Some fan bases do panic better than others, but the Denver Broncos fans and media are taking this sort of thing to a new level. In his latest mailbag, Mark Kiszla of the Denver Post fielded a question from a fan who claimed he was getting “Jay Cutler vibes,” and Kiszla took that one step further in his response.

“Pull the trigger! Any NFL quarterback who hesitates is lost,” Kiszle wrote. “Unsteady in the pocket, Nix has lost confidence in what he’s seeing develop downfield. With an average skill set for a pro QB, his greatest attribute is mental toughness. So with a mini-bye after that Thursday night mess, maybe Nix hits the reset button and comes out firing against Kansas City. 

“But I’m not afraid to say it: With a chance to win the AFC West, coach Sean Payton should stop at nothing, including replacing Nix with Jarrett Stidham, if Nix looks lost in the first half against the Chiefs.”

Another fan pointed out that Nix has greatness in him, based on some of his late comebacks that are only showing up in the fourth quarter. But that didn’t stop Kiszla from edging ever closer to the edge of the cliff. 

“True greatness does not show up only 25% of the time,” the columnist added. “If Nix earns three ‘F’s and one ‘A’ on his report card, that gives him a 1.0 GPA. Right now, he’s a ‘D’ quarterback. This Broncos defense can carry a merely average QB a long way. That’s why Payton should seriously consider benching Nix for Stidham, even if it’s only for half a game.”

This is pure insanity, for any number of reasons. The most obvious one is that it would destroy any chance for continuity in the Denver offense, which is already trying to deal with some fairly epic inconsistency issues. 

Also, anyone who watched Stidham during his prior stints with the New England Patriots and Las Vegas Raiders knows that he’s not the answer to a situation like this. Stidham has a strong arm and he throws an impressively tight spiral, but he was an interception machine in New England, and not much better in Las Vegas. He’s earned his status as a career backup, and the only time he should take Nix’s place is in the fourth quarter with the Broncos on the wrong end of a bad blowout. 

For better or worse, Nix is Denver’s future, and it’s a good one. A lot of teams would love to have a quarterback who has developed enough to do what Nix has done, and if you have any doubts about that, just ask a few Cleveland Browns fans about what it’s like trying to find a quarterback good enough to win with a great defense.