Get To Know The Denver Broncos...A Few Good Questions With A Broncos Blogger

1 no MINN wouild have took him at 30 2 50-50 see A Smith 3 good in short dose too inc at times 4 Maybe K-MOR if not lance ball maybe we throw short passes a lot like a long run game

Most people were shocked and not in the good way when we picked Tebow. Although, I was one of the people who was thrilled that we got him. He has absolutely won everyone over. He is a tough player and he is a winner. He has performed great during the pre season. All he needs is to tighten up his release, but once he does that, we will have a heck of a starting QB.

Most people thought he was a reach, but some of us at MHR knew that if we wanted him, we had to trade up and get him when we did.

Broncos have had ups and downs this off season. LOTS and LOTS of injuries. We haven’t seen the entire starting team yet. So it remains to be seen how good we will be, but our passing offense looks great.

Knowshon appears to be healthy enough to play against the Jags, but I don’t expect him to start and get 20+ rushing attempts. Buckhalter will get carries, and so will Lance Ball.

1. Depends on you definition of reach. Personally, I think Tebow is gone before the Broncos draft again, and if that is the case you get the player you want. In terms of what the Broncos did in the 1st Round, they ended up with two players at 22 and 25 for less money than they would have paid one player where they were supposed to pick at #11.

2. I’ll put it this way…I am excited with how McDaniels has gone about building a team, and how he has handled the missteps he has made along the way. Personnel is not an exact science. Sometimes you are going to swing and miss. How McDaniels has handled those few misses has impressed me just as much as all the right moves he has made.

3. Hard to say. With all the injuries, the Broncos decided to take a ’let’s get a good look at the young guys’ approach. Several vets missed most of the preseason, but the Broncos were able to get solid reps for the rookies along the offensive line and defensive backfield. That could pay dividends down the road.

4. My thought is the Broncos will take a long, hard look at Knowshon Moreno in practice this week. He still hasn’t gone against full contact. Since Correll Buckhalter made it through the Vikings game unscathed he could be the starter, as he was Week 1 last season when Moreno missed most of the preseason.

The value of something is the price that someone is willing to pay for it. Was Tebow worth the #25 pick? Maybe not for a team with only one 1st round pick and without a surplus of draft picks from trading players like BMarsh/Scheffler and trading back twice from #11. But for a team that just drafted their primary target (WR – D Thomas) in the first round and does have said surplus of draft picks from said moves, yeah Tebow is worth a #25 pick.

The bottom line is that it doesn’t really matter where other teams would have taken Tebow since no other team was in the unique circumstance that the Broncos were in. A circumstance that McD manufactured perfectly and executed upon.

We still ended up drafting 9 players even after trading 3 picks for TT. We had the ammo to make that move and I’m glad we did. We have added four 1st round draft picks to our roster from the last 2 drafts.

Regarding your other questions: Very happy with McD’s moves for the most part.

The Broncos first unit offense looked very good in the preseason. Our first team D looked ok but not great but guys like Champ, Dawk, and DJ didn’t really play so it was hard to get a good read.

KnoMo will be the starter come week 1 IMO, barring a setback in practice this week. I think we kept him out longer than we had to just to make sure he would be good to go week 1.

not had a healhy o-line so-so

We certainly miss Doom, but the pass rush has been better then I expected. Robert Ayers has been totally dominant so far in the pre season. Jarvis Moss has also started to come on. We also have some complimentary pass rusher who have been decent so we will see.

With the injuries the O-Line has had to shuffle all summer long. If McDaniels had his way, this would be the starting group:

LT – Ryan Clady
LG – Zane Beadles(Rookie)
C – J.D. Walton(Rookie)
RG – Chris Kuper
RT – Ryan Harris

The team has played with that unit ZERO TIMES this preseason. Clady is coming back from off-season knee surgery. He finally returned for the Vikings game just long enough to see Ryan Harris injure an ankle. He is questionable for the Jags game. The two rookies have played well, all things considered, but Beadles will likely play one of the Tackle positions if Harris or Clady can’t go. If both are out, the Broncos are really in a bind.

Luckily, Kyle Orton has looked solid moving around in the pocket. He’ll have to continue doing that until the O-Line gets settled.

Hype is hype. He has handled it well, and his heart and mind seem to be in the right place. To me, the key is playing him if/when he gets ready. Josh McDaniels is not going to play Tim Tebow just because Jags fans, or any other fans, want to see him play. That’s the most important thing. All the other stuff is easy to ignore,

1. There are too many players to name who have been hurt this off season. Clady and Harris have been injured. They are the 2 people we need most if we want to win. Harris injured his ankle the last pre season game and Clady is still coming back from his off season injury. Knowshon hurt his hamstring and is still coming back. We have had a ton of other players dinged up.

2. Matt Willis has looked phenomenal. He has been great all off season. He could be a real player for us in the near future.

3. Average. We certainly miss Doom that’s for sure. But all hope is not lost. A ton of hope is being placed in Robert Ayers and so far, he has not disappointed.

4. Rushing? Pass Rushing? or Running the ball? I think you meant running the ball. Knowshon is supposed to be healthy enough to play, but we’ll see. Buckhalter and Lance Ball will get the majority of the snaps if Knowshon isn’t ready to go.

5. No. Spencer Larsen is our starting FB. He has been solid. We also just got Dan Gronkowski and he can play FB if we need him too.

6. Very likely. He will either start at Tackle for the injured Clady or Harris, or he will start at left guard.

7. Personally, Garrard scares me a little bit. He has games of brilliance and games of being terrible. We will see, but i take solace in the fact that our secondary will be one of the best again this year. Additionally, your WR don’t scare me too much other then Mike Sims Walker and Mercedes Lewis.

8. Secondary. Easily the best part of our team. Not only are our starters great, our depth has been phenomenal this pre season. Also, beware of our passing offense. Orton looks primed for a HUGE year.

1. No one really knows. The Broncos are extremely hush-hush about it. From what I have been told by reliable sources, guys like Champ Baily, Chris Kuper, Daniel Graham are locks to play. None of them have really played since Week 1 of the preseason. As for guys like Ryan Clady, Ryan Harris and Knowshon Moreno, this week of practice will be key.

2. I love Matthew Wills. What I was impressed with when I was watching him at Training Camp was his ability to run routes. Make no mistake, quarterbacks won’t throw the ball to a receiver that they don’t trust running good routes. Willis has had success with all three quarterbacks this preseason, and looks like he can do some damage in this League. Doing it during the regular season is something different, however, so I am excited to see him play.

3. That is going to be the big question this year without Elvis Dumervil. The Broncos have two guys that were picked in the 1st Round that need to step up – Jarvis Moss and Robert Ayers. Ironically, it was the Jags that made the trade with the Broncos in 2007 that allowed the Broncos to move up to get Moss. The Jags ended up taking Reggie Nelson and he’s now gone too. The Broncos won’t replace Doom’s production with one player. If they can get it done with multiple guys, however, they’ll be ok.

4. Anyone and everyone who is healthy. Knowshon, Correll Buckhalter, Lance Ball, etc. The Broncos won’t likely have one feature back. They will rotate guys in and stick with the hot hand. Hopefully someone gets hot.

5. No

6. In a perfect world, Beadles would be at LG. Unfortunately, the world of the Broncos O-Line is far from perfect. That means Beadles will start at one of the T spots should Ryan Clady or Ryan Harris not start.

7. Scare? Well, MJD is the key. He’s the one guy you CANNOT let beat you. I like the Broncos DBs, so I’ll take my chances with Garrard throwing the ball. Mike Sims-Walker is a solid WR so the Broncos will have to keep him in check. Something tells me this game will come down to Special Teams and Turnovers…

8. I think the Broncos return game is going to be very, very good. The Broncos pass defense – especially in back – is very good as well. That’s why teams are going to attack the Broncos on the ground. That’s where MJD comes in.

Robert Ayers, Jarvis Moss, and Jason Hunter are our OLB’s. They will need to get to the QB. We also have McBean and Bannan as the DE who will need to get to the QB. I also suspect some CB blitzing this year.

They will get creative and try and do it with coverage and scheme. One reason for the separation between the Broncos and Mike Nolan was Nolan’s insistence on blitzing. Josh McDaniels really doesn’t want to send extra defenders. The Broncos will try and get to the QB with 4 or 5. They are hoping that works, only time will tell.

looked great when he was practicing. He has shown some really good flashes, but he injured his foot again and hasn’t played in the pre season. He probably won’t even play against the Jags. However, our receiving corps is deep and we don’t need him to have a great passing game.

He was really coming along until he got hurt. I know someone who played in the NFL that had a similar injury and he told me he would take Thomas a year to start feeling normal again. The foot itself might be ook, but the tearing of scar tissue is normal. The pain is normal. All of that, however, leads to a player that doesn’t trust his body. When that happens, it is extremely hard to goo 100%.

With the depth the team has at WR, I’m hoping the Broncos shut him down and let him get 100% healthy. Sometimes the big picture is more important, and to me that is the case with Thomas.

1. Easy – The Oakland Raiders
2. It’s the Chargers until someone beats them. The Broncos have had the chance recently, but let it slip through their fingers.
3. I’m a Halo guy…

Oakland Raiders

Chargers

Black Ops ALL THE WAY

As talented as those three were, they were cancers that are more concerned with themselves than the team. That does not work in McD’s world, no matter who you are.

Sometimes you take a step back to take 3 steps forward. That would be my answer to this. Cutler’s colors haven’t changed. Until someone holds him accountable – and doesn’t give him excuses for his failures – he will continue to fail. Marshall needed a change of scenery for more reasons than just his issues with money or Josh McDaniels. The Darrent Williams murder really made it impossible to ever move forward in Denver. As for Scheffler, he gets lumped in, but I was never really that high on him. He can catch the ball, but he’s no Shannon Sharpe.

I’ll go by my biggest concern, which is the offensive line. It all starts there, and if the O-Line can’t get the job done consistently the offense is going to struggle. With 2 rookies, plus both tackles coming off injury, the unit is a huge IF right now.

As for the Jags, I’m going to say the defensive backfield. That is purely a view from the outside, but with Rasheen Mathis being the one standout to me, the other three positions are a bit of a question mark. I’d love to know what you think your biggest weakness is…

As much as I have taken Mike Shanahan to task, he did help the Broncos win 2 Super Bowls and will always hold a special place in the hearts of Broncos fans because of it. He simply became too powerful in Denver, essentially becoming the only voice.

McDaniels has been a breath of fresh air, and I think many Broncos fans are now beginning to realize the situation the roster was in. It is going to take time, and I think McDaniels will be given the time to pull it off…

We’ll likely see a WR-by-committee approach. That said, two players seem to be on the same page with Orton – Jabar Gaffney and Brandon Lloyd. Both had nice preseason’s and Orton trusts both. Eddie Royal is going to be featured as well.

The plan is for D Thomas to emerge as the #1 at some point. With the chemestry that Orton and Jabar have right now it may take some time for Thomas to overtake Jabar for the #1. Once D Thomas is fully healed though, he looks like he can be an excellent #1.

Probably in the same place as Jack Del Rio’s axe

I don’t get the feeling it was the latter. The Broncos were 24-24 the final 3 seasons under Mike Shanahan. This wasn’t a situation where there was a winning formula and McDaniels came in and changed everything for the sake of change. I could go deeper into each big change – all had to happen for different reasons – but the 10,000 foot view is the Broncos needed to move to a team-first approach. I think they are on their way.