SB Nation User Blog: orange&blueblood

Curse of Attending Games

orange&blueblood — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 04:46:04 -0000

As a broncos fan living in St. Louis, I have only been to two regular season Broncos games in my life. One was two seasons ago in the season opener in the STL in which Jake the Snake had three interceptions and a lost fumble and the Broncs lost 18-10 despite not giving up a touchdown. The other was today- I drove the 4 hours to and from KC to see the game, only to be rewarded with the worst effort by the Broncos in who knows how long. Pretty much anything that could go wrong could, and the game was about as demoralizing as one could be. Some thoughts:

-Arrowhead probably hasn't changed in thirty years and is an awesome environment to watch a game. Although the stadium is pretty shoddy, I was sitting was up in the nosebleeds and could still see fairly well. and the fan noise and atmosphere was great, much better than the dome in STL. I plan on coming back, even if we lay an egg again.

-Brandon Marshall needs to run with the ball as little as possible. He has fumbled the ball many times while running with it; ball security is not one of his good points, and he has a tendency to lose yardage while trying to make a play. He should focus on holding onto the ball and not hurting the team by overextending himself. On a similar note, Selvin Young several times kept sticking the ball forward at the end of plays, a boneheaded move given our several fumbles already.

-I think that the team should consider using Pittman as a primary back until torain returns. He is the best receiver and blocker out of the backfield, he is the go-to back for short yardage, and I think he has proven that he can make plays between the 20's as well. (Pretty much everything you could ask for in a RB) In addition, he doesn't wear down because he's too small, and brings vet confidence and swagger.

-I think the team in general was intimidated by the road atmosphere. Although the stadium was by no means full, it was loud, and I wonder if the noise was a factor in some of the plays that were made (nerves). In addition, I think that the team is extremely dependent upon playing with a lead, and needs to develop the character to be able to trade shots or play from behind. After losing the coin toss and giving up a big play, the Broncos were simply flat for much of the rest of the game. If we had had possession first or had started out with a lead, the crowd would have probably left and not been a factor and the game could have turned into a blowout.

-Besides from his first fumble, Royal had a solid game between his receptions (9) and the punt return. The same could be said for Marshall. But fumbles are unacceptable. One must accept some interceptions as coming with the difficult and split-second decisions a QB must make, but losing the football from your own hands is ridiculous. That said, Cutler made some horrible decisions (2nd int) and his accuracy was off on many plays, including screen passes in which pressure seemed to scare him.

-If the offense seems to struggle, going to the two-minute no huddle offense may do the trick. It settles cutler and the receivers down by getting many quick completions, putting the offense into a rhythm, and keeps the defense off guard, especially for run plays on second or third and short. I think that the two minute drill with pittman kept in for protection and draw plays was one positive thing to take away from this game. This worked several times during the game, although we failed to convert these productive drives into TDs. I think that this was due partially to bad play calls inside the 10, where I think we should have tried to run it, given our success in short yardage so far this year. Overall, I think that this is a good option for settling cutler down, moving the chains, and wearing down the defense. We might even consider starting games with a no-huddle offense.

-We still had a chance after all our mistakes late in the game when Spencer Larsen bobbled the ball on the onside kick. The fact that it felt like the Broncos had a chance so late in the game underscored how much of a waste this game was, that the Broncos could struggle so much and still have a chance to win- what a waste.

-The ball was not thrown Champ Bailey's way hardly at all, and J Williams and Dre Bly were picked on all day by Dwayne Bowe. On a positive note, Bly actually made a couple good tackles, although LJ did drag him for a 1st down early in the game.

-Prater made up for a gimme FG with two 50+ yarders, one after a false start. He is 9/10 so far, but the reason we got him is for kickoffs, and he is still inconsistent in getting touchbacks. Another special teams note is that Eddie Royal inexplicably did not fair catch a punt that landed around the 25-30 yard line and ended up going out of bounds inside the 10. Perhaps nerves after the fumble, but extremely dumb.

-Again we got no pressure on the QB when we did not rush an extra man, and Huard had basically all day to make his safe throws. Our defense will struggle until we get a legitimate pass rush. At this point not even DOOM is getting any pressure on the QB. One positive thing about the defense is that they are fairly strong in short-yardage situations, as shown last week, and do fairly well at holding the opposing teams to field goals given their overall struggles in terms of yardage. Not counting Marshall's fumble which gave KC the ball at the two yard line, the defense was decent until late in the game. I definitely think that stamina is a factor because the D seems to wear down as the game goes on. Some of this should have been avoided by not turning the ball over and by being ahead so that Huard would have had to throw the ball instead of just handing off to LJ.

-OVerall, this team is still going to have to win with its offense. At the very least, we cannot afford to turn the ball over and play as weak as we did today. We may want to consider mixing in the 2 minute drill into our normal offense. During this drill I would use pittman as the RB full time. In addition, I think that pittman should perhaps be utilized as the primary back. I'm not afraid of him fumbling like I am everytime Young gets stopped for no gain.

-We deserved to lose this game. Cutler made several boneheaded throws and decisions and was inaccurate on many throws. Royal fumbled and dropped a pass in the endzone, and Marshall fumbled. Stokely dropped a pass that looked like a fumble for a little bit. While pittman was solid, the other rbs did not do much, and the running game was nonexistent. That is partly the coaching staff's fault. Graham and Scheffler both dropped passes that were catchable although not ideal. The D-line has yet to generate any legitimate pressure this season. The secondary is pretty much toast because other QBs have all day to throw. Our linebackers and safeties got burned multiple times for long running plays, which is unacceptable, and coverage on special teams was blown again. Prater was solid but could have done better on kickoffs and missed a short FG. Kern shanked a punt. The coaching staff did a poor job calling plays in the red zone and did not bring the team fired up and ready to play. The Broncos better be humilated and play like they care next Sunday. I'm tired of going to games to see them put forth a sorry effort. I care too much, and it makes me feel like going to games is a curse and that I should watch on a screen, not live.

-I realize this post is pretty negative, but it was pretty depressing to watch this happen live with Chief fans all around me and then have to drive home for 4 hours. Residents of La La Land need to come back to earth and deflate their expectations- the Chiefs hadn't won in almost a year. That was a huge let down that could affect our playoff hopes down the line. Heres hoping we pull it together

Building a contender

orange&blueblood — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 06:16:06 -0000

The trade of Keary Colbert made me consider the overall direction of the Broncos once again. For several years the franchise had attempted to skip the "rebuilding" phase, instead opting to sign aging veterans who were certainly capable, but could not take us to the championship level. While we had great success with players such as Plummer (13-3), we never got an entire team assembled at once. To me the problem with looking to veteran players primarily is that if most of your team is towards the downside of their career you never know when the dropoff in talent will occur. Therefore everything must go just right in order to have a successful season; that is very few of your veteran players can have their abilities deteriorate during that particular season if you are to succeed.

On the other hand, a team that is built on youth usually improves during the season. While a veteran team cannot really improve merely on experience, instead worsening due to injuries and age, a young team plays with better chemistry as the season goes on and individual players adjust to the game speed and hone their skills as they get more playing time. Although teams like NE have obviously been successful with the FA/veteran mode of team building, for the above reasons I think the homegrown, build through the draft method of contender assembly is the way to go. The Broncos subpar drafts of the 2000s stand as an example of how important drafting is. While trades/FA acquisitions such as those that brought Champ and D. Graham are important, these should supplement the draft as a source for players.

Looking at only the past 3 drafts (including undrafted FA), one can see how quickly the Broncos have reloaded: Cutler, Marshall, Scheffler, Royal, Clady, Harris, Lichtensteiger, Torain, Alridge, Young, and Hillis make up almost all of the starting offense. Our drafting success on the defensive side of the ball is less impressive (obviously Doom), and look at the overall quality of the two units: our offense is arguably one of the best in the NFL, while our defense is struggling. The importance of drafting players whose nuances particularly fit your system, cannot be overemphasized. In the draft one gets a chance to pick through many, many players for little cost (aka 7th rounder). These players as well as undrafter FA's may make your team if management knows what they are doing (aka Woodyard).

The overall direction of the team is extremely encouraging. Our offense can only improve with the addition of a true power back in Torain, and Stokely has barely been involved in the offense. The defense should be the focus of the next draft, and another draft as solid from top to bottom as this one should definitely boost the Broncos into championship contention. From the last draft Clady and Royal appear to be playing at quality starter, not rookie, levels, J Williams and KLich are providing depth, Hillis is starting, Torain will compete for starting RB, Barrett on practice squad for development (perhaps to active w/ Colbert trade), and Woodyard, Alridge and Polumbus were also keepers. To acquire basically a fifth of a NFL roster in one year through a draft is simply ridiculous. If we can even come close to that for 1 more year, we will be set.

Actually the point of this optimistic post is the Broncos focus on the draft after a period of years in which it was an exercise in futility. While DFox was a quality man and player, exchanging his rights for a draft pick shows the confidence of the organization that they can find a quality player in the 7th round. The Colbert trade was extremely good value (5th or 4th) for a player of little use to use barring injury, and actually allows us to promote other young talent (Barrett?) to the roster for seasoning. Acquiring draft picks rather than letting our players walk and continuing to build the roster through the draft makes me extremely hopeful for the future of this organization long term and has me looking forward to next April- were it not for the potential of the Broncos THIS year. Excuse my optimism, but I have not been this happy with the Broncos for , well, a long time. It is extremely gratifying to see and I am grateful that our "rebuilding" year was a mere 7-9 year. Makes you almost feel sorry for the raiders/chiefs and the 3-13/4-12 seasons their fans have become accustomed to. While I do feel some sorrow when I see that we have traded another player, it also makes me look forward to the future and the many championships to come.

Sidenote: any comments or thoughts on the activity of Josh Shaw who was only recently signed? I thought he was signed to the practice squad originally. Will he be an important contributor, or a backup?

Cutler weary as game went on?

orange&blueblood — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 05:05:45 -0000

First of all, this post is in no way intended to criticize Jay Cutler- he had the game of his short but spectacular career this afternoon. But it seemed as if his mechanics and decisiveness deteriorated as the game went on. Some of this can be attributed to increasing pressure. While at the beginning of the game Cutler was virtually untouched, as the game went on, it seemed the Charger pass rush was looming closer and closer, and Cutler eventually did take several hits. I was very worried on several plays as Cutler stood in the pocket and seemed like he failed to pull the trigger as promptly as he should have.

But although some of the drop off in offense can be explained by the increasing pressure on the QB by the Chargers, it is fairly clear that Cutler made several very boneheaded mistakes in the fourth quarter.

1) Throwing interception in end zone (should have either tucked the ball away and ran for the 1st down or thrown the ball away and taken the FG)

2) Dropped the ball two times (once when he completed a pass to D. Graham (who incidentally seems to be more involved in the offense than last year, a good sign for the O line) and once on 2nd down on the last game-winning drive)

These mistakes can obviously be overlooked for the amazing game Jay-C otherwise had (4TDs) which honestly could have been better given some dropped balls (eg Scheffler letting a pass bounce off his chest near the end zone for the 2nd straight week). However one has to wonder: how good of a job are the Broncos, and specifically Steve Antonopoulos (aka Greek) of managing Cutler's blood sugar? The drop off in decisiveness in the 2nd half was pretty severe. Although Jay-C regained his swagger to win the game, it seemed like for a while that he was a bit down (although he is pretty coldblooded, which I like for a QB). In addition, diabetics can get diabetic neuropathy which can cause loss of feeling (due to nerve damage) to hands/feet. I highly doubt that this is the case for Cutler because the risk for diabetic neuropathy increase with age and duration of diabetes, and Cutler is rather young. It just seems really bizarre how the ball twice just fell out of his hand when he wasn't under severe pressure (w/out defensive contact).

Overall, i think the broncos are looking at a very bright future, and our main rivals in the AFC are the steelers- we could be seeing them in the AFC championship game again. THE Main reason for this is the ability of Jay Cutler, but I just wanted to see if anyone else was wondering about the job the Broncos are doing of managing his blood sugar in game. It seems like it would be better to keep it high than low.

Some Eddie Royal Adulation from Shutdown Corner

orange&blueblood — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 04:29:15 -0000

Yahoo Sports MJD Shutdown Corner Blog had some good things to say about Eddie Royal and the Broncos beatdown of the raiders in general. The article is entitled

Don't Count On It: Things you won't be seeing again

A rare complementary article about the Broncos by the national media. Seems like MJD might be joining the Broncos bandwagon in heading for lala land. Enjoy!

.. the Raiders continuing to be so tragic. Actually, you might be able to count on the Raiders continuing to be just that tragic. I don't know. What we witnessed from that morosely-dressed clown troupe on Monday night was almost unspeakable.

Things started well enough for them. They ran the ball. Justin Fargas found some holes, Darren McFadden had some success when he touched the ball. There seemed to be a shred of two of promise.

From there, I'd like to say that the wheels came off, but that wouldn't feel like an accurate description. The wheels didn't just magically come off, the Raiders all got out of the car (all 45 of them were in one Volkswagon; remember, this is a morosely-dressed clown troupe), shot the wheels off the own car, busted out the taillights, smashed the windshield and poured Splenda in the gas tank. Then they all piled back inside and started screaming, "CAR WON'T MOVE, ME SAD NOW!"

I just don't know how you can allow a performance like that to happen. Ninety-six penalty yards, most of them coming on ignorant personal fouls, a pathetic passing game in which Ashley Lelie was the star receiver, Eddie Royal consistently and viciously abusing DeAngelo Hall ... at no point were the Raiders anything but an ugly carpet for the Broncos to walk on. You don't need talent to have discipline. You don't need a loaded roster to not be an embarrassment. The Chiefs found a way to take the field and not be a laughing stock, and they went out of their way this offseason to strip their roster of talent.There's just no excuse for a team performing as poorly as the Raiders did on Monday night. I don't care if it's Week One or Week Seventeen.

... me going to sleep without praying to Eddie Royal. I'm not saying that I believe that Eddie Royal is a deity. But each night this week, I am going to offer a few words of praise and worship to Eddie Royal before I go to sleep. You know, just in case.

Even if he's not, we all (especially those of us who were obligated to live blog the game) owe him a debt of gratitude for what he did Monday night. He caught 9 balls for 146 yards and had DeAngelo Hall wishing he was inside with Michael Vick. He took handoffs. He returned punts. He returned kicks. He recovered a fumble. On a play designed for him to throw a pass downfield, he actually threw the ball away. It might sound small, but this is something that David Carr has yet to master in six years of playing quarterback in the NFL.

It was a magical performance. I almost hope that Royal disappears now and never has another good game in his life, just so I can remember this one as being so special.

Another Incompetent Sportswriter

orange&blueblood — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 04:27:29 -0000

Has anyone taken a look at Michael Silver's "rankings" in the form of his 32 Questions column? If these are really rankings, they are absolutely absurd.

-The titans are 4 and he touts them as putting "a licking on their opponent". I'm pretty sure that their quarterback is extremely questionable at this point physically and emotionally, so he's putting a team currently without a franchise quarter back at # 4.

-the giants are 2 b/c of their front seven depth. Yeah, but they're just about out at the and its only the beginning of the season.

-jaguars are 8 even after allowing garrard to be sacked 7 times and only rushing for 33 yards with the vaunted MJD and Fred Taylor

-eagles only 14th after giving the rams an absolute butt-whipping without their top two receivers.

Anyway, these rankings, as Yahoo refers to them on the link, are an absolute joke. The link is the first related item.

On a more positive note, the Yahoo Shutdown Corner blog by MJD has the Broncos as the #2 seed in its early preview of the playoffs. (2nd related item)

Take a look at Silver's ratings and let me know if you think there's any shred of truth or if you agree that they're bogus. I don't understand how writers get paid to put lists like this together. I mean, at some parts of the list it basically looks like teams were drawn out of a hat.

Running game: Hitting the hole

orange&blueblood — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 00:14:32 -0000

Like everyone else, I thoroughly enjoyed the MNF beat down on the hated raiders and the senile, adult-diaper wearing al davis. However I noticed that on multiple running plays, the back failed to see the hole and really burst with confidence (go north-south )and instead ran into the back of his blocker (on one play Daniel Graham). This happened several times on stretch plays. If the back had either taken the ball all the way to the outside or cut back inside, he would have picked up at least several yards. Instead the RB seems to just follow behind the blocker, getting stopped for no gain or a loss. I just wanted to see if anyone else noticed these plays and if so, who the running back was.