Last year we started out 2-0, but we all know the reason for that was Ed Hochuli. That blown call resulted in us beating San Diego instead of them running out the clock after the Cutler red zone fumble. Our defense last year was historically awful. I'm not breaking any new ground here. Also last year we played the Browns and it took Eddie Royal beating his man for a 93 yard TD play and a 4th quarter comeback. Our defense gave up 30 points and a ton of yards in that game. Brady Quinn looked like the next superstar QB.

Flash forward to this game. Our defense basically gave up 3 points (the other 3 resulted from the turnover landing the Browns already in FG range). Quinn was either hurried or on his butt the entire afternoon. Elvis was in the building! His transition to OLB has been way better than I could have hoped for. Dawkins has this defense believing! He's got me believing so far.

This team has a ways to go. Our offense looks like we need more work on the timing - though that was better with Marshall out, don't know if it's dogging or just not enough time with his new QB. I do like what I saw out of the running game. Knowshon needs to keep heading North/South like he did in this game, no dancing for him. The OL looked much better as well (I expect we will look back and realize that the Bengals defense is really good this year). I can't really complain too much with as many points as we put up, though. Orton looks like he is getting some rapport with Sheffler, Gaffney and Stokely.

Special teams - Prater, I want to rip the guy for missing 2 FGs, but it was a 40 mph wind blowing. Our coverage unit kept one of the best returners (Cribbs) in check.

Last year we were a fraud at 2-0. This year? It remains to be seen, but I think we are a better overall team already. We're better on Defense and Special Teams, and I don't think we're any worse on Offense than we were over the course of the last 13 games of the season last year.

We've beaten Ohio, bring on the rest of the states!
 

So last year I wasn't thrilled to have the #12 pick in the draft, I thought no way Clady would fall that far and there was no one else that I though was worth picking there. I figured we'd trade down and pick a lesser LT (Williams and reunite the Vandy teammates, how ironic that they're going to be playing together).

However, in watching the mock drafts take place and the different players landing in different positions in just about every single draft, I've come to the conclusion that we're sitting in the catbird seat.

Someone who we don't expect will fall out of the Top 10 and into our laps. It's easy to envision a scenario that has Mark Sanchez available. I think he'd be okay to draft, but more importantly, we could easily make a deal with say, the Jets, to drop back a few spots and pick up a 2nd next year or another 3rd this year.

McDaniels/Xanders have done a great job in filling a lot of holes in our team already which leaves us in good shape for the draft. Think about this, we could have any number of good players like Malcolm Jenkins (CB), Tyson Jackson (DE), or BJ Raji (DT) (assuming no positive reefer test). Any one of those guys could make an impact on our defense.

We have an outside shot at Michael Crabtree (WR) somehow falling that far, how amazing would our passing attack be with the shotgun spread formations lining up Crabtree, Marhall, Royal, Stokely and Sheffler? Talk about a nightmare match up for defenses!

Additionally, the #12 pick isn't a franchise breaker dollar wise either.

I do think we have a lot of options now at the #18 spot as well. Someone like Clay Matthews (LB) who will be able to stay on the field all 3 downs, and is a smart, tough player that fits the "team-first" mold. He also probably has hands good enough to be a TE, so if we take him, expect to see him play some offense in goal situations ala Vrable.

I can't wait for the draft, if you have NFLN, don't bother with E!spn's coverage (though I hope Shefter is back this year).

Now that the Jay Culter saga is over, let’s take it back to 2005, prior to the season, we traded away our first round pick to Washington so they could select Jason Campbell (how ironic it would have been had we made the reported deal with DC?), in return we received Washington's 2006 first round selection. The Broncos had a good but not world-beating offense led by Jake Plummer, had a good but not world beating defense led by Champ Bailey. On any Sunday either side of the football could dominate a game, but mostly it was both sides of the ball playing well enough to lead to a whole lot of wins. 

When the 2006 draft rolled around, the Broncos had lost the AFC Championship game at home after taking down the previous season's Superbowl winning Patriots. We were in need of getting younger at a lot of positions, offense and defense. We also had 2 first round picks. We gave both of those up, plus a 3rd rounder to get up to #11 to grab QB Jay Cutler, even though Jake Plummer was the guy who led our team to within one game of the Superbowl.

How different would the last 3 years have been if we had made different decisions leading up to that draft? Would we have added key pieces to the defense so that it wouldn’t fall apart? Who knows, we could play "What If?" all day long, but never come up with an answer.

The next 2 drafts could go in a similar direction. We have 2 choices this year and next and a lot of people are thinking that we will take a QB with at least one of them, if not using them as ammunition to move up and grab The Next Big Thing. I'm willing to bet that won't happen. It might have were Shanahan still coach, he was never shy about moving up to get the guy he wanted - and I hope that Jarvis Moss still works out, but I'm not hopeful.

Josh McDaniels comes from a different style of acquiring players. The Patriots have had much success stockpiling picks and mostly building through the draft. We now have a whole lotta draft picks. The Patriots target guys that the rest of the league doesn't value as highly, specifically football smarts over athleticism. I don't know how Xanders, our GM, fits into that equation, but I suspect he's along the same lines given the turnover in the front office this year. I think Pat Bowlen has bought into "The Patriot Way" given their success.

I look for the Broncos to not make a lot of noise and buzz moving up in the draft, we may even trade down and get more (though I doubt it with 11? picks). No more reaching for "potential" or guys with "upside" early on.

Solid players and lots of them. We're building a complete team now, and for the long term.

I happened to catch "John Elway: Forever Champion" on NFL Network today. It's an interesting show, especially since it takes place after we won the Superbowl against Green Bay, but before the 1998 season. A fun trip down memory lane.

One of the things that stuck out to me, was the period of the early 90s, or should I say, the drama of the coaching changes in the 90s and the effect on John Elway and the Broncos. First, Dan Reeves was fired and replaced by Wade Phillips. Wade was a highly successful defense coach. His goal at the time was to leave the offense alone and just work on fixing the defense.

If you remember those Wade years (and I try not to), we weren't a very good team. Elway and the offense put up great numbers and yet the defense let them down again and again. It was typified in the Monday Night loss to the Chiefs and Joe Montana. I still remember sitting in Pollock Joe's bar in Phoenix watching Elway pull off his 4th quarter magic only to see Montana return the favor (they highlighted this game on the show as well).

When Mike Shanahan was brought in to replace Wade, he changed the entire culture of the Broncos. He didn't just say that the offense was good and he was going to fix the defense, he kept the guys that were good, and added some of "his" guys like Ed McCaffrey. Why? The offense was good, it put a lot of points up on the board!  Mike Shanahan had his system and fit what players he could into it, but also brought guys along that had already bought into it. He implemented the West Coast Offense, even though the previous 2 years had seen Elway and the offense's best statistical years.

He overhauled the defense in that time too, bringing in a lot of veterans from successful franchises to complement a good young core of players.  That combination of players and system was the most successful the Denver Broncos Franchise has ever been. 

Are any of you getting Deja Vu yet? Fast forward 10 years. It's not exactly the same, our offense can rack up the yards, but scoring has been a problem (2nd and 16th respectively). Our defense had more holes in it than Swiss cheese. People were calling for a defensive minded coach to fix the defense and leave the offense alone. Pat Bowlen had been down that road before, instead of going with a "Wade" he went with a "Mike." A guy that would come in and change the entire culture, not just be a Bates+defense.

With the hiring of Josh McDaniels, the Broncos are sitting on the edge of a new frontier, just like we were in the mid 1990s. Taking the coordinator of one of the league's highest powered offenses and turning over the entire team to make in his image. For the most part, McDaniels has left the offense intact, but is going to change the system (at least part of the system while retaining the ZBS). He has brought in veteran leadership on the defensive side of the ball to compliment a lot of young players who have talent, but lack playing time and attitude.

I really hope that Jay and Josh can sit down one on one when minicamp opens next month and work their differences out. We've got an amazing time coming up the next few seasons, I'm excited. Bring on the draft, bring on camp, bring on preseason, bring on the season!!!

With all the drama that has surrounded last year's starting QB, something occurred to me. Since the deal for Cassel fell through, the Broncos brought Chris Simms to backup Jay Cutler at a pretty hefty salary for a clipboard carrier (and worth it as he's an upgrade over Ramsey). Here's what I know about Chris Simms - he played for about a year and lost a spleen during a game. I couldn't speak intelligently about any aspect of his mechanics, arm, or mental capacity to run a playbook. Maybe someone here can. 

Did he benefit from the Tampa D (of course), to what extent? Was he coachable (Gruden, the QB Collector...)?

I don't think too highly of Matt Cassel as a guy who can take a team on his back and lead them to wins. I know he is smart enough to run McDaniels' offense, take care of the ball, and get better (much better) as the season progressed. I think Matt Cassel would have done well in Orange and Blue, he's going to struggle in KC for a whole lot of money.I think what McDaniels is trying to do in Denver is build a situation where the QB doesn't have to go out every week and try to take the team on his back like Cutler was forced to do much of the last 2 years. That may mean taking a step back at the QB position and gaining in a lot of other areas.

If Jay Cutler or Bus Cook want Jay playing elsewhere in 2009 and beyond, I'm fine with that, he has handled the situation poorly in my opinion. I'd prefer him to stay, all else being equal though.

So here's my thought - if Jay wants out and the Broncos decide to move him, can the team be better off with Simms and several draft picks? For instance, would the Broncos deal Jay to the Lions for their #20 and 2nd and 3rd round draft picks (no one wants the #1 overall pick)?

I'd have to think long and hard about that trade. If you think Simms could run the offense, you jump at that, we'd own 3 of the top 33 picks, and could probably trade down from either the 12 or the 20 spot for more 2-3 round picks, or move them to stock up for next year.

I have to believe that the Broncos Braintrust have thought about life without Cutler, they'd be stupid not to at this point. Hopefully someone can enlighten me further on the capabilities of our backup QB. Does anyone else think that Simms+#20+#33+3rd (either #65 or #82) round would make the Broncos a better team overall than staying with Cutler?

Congrats to Mdierk and his wife on their new baby boy who arrived on Thursday.

We have some news of our own...

My wife gave birth to our son Eli Joseph on Friday at 6:11pm, weighing 6 pounds 14 oz and is 21 inches long. This is him on his first night, I'll have some pictures of him in his Broncos gear in a little bit.

Both he and momma are doing well, we just got home from the hospital today. We're about to watch our first Superbowl together!

I'm still on Cloud 9 this morning with our pasting of the raiders last night. Any time we can beat them down and make them give up is a great game (with respect to Justin Fargas as the only one to fight for 60 mins). There is one thing that I wanted to point out about the coming out party Eddie Royal last night. Not only is he a great route-runner and has awesome hands, he's football smart.

Before I get to Royal (with Cheese!), let me go back a couple of years ago to the Chargers/Patriots playoff game where the Chargers defense needed to stop the Patriots offense and Brady's 4th down pass was picked off by Marlon Mcree. Mcree, instead of taking a knee and ending the game, tried to run the interception back he was then stripped by Troy Brown to extend the New England tying drive. New England won the game and Marty Shottenheimer was done in San Diego. A great play by Mcree was wiped out because he didn't know where in the game he was.

Forward to last night's first game. Minnesota was trying to drive for the game winning score, Minnesota was out of timeouts and with 54 seconds left Tavaris Jackson threw an interception to Atari Bigby. Bigby was on the ground, but he got up and tried to run back the interception. Luckily for Green Bay, he wasn't stripped and the game was over with a couple of kneel downs.

These are players with several years worth of experience, but they put their own fortune over that of their team (not intentionally).

Let us now turn to rookie Eddie Royal, starting his first game in the NFL, on the road on Monday Night with the #1 WR out. Royal had zero mental mistakes. His routes were precise, his hands were solid. 9 catches for 146 yards and a touchdown, rookies starting their first game aren't supposed to do that. Alone that would be amazing, but wait, there's more! On a reverse option play (where Royal was looking to either throw a pass or run) neither was open and he didn't try to force a ball into a receiver who was covered, but then also had the awareness to throw the ball away when his running lane wasn't open. It was a small play, but it was the difference between losing 5 yards or not. Not huge in a blowout game, but a lot of games are won and lost by a couple of yards.

The second heads up play by Royal was the final kickoff return. With just over a minute and a half left, the game was over. Royal took the kickoff, ran up until the first defender and sat down. There was no need to pad his stats, no need to show off and try for a score, no need to risk injury when the game was out of hand. Smart.

Eddie Royal showed me that he isn't just a wide receiver, but a football player. And already has shown the smarts of a veteran. What a great start, let's hope it continues!

Several sources are confirming that Brandon Marshall's suspension has been reduced to 1 game, and he will be fined an additional game:

From the RMN:

After hearing Marshall's side, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell has reduced the receiver's two- to three-game suspension for violation the league's personal-conduct policy to one game, the Broncos' season opener at Oakland on Sept. 8, an NFL source has told the Rocky Mountain News. However, the league has fined Marshall one game's pay, $26,178, plus he will lose that amount for sitting out the Raiders game.

An announcement is expected Friday.

He'll be back for the Chargers game after we stomp the heck out of the raiders.

Continue reading this post »

Go easy on me, this is my first diary on MHR :)

First, a change in philosophy:

When we won back to back Championships, we had a lot of high character guys - Rod & Easy Ed, Elway, Davis, Neil Smith, just about the entire offensive line, Steve Atwater, and, for all of his talking, Shannon Sharpe. For most of the post Superbowl Mike Shanahan era, it seems that as long as someone could play technically sound football, they had a place on our team. Character traits were overlooked for numbers (Dale Carter, Daryl Gardener, Travis Henry – though he seems to be making a good effort to turn it around). Guys with attitude problems were welcomed if they could put up the stats (Javon). Sure, we'd like the guys who were leaders and had high character, and we'd have them on the team, but it wasn't a priority compared to their play. As those guys left, we didn't replace them with enough outspoken high character players. We weren't prepared for the leadership vacuum last year when Rod Smith and Al Wilson couldn't play anymore.

Last season, game after game, Bronco fans were saying to themselves and to each other "there were a lot of players who just gave up in the middle of that game." The two San Diego games and the Detroit game jump right to my mind. We had a bunch of guys out there that were just collecting a paycheck. This draft changes that, in fact, the entire reloading season has been about changing that. I got to thinking about this when I read through most of the pages on the guys we selected in the draft and that expanded to guys we brought in as free agents as well.

Second, The Rod Tidwell draft aka "I'm all heart":

Yeah Jerry Maguire isn't a great movie, and don't get me started on Tom Cruise's acting ability, but I love the Rod Tidwell/Cuba Gooding Jr story line (side note - I was bartending in Phoenix when the movie was filmed and met Cuba who was staying at our resort, great guy) he learns that playing for a paycheck isn't what makes a great player.

With each free agent we signed, with each draft choice we made, the Broncos are bringing in guys who all had a few things in common. Call it desire, work ethic, tenacity, or competitiveness, but it all can be boiled down into one thing - heart. Let's take a look at some of the guys we got in the draft:

Royal, WR/ST - Strong, good work ethic, high character guy
Lichensteiger, C - Lineman with a nasty streak, relentless competitor
Williams, CB - Competitive, never gives up, has a will to win
Torain, RB - Good work ethic, character
Powell, DT - Always gives 100%, competitor, always hustles, character
Larsen, LB/ST - outspoken leader, challenges others, gets in guys faces who don't give their all

It seemed like in addition to their football abilities the Denver Broncos were drafting guys who weren't going to take "no" for an answer. Guys who would fight for every yard and every inch until the whistle blows. Guys who will lead by example and speak up when others aren't pulling their weight.

Third, The free agent signings:

Losing both Rod Smith and Al Wilson left a gigantic hole on the field and in the locker room. John Lynch is a good leader for now, but doesn’t have many years left on the field and Jay Cutler is growing into that role as a quarterback needs to, but we need more than just one guy on either side of the ball to maintain accountability on our team.

We have heard that Niko Koutouvides was a team leader even though  he was only a back up and a special teamer. He was a team captain in Seattle, I have a feeling that the guy is going to be something special for us for a long time, both on the field and off.

Shanahan compared Keary Colbert to Eddie Mac saying "I like the type of person he is, you could see the  way he played in the running game and the passing game, that's what we look for in a player." I hope Colbert has the skills that Eddie Mac had, but more than that, I hope he has the drive and determination that Easy Ed had. Shanahan thinks so, so that's a good sign.

If Boss has half of the character that his brother does, he will be quite the asset as well. We know that Champ will keep him in line, but I don't think that's going to be an issue.

Conclusion:

I'm sure that we'll still take chances on talented but troubled players in the future, however, we needed to address our biggest weakness this reloading season - heart.

On that, I give the Broncos a grade A+.