Seven thoughts after Nik Bonitto and the Broncos defense saved the day in a 20-12 Week 1 win over the Tennessee Titans on Sunday at Empower Field.
1. Denver’s discombobulation offensively sure looked like it went further than Sean Payton and Bo Nix wanted to acknowledge after the game
Bo Nix was hot.
Denver’s offensive season actually started pretty smoothly, but it went off the rails quickly.
The Broncos took their opening drive and promptly marched into Tennessee territory Sunday, covering 44 yards in their first six plays. Jeffery Simmons gifted them a first down with a neutral zone infraction on third-and-5 to push the ball into the red zone.
Nix, though, got nonchalant trying to change a play with about 8 seconds left on the play clock and took a delay of game penalty.
Then he missed running back Tyler Badie twice.
Then a playcall came in too slow for Nix’s liking, the Broncos got out of the huddle late, and Nix had to burn a timeout.
He turned toward the sideline, looked at head coach Sean Payton, and appeared to yell, “Come on. Let’s go.”
The Broncos stalled on third-and-15 after the timeout and settled for a field goal.
Nix isn’t afraid to let Payton know when he’s not happy. It’s part of what earned the quarterback a “Ferris Bueller” moniker from Payton last fall.
But the discombobulation didn’t end there.
On third-and-2, the very next series, Nix rushed to move guys in motion and get them set after the initial formation clearly wasn’t what the quarterback thought was coming.
He did that several times over the course of the afternoon. Getting alignment issues and formational problems corrected is part of a quarterback’s job, but too much air traffic controller means less time for Nix to survey the defense and anticipate what’s coming.
Payton and Nix downplayed the idea that operational issues caused the up-and-down outing for Denver’s offense.
That, they said, had more to do with the three turnovers from Nix. The 56 rushing yards on Denver’s first 18 attempts. And, to give the Titans credit, a stout front three led by a terrific player in Simmons.
“We had one delay of game, right?” Payton responded when asked about the issues. “I’ll have to see the film. I mean, operationally, I didn’t think (there was a big issue). We were late with one where they blew the whistle quick on us, and we got called for a delay. I’ll be better.”
Nix was even more direct.
“I know we didn’t get points, but I don’t necessarily say it was out of sync,” he said. “The first drive, we go down the field, and then that penalty got us back behind the chains. Had to settle for a field goal.
“But when the first drive goes down like that and gets points, I don’t think that’s out of sync.”
Denver’s next four offensive possessions after that field goal went interception, punt, fumble, punt. After three first downs on their opening march, the Broncos mustered six over their next seven drives.
Perhaps it’s a matter of perspective. Much of the offseason talk from the offense centered around how much smoother things were running, and how much quicker in and out of the huddle the Broncos were. All of that.
It didn’t look that way in Week 1. That doesn’t mean it won’t going forward, but Payton always talks about the race to improve from Week 1 through the first month of the season, and smoothing the road between snaps would certainly help.
2. We’re not calling for a Bo Nix Growth Meter, but…
Payton bristled almost as the question started to unfurl during his postgame news conference.
He’d already called quarterback Bo Nix’s performance in Sunday’s Week 1 win“gutsy.” He knew good and well that Nix turned the ball over three times for just the second time in his young career.
But when he got a question about what growth Nix showed in the first outing of his second season, Payton had enough.
“I appreciate the question, but we’re not going to have a growth meter each week in Year 2,” Payton said. “He’s in his second year, and I love the player. I get a chance to see him every day. He can be a huge reason why we win games, and so we’re not going to have that weekly meter.”
He marked the calendar himself.
“That’s the first refused ‘Growth Meter’ question. In Week 1. I mean, that’s crazy,” Payton said.
This won’t be the place to find Nix Panic, either. It’s one game, and openers have a history of delivering weirdness. Nothing’s on film and everything’s new.
All the same, Nix’s 4.4 yards per attempt checked in lower than all but three of his rookie-year outings: Weeks 1 and 4 against Seattle and the New York Jets (Nix had minus-7 at halftime in the Meadowlands) and a December home win against Indianapolis.
He turned in the fifth multi-interception game of his career and, interestingly, three have come in his past six regular-season starts. Nix threw two each in his first two starts last fall and then didn’t have more than one in a game for 10 straight weeks. Then came five across wins vs. the Colts and Cleveland.
Nix caught fire in Denver’s final three regular-season games last year — two losses before a playoff-clinching win — with a 126 quarterback rating and nine touchdowns against one pick.
He said Sunday he’s harder on himself now than he was then.
“Because you know better,” he said. “I’ve had some experience, and I know what not to do.”
What will be interesting to watch in the coming weeks is how Nix plays on the move and if he dials up the aggression in running the football.
Early on Sunday, he made two really good throws on bootlegs moving to his left. Then he struggled, throwing from inconsistent foot placement and arm angles. Both of his interceptions came outside the numbers.
Nix finished with eight carries, but half were three sneaks and a kneeldown. When he finally took off and ran in a scramble situation, he made a man miss and scooted 11 yards on a second-and-18, then smoothly converted an in-rhythm throw to Courtland Sutton for 8 and a first down.
Nix’s legs help him, but his feet can get him into trouble. He’s found the balance for long stretches before. The sooner he settles into a rhythm again, the better for the Broncos.
3. Talanoa Hufanga and Brandon Jones have the makings of one of the best safety duos in the NFL
Broncos fans didn’t have to wait long to feel safety Talanoa Hufanga’s impact on an already terrific defense.
The 25-year-old safety has dealt with injury issues in his past, but he’s healthy and authored a season-opener that looked like his 2022 All-Pro form.
Hufanga racked up nine of his game-high 10 tackles in the first half, made plays all over the field, and jarred the ball loose from Titans running back Tony Pollard to force a fumble that, fittingly, fellow safety Brandon Jones recovered.
Hufanga might be the newcomer to this defense, but he’s representative in a way: Everybody on that unit watched him in camp and knew he was going to be really good. But even still, seeing him in action for the first time drew quite a reaction.
Same thing, really, for the defense as a whole.
“Huf’s a dawg. He’s huge with what he does for us,” defensive lineman Zach Allen told The Denver Post. “I’ve seen it for years playing against him in San Fran. He’s good at everything. He’s good in the run, he’s good in coverage. To find a safety like that is super rare. The fact that we have that, we’re super fortunate.”
Signing Hufanga to a three-year deal this spring meant bumping P.J. Locke out of the starting lineup and back to a special teams role.
That didn’t stop Locke from raving about his new teammate and Jones.
“He and Brandon just play alike,” Locke said at his locker after the game. “They just have this pursuit about them. They’re always around the ball.
“Hufanga was all over the place tonight, man. It was exciting to see. To me, he showed why he’s an All-Pro type of player.”
He and Jones have made a good match so far, and they’ve each said over the course of camp that they feel like they’ve been playing together much longer than just the past five months.
Hufanga jumped at the chance after the game to, as he says, give Jones “his flowers.”
“Nobody knows he’s the first person in every single day,” Hufanga said, adding that Jones swims at 4 a.m. before he gets to he facility in the morning. “… Nobody sees that kind of stuff, right? So, he’s teaching me what work ethic really looks like.”
Jones turned into one of several free agency hits for the Broncos when they signed him to a three-year, $20 million deal in the spring of 2024.
If Hufanga plays the way he played Sunday and stays healthy, they can turn into one of the league’s better duos in a hurry.
4. When Payton’s got a play he feels strongly about, he’ll roll the dice. This time, the Broncos defense had to make sure the Titans didn’t steal the game because of it.
Payton loves nothing more in the game-planning process than finding the thing that’s going to crack the code. It could be a trend, it could be a weakness identified in a defensive structure or just a player who represents a weak link.
Combine that with feeling particularly good about a play call, and you get the recipe for the veteran head coach taking a jugular shot.
That’s what he had lined up on fourth-and-8 from the Titans’ 36-yard line late in the fourth quarter on what could have ended up being a disastrous decision.
Payton ruled out punting with rookie Jeremy Crawshaw, who had an outstanding day, since a touchback would have netted just 16 yards. He has confidence in kicker Wil Lutz, but countered that with the notion that a blocked kick and return was the fastest way to let the Titans back in the game.
Plus, Payton said himself, “I felt strongly I had a play.”
Marvin Mims, lined up to the left, ran a deep crosser across the field to the right. Sutton, lined up to the right, ran a deep crosser to the left.
The Broncos countered Tennessee’s pre-snap chaos with some of their own. They put swing tackle and jumbo TE Alex Palczewski, an eligible receiver on this play, into a tight bunch with Sutton and Adam Trautman. Mims was alone to Nix’s left.
The Titans were moving defenders all over the place and, predictably, brought pressure.
From the snap, nobody covered Sutton.
The problem for Denver: Simmons, who started over left guard Ben Powers, looped to Denver’s right and crashed through toward Nix. The quarterback let the ball go for Mims without realizing just how free Sutton was running.
“I want to see the protection,” Payton said. “We got the look we were expecting.”
Nix knew straight away he should have gone the other direction with the throw.
“Probably just a few inches higher and Marvin goes out there and catches it,” Nix said. “Court was probably open as well. When I go back and look at it, he probably ran a good route and was open.”
Indeed, that’s exactly what the quarterback will see.
If Tennessee goes down and scores, Payton would have been crushed for the decision to go for it. As it stands, it’s easier to argue he shouldn’t have rolled the dice. And not just because it didn’t work.
On the other hand, game situation matters — rookie quarterback on the other side, home game, etc. — and there’s no denying this: Going for it shows confidence not only in Nix and the Denver offense, but maybe even more so in the defense.
That’s a luxury not many head coaches or offensive play-callers have at their disposal. If Payton finds the right balance with that kill-shot instinct over the course of the season, it will pay off big.
His protégé in Detroit, Dan Campbell, has largely thrived and occasionally failed spectacularly living on the outer fringe of aggressiveness. That was an offense that built more track record before coordinator Ben Johnson’s departure to Chicago than the Broncos have on their resume with Nix, but Payton has a defense that’s already proven it can play in hot water without cracking.
The bet here is Payton will continue to push until he finds the limit of what the defense can withstand.
5. The Broncos’ run game plan overall and their commitment to using more outside zone is very much a work in progress
The Broncos spent much of training camp and the offseason program in general working through tweaks to their run game.
The one that got the most buzz: Trying to incorporate more outside zone into the run mix. Payton’s always been a purveyor of a varied run game. Everybody is to some degree, but Payton likes a little bit of everything in the plan. He’s certainly not in the Shanahan coaching tree-lined neighborhood where San Francisco’s Kyle Shanahan, the Rams’ Sean McVay, Green Bay’s Matt LaFleur and Minnesota’s Kevin O’Connell live.
Interestingly, though, Denver dipped into that ecosystem for multiple additions this offseason. One: New assistant offensive line coach Chris Morgan, who spent 2024 in Chicago but spent 2015-16 in Atlanta with Kyle Shanahan and is a wide zone expert.
“I’ve gained some things back that I was taught early in my career,” right tackle Mike McGlinchey said Friday of working with Morgan. “He was a disciple of the Shanahan tree, and my old o-line coach, Chris Foerster in San Francisco, Chris was his assistant in Washington. There’s a lot of carryover in certain things, and he’s reminded me of some things that, after three years of being gone, I’ve had to knock the rust off of a little bit.”
Another: Receiver Trent Sherfield, who went as far as to say he thought the things Denver’s worked on in camp are essentially the same as what he did for O’Connell in Minnesota last year and for Miami coach Mike McDaniel (2022) and Shanahan (2021) before that.
The final numbers Sunday looked rosy — 30 carries for 151 yards and a touchdown — but under the hood, it looks as though substantial tinkering is still required.
In fact, what the run game looks like going forward is an open question for Denver after they logged just 56 yards on their first 18 carries before three for 74 on a fourth-quarter blast of a scoring drive.
RJ Harvey’s 50-yard rumble featured Powers pulling to the right and then a wicked cutback all the way across the field by the rookie. J.K. Dobbins rumbled to a 19-yard touchdown on an inside run with Adam Prentice at fullback. More hat-on-hat than the get-your-offensive-line-out-and-running outside zone.
“(Offensive line coach and run game coordinator Zach Strief) spends a ton of time studying other teams and, again, does that fit what we’re doing? Does it fit our runners?” senior offensive assistant Pete Carmichael said last week. “Not only our offensive line, but our runners. Then obviously we brought in Chris Morgan this year. And so he’s had his ideas to share, which is maybe something a little bit different. There’s a lot of work that goes into that in the offseason from Zach, Chris, (RB coach Lou Ayeni).
“Then you get to training camp and you get a chance to work some of that stuff, see how it is. Maybe some of that sticks, maybe some doesn’t.”
Payton didn’t specify exactly what he was talking about, but he sounded like a coach unconvinced that everything in the Week 1 plan was going to stick.
“We’ve got to look closely at what we’re doing and, as coaches, look closely at what our strengths are,” Payton said. “It was good to finally be a little bit more efficient in the second half than in the first half.”
6. A little-talked-about addition for the Broncos this offseason appears to already be paying dividends
That’s game management coordinator and offensive line assistant Evan Rothstein.
Rothstein works in the coaches booth, so there’s not going to be a bunch of airtime in his future, but Payton has tried to hire him for years. Just last week, Payton called Rothstein “brilliant.”
“As it pertains to the game, there are some things that vary based on your opponent, so it’s not as clean sometimes as just a pitcher and a batter,” the coach said. “How’s the game unfolding? All of those factors into some of those decisions whether to go for it, two-point plays, all the things that oftentimes are the main things that are discussed.”
So, there’s another potential factor in the fourth-and-8 decision, but Rothstein also has other gameday duties. Among them, helping come to a quick, clear decision on whether or not to challenge a play.
Payton won his first two challenges of the season and would have won a third that he threw a red flag on, but referee Alex Kemp and his crew changed it themselves with the help of the league’s replay assist system.
Payton lost his final challenge on a close spot later in the game, but overall, that part of the operation was one under-the-radar part that appeared to be efficient right out of the gate on an otherwise largely sloppy Sunday.
7. Bo Nix did something he hasn’t done since the 2021 season at Auburn… and it wasn’t good.
Quarterback Bo Nix lost a fumble in the second quarter, ending a marathon streak.
Nix did not lose a fumble in 17 starts as a rookie over 1,088 snaps. Not only that, but he technically didn’t lose a fumble at all in two seasons starting for Oregon, either. There was a team fumble on Nov. 17, 2022, on a botched quarterback-center exchange between Nix and now-Broncos offensive lineman Alex Forsyth, but Nix didn’t get charged with a lost fumble.
That means the last one he lost before Sunday came in 2022 in his third season at Auburn.
NFL Network analyst Brian Baldinger called Nix’s fumble-free streak “Tom Brady-esque” in a conversation with The Post this summer.
It ended compliments of Jeffery Simmons on Sunday as part of a three-turnover day for Nix and a four-turnover day overall for Denver.
“I took two hands off the ball, and that’s the cardinal sin as a quarterback, when you take two hands off the ball in the pocket,” Nix said after the game. “(Simmons) is a good player who’s going to be taught and going to have knowledge to just rip the ball. It just happened quick, and I just should’ve had two hands on the ball in the pocket.”
Nix had just one three-turnover game as a rookie: a December home win vs. Indianapolis.
The Broncos won, of course, despite those numbers Sunday, and that’s a rarity. League-wide last year, teams with four-plus turnovers went 3-15.
Thank you, Vance Joseph and company.
7b. A bonus for the home-opener: Headscratcher of the week goes to Tennessee coach Brian Callahan. What exactly he was thinking trying to throw the ball from his own 8-yard line with 47 seconds left in the first half is unexplainable.
But there the Titans’ coach was, leading 6-3, when he tried to get aggressive a la Sean Payton Week 16 against the Chargers last year. Instead, Cam Ward narrowly avoided a safety, Payton gladly used his timeouts, and forced Johnny Hekker to punt from the back-line of his own end zone, which Marvin Mims Jr. returned into field goal range. One play later, Bo Nix hit Courtland Sutton for a 22-yard touchdown and 10-6 lead.
Broncos special teams coordinator Darren Rizzi, though, gets the Headscratcher of the Week VP spot for the ensuing kickoff. The Titans returned it 71 yards when Denver could have kicked it through the end zone and made Tennessee start from the 35. Tennessee’s kicker has a big leg, so the temptation was to try to back Ward up further to start the drive. Instead, the Broncos only came out plus-4 instead of plus-7 on gifted points in the final seconds of the first half.
7c. Can’t get out of here with a second VP on the headscratcher front for Jeffery Simmons. Tennessee had the Broncos stopped and about to get the ball back down 8 just above the two-minute warning when he needlessly threw Marvin Mims Jr. to the ground. One more self-inflicted wound on an afternoon full of them for the Titans.
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