantages running back Kenneth Walker III brought to the table was creating effective down and distance situations for the Chiefs, and that kept the Broncos pass rush from getting started. It’s a big change that will need to happen against the Jags, but in this game it will be forcing quarterback Trevor Lawrence to throw early incompletions.
Fix the tackling
Well, yeah. You knew this was gonna be in here, so we decided to put it at the end to maintain the, uh, suspense?
