Locked On Broncos - Daily Podcast On The Denver Broncos - Denver Broncos Starters SLUGGISH In Win vs. San Francisco 49ers
Episode Date: August 10, 2025The Denver Broncos starters on offense and defense got off to sluggish starts in Saturday's preseason win against the San Francisco 49ers. How did Bo Nix and the Broncos offense look and what do they ...have to clean up? Plus, why did Nik Bonitto's three play stretch for the Broncos defense showcase why the team needs to pay him sooner rather than later and Blake Watson flashed big time as the Broncos RB competition heated up. Cody Roark is a credentialed beat reporter for Mile High Sports and covers the Broncos daily in person. Sayre Bedinger is the site expert for Predominantly Orange. Both bring Broncos Country the most in-depth and objective coverage of the Denver Broncos. WANT MORE DAILY DENVER BRONCOS CONTENT?For all of the latest Denver Broncos news today -- Follow & Subscribe on all Podcast platforms…🎧 https://link.chtbl.com/LOBroncos?sid=YouTube Locked On NFL League-Wide: Every Team, Fantasy, Draft & More🎧 https://linktr.ee/LockedOnNFL Follow on Twitter: @CodyRoarkNFL and @SayreBedingerFollow the show on Twitter: @LockedOnBroncos Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!5-Hour ENERGYGo to 5hourenergy.com today and use promo code LOCKEDONGOLF to receive 20% off your order. This offer is only valid until September 30th on one order and cannot be used with other promotions. The code is not good on subscription orders. Yahoo FantasyPresented by YahooFantasy #YahooPartner. Play Now at https://yahoofantasy.com/lockedonnfl. GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONNFL for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download Gametime today. What time is it? Gametime. FanDuelRight now, new customers can get $150 in BONUS BETS when your first $5 BET WINS! Download the app or head to FANDUEL.COM to get started. Monarch MoneyTake control of your finances with Monarch Money. Use code LOCKEDONNFL at monarchmoney.com/lockedonnfl for 50% off your first year. FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
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The Denver Broncos starting offense and Bow Nix, they were sluggish in the preseason opener against the 49ers.
We'll tell you why there's no reason to be concerned yet.
We'll tell you about that much more here on today's episode, Lockdown Broncos.
You are Locked on Broncos, your daily Denver Broncos podcast.
Part of the Locked on podcast network, your team every day.
What's up, Broncos country?
Welcome into another episode, Lockdown Broncos, your daily Denver Broncos podcast.
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I'm Cody Rourke.
Broncos reporter for Mile High Sports.
Join, as always by Sarah Beninger,
the site expert over there at Providence.
Domely Orange.com. The Broncos win the preseason opener 30 to 9 against the San Francisco
49ers, but not without some ups and downs. The Broncos offense and the starters. They were
sluggish in the early portions of their 18 total snaps that they played. We'll talk about
Bo Nix and the offensive struggles early on. We'll tell you why the Broncos need to pay Nick
Benito now before that price tag goes up based on the series that he had for this game.
And then we'll also dive deeper into the Broncos running back competition, which really heated
it up in Saturday's game with one guy emerging, I think is the hot hand early on after the first
preseason game. Sarah, my friend, a lot of ups and a lot of downs here for this Broncos team and
week one of the NFL preseason, a lot of overreactions on social media, the stuff that we all
missed dearly. But for this Broncos team, for the starters on offense and even defense,
well, folks here on the offense to start, a lot of rust that they're going to have to shake off
going into week two of the preseason. Yeah, a lot of rust, Cody. Sean Peyton said,
after the game, average to below average from his starters.
So anybody that thinks our observations are going to be overreactions at this point.
Just know that the head coach himself said average to below average from the starters.
I was really underwhelmed, Cody, from the very start of this game.
It's disappointing when you're going up against another team's backups that you come out,
you give up a 50-yard play, J-Quain Macmillan and coverage.
I know you'll talk a little bit more about that as well.
But you give up a touchdown to the Mack Jones-led 49ers offense.
I know those guys are paid to play.
I know Jones has been to a Pro Bowl,
but this is supposed to be the number one defense in the NFL.
We all expected them to make a big statement out there.
And then the offense just struggled to really get anything going.
They were struggling with the 49ers coverage scheme.
They were struggling when the 49ers sent blitzes.
I mean, it was just not great.
It was not crisp.
It was not what we expected from a team with all these expectations going in.
But you know what?
It might end up being the best thing for them.
because last year they had to come into every game with a chip on their shoulder.
Underdogs every week, including the preseason,
everybody's saying you got the worst roster in the league.
Now everybody's telling you, oh, you're a dark horse Super Bowl candidate.
You know, you're one of the best up-and-coming teams in the league.
Sometimes you need a little kick in the pants to kind of get you going again
because this was a humbling, in my opinion, it was a humbling experience.
If I was on the team, I'd be upset with the way that this night went, Cody.
Yeah, and I think that Bo and the starters,
I don't think that they were pleased with how their performance.
And so it was obviously they got 18 plays in this game.
They were expected to get initially around 12.
But because of what we saw in the first couple of series there,
Sean Payton kept them out there,
you know, a little bit longer than he would have liked to because you want to at
least have some sort of momentum here.
And look, I'll say this.
This is my devil's advocate argument here.
I would rather this offense struggle or look a little slow here in the preseason
than start this way in the regular season, right?
Because that's one thing that this team can't afford in the regular season.
You can't afford to get off to a slow start against the Titans and then the Colts and then the Chargers, then the Bengals, then the Eagles, because then it gets a little bit tougher after that.
You have to get off to a hot start.
Whereas I'd say last year, the Broncos offense in the preseason, Sarah, they did get off to a little bit of fast start.
And then it took them until week four, the regular season to actually carry that over into regular season.
So, I mean, knowing Bo, knowing this team, I'm not worried about it.
But yes, it was disappointing to see them get off to this type of sluggish start.
Now, there were some positives that we saw in terms of the offense.
We'll get to that here in a minute.
But I wanted to go through Bo, Nix, in terms of his performance there.
I felt like he had a couple of these underthrowing passes that, you know,
it worries me a little bit if that's what's happening in the regular season
because you can't be underthrowing passes across the deep middle of the field there,
especially with the speed and the physicality that NFL safety,
these all these starters bring to the table.
You know, there was a play to Troy Franklin.
It was a little underthrown there.
Bo's going to want that one back when he goes back and watches the tape.
And then on third down on the left side to Cortland Sutton, he had another underthrown ball on a vertical route there.
So is this because this was the first actual game action and this is just rust and everything like that because the game is faster than what you're going to get when you're going against someone in practice.
Even in the joint practices, it's not going to be at the speed or the intensity that you're going to get in this actual game where guys can really hit you.
So part of me is wondering, is that part of the rust factor here?
Certainly some things that the Broncos have to clean up.
And that's something that Sean Payton said.
And Sean even said he wrote 14 things that he was pissed off about that had nothing to do with the game.
And so I'm thinking on my head like,
Sean,
what are those 14 things?
But what are the things about the offense that you, you know,
want to have cleaned up?
So for me,
I share your sentiment in terms of the disappointing factor here,
especially against backups.
But you want to see this team bounce back here in week two of the preseason.
And I think they will.
They go up against the Arizona Cardinals here coming up next,
right at home next week.
So that's,
you want to see.
you need to see them bounce back at this point.
And I think that will shift the narrative.
It'll get everybody back feeling a little bit more comfortable about where things are at.
Because after a game like this, Cody, you know, everybody says don't overreact.
And I think that the reason they're saying that is because it wasn't good, right?
It's like, don't overreact because it was bad.
And I think that's what we're trying to say is like, yeah, it didn't look very good out there.
But situationally, we still got to see some really nice things, got to see some good work from the offense.
Ryan Harris, who was calling the game for 9 News, Cody, he didn't seem concerned whatsoever
about the way things were going. He's like, I thought it was a great day for Boe out there.
Great work for the offense. Like, these guys just perceive things so differently because they're
working situationally. We saw the fourth down catch by Troy Franklin. Outstanding stuff.
We saw RJ Harvey get stuffed in the middle of the line of scrimmage and then bounce a run
outside, showing off the burst, the giddy up, the quickness, the vision that, man, that's
what makes him so special.
We saw a concerted effort to get certain guys involved offensively all throughout the course
of this game, but to spread the ball around deliberately from the beginning, I think that was
intentional.
And I do think that also gives some context as to why maybe the offense isn't moving the ball as
well as they should be at this point is because you are deliberately trying to, hey, here's a
game situation.
We want to throw the ball to RJ Harvey Harvey.
So it's not, it's like, it's like in Madden when the coach picks your play.
you're like, okay, you're going to the guy who's highlighted yellow on this play,
but we want to see what RJ can do.
Like, you do see some of that throughout the course of a game where you want to get these guys involved.
Yeah, and look, I'll even say this as well.
We'll talk about a couple of things.
I love the connection to Troy Franklin.
I would have liked to see Evan Ingram catch a few passes here in his debut.
I felt like it was a relatively quiet night for the tight ends outside of Lucas
Crowell's touchdown that he had and Caleb pre-scorn late from Sane, Ellinger.
But I will say this, you know, I've seen a lot of people talking about, you know,
Bo in terms of the safety, the intentional grounding.
And yes, I mean, it's a teachable moment.
But here's my argument on that.
You're looking at the right side of that offensive line.
And it seems like the 49ers are overloading on the right side.
So it kind of looked like Bo was sliding the protection right.
They bring an on, they bring a nickel defender, a blitzer free off the edge.
No one accounts for him.
No one even pinpoints him out in both senses he's coming.
So that's why he does that spin.
and he just chucks it, right?
Intentional grounding, it leads to his safety, yes.
Negative play, I would have much rather that happened than Bo stand there sitting in the pocket,
not seeing that nickel guy coming and then just absolutely getting blown up.
I would have hated to see that.
At that point, I would have been like, why is he still in the game?
But yes, some stuff that you want to clean up here.
We'll look at that.
What were your thoughts on RJ Hartley overall?
Because look, we got not a big sample size of him,
but I feel like with what we saw from him, you saw the quick cuts,
You saw the explosive decisiveness.
There was another gear that he had as a runner that certainly I just kept thinking to myself,
they didn't have this with Javante last year.
Exactly.
He brings what they did not have before,
which is that giddy up and power combination.
I feel like he's got the ability to stick his shoulder down when he wants to because he's
shorter,
but he's not a small guy.
Like he has some big legs and he will drive them when he needs to.
So I really liked what we saw from RJ Harvey, Cody.
I know that there was a couple of shorter runs that he had that brought the yards per carry down.
But I feel like overall we saw that burst, the explosiveness, the vision that we wanted to see.
We saw him get involved in the passing game a little bit as well.
I feel like they did a great job overall in this game involving the backs and highlighting that competition that we're going to talk about later in today's show.
I'm stoked about it too.
In Broncos, country, make sure you share your thoughts with us here on Bow Nix and the Broncos starting offense.
and their sluggish start that they had here in week one of the NFL preseason.
We want to know what you're thinking here.
But now we're going to transition our thoughts here and talk about the Broncos defense,
who got off to a sluggish start.
But then a Nick Benito forest fire absolutely ran rampant in the second quarter there.
I mean, in the second defensive series to give the Broncos defense a little bit more life.
We'll highlight why the Broncos need to pay Nick Benito now here on today's episode,
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It's time to give that man his money, Cody.
We need Nick Benito to be getting that bag.
He gets, let's give him a blank check after what we just saw in the preseason.
I don't think anybody sent a louder.
message in the preseason opener, then did Nick Benito, who is still yet to be paid his long-term
contract. But you know what? Maybe an episode of Lockdown Broncos coming in the near future
about Nick Benito signing a big money deal. Broncos country number 15. He stood out off the edge.
And we'll talk more about the defense. Underwhelming at first. But then, man, they showed their
teeth over the course of this game against the 49ers backups. But thanks so much to all of you that
make us your first listen of the day every single day, whether it's Monday through Friday,
whether it's after a preseason game bonus episodes,
make sure you're subscribed so you don't miss a single episode of the show,
whether it's on your favorite podcast platform or YouTube or both.
Cody, let's talk about Nick Benito because, of course,
the defense was gassed on the first possession.
We'll talk about that,
but the big story here is Nick Bonito making his case on three very specific plays
that he got.
That was kind of just a mic drop moment for him.
I think we saw.
this guy is ready to go dominate this coming season.
Well, he's at a dominate training camp as well.
He's been a standout name almost every single day working against the Broncos first team guys.
We obviously saw him making a lot of hay in the joint practice against the 49ers a couple of days ago.
And of course, yes, it's not against Trent Williams or Brock Purdy here.
But when we talk about when we say the Broncos need to find a way to pay Nick Benito right now,
this is a guy with his high motor, high effort, high energy.
you're going to see this type of emphasis, I think, come the regular season.
And can the Broncos really risk that because of leverage?
I mean, Nick Benito, let's talk about those three plays here.
It was on the Broncos' second defensive series, right?
Their first series was rough.
We'll go back and highlight some of those slow start concerns as well for that unit in a minute.
But let's talk about the story here for Nick.
It was against the second series defensively here for them.
Benito on three straight plays his first play.
He sacks Mack Jones with ease.
and makes a big play, right?
Second play, you swarm, you see the pastor.
She beats the offensive tackle again.
He and John Franklin Myers, they share half a sack each on Mack Jones on that play.
Then the third play is third down and long.
Mack Jones is dropping back.
And of course, before he can even set his back, plant foot,
Nick Benito is there, almost wraps him up, gets right back up and is chasing him.
And Matt Jones kind of sidesteps and runs 20 yards backwards and heaves the ball out of bounds just to avoid Nick Bonito,
who's just so relentless.
And so the reason we're saying pay Nick Benito.
It's not because, okay, he did this against second string guys in the preseason.
It's the Broncos see what they're going to get from this guy in terms of how he works.
He didn't want to come out the field.
He rolled his ankle.
He stayed on the field.
He didn't want to come off.
But you're going to get this.
And if the Broncos allow this to happen where it's like they get to the point in the regular season where things roll around,
you're seeing plays like this on a consistent basis, his price tag only increases.
And then that puts a little bit of pressure on the Broncos.
So pay him now or pay him.
maybe during the regular season where you might have to pay them a little bit more than maybe what you can get now.
I don't know where they're at in terms of the language of that.
But to me, it's like you have a guy who's obviously flashing these special traits,
not only against the 49er starters in joint practices, Denver starters every single day in practice,
but you're seeing it on field and game situations.
You know what you're getting with this guy.
And you've got to take care of that.
I think the Broncos will, but how soon is the question?
It is.
And I think the more plays Nick Bonito makes, the more maybe he's like,
Like, let's just kind of wait and see, you know.
I don't know.
I don't know how he is, but, I mean, you might start thinking that.
If you're making more plays and you're saying, hey, this is what they're offering right now.
I mean, I could keep climbing, you know.
So for a guy like him, it's an interesting predicament to be in.
But at the same time, it's a situation where you know that the Broncos are going to want to keep this guy around.
Because not only was he making plays in this game, Cody, but he was also a member of the play that we talked about at practice where he almost picked off Boe Nix in the backfield.
and did a similar thing that he did last year against Cleveland and Indianapolis,
taking the ball back for six.
I mean, this guy is a playmaker off the edge.
And he is that stud that the Broncos have needed so desperately off the edge.
And this performance just felt like kind of one final warning sign of like,
all right, like you said, I mean, if you let me continue to play this well,
the price tag is only going to continue to go up.
And that's the reality that you face when you wait to do extensions.
and George Payton has not been waiting to do extensions.
He's been getting out a year ahead, pretty much all of them.
So I do expect this to happen at some point here in the near future, Cody.
I just feel like this was kind of that final nail in the coffin, so to speak, to prove that Benito.
What's the conversation been?
It's like, well, go out there and do it again this year after what he did last year and the year before.
Everybody's like, we want to see him do it again this year before the Broncos pay him all this money.
And shoot, I don't know, Cody.
I think I've seen enough.
Pay the man. The price is right. Come on down.
That whole thing comes to mind here when I think about Nick getting the paycheck.
I think he deserves it. I hope the Broncos find a way to take care of him.
He was a bright spot. Look, the Broncos defense, the second string, third string, guys,
they did a really good job in this game of coming in, forcing takeaways here.
But let's talk about a little bit of the slow start that they had as well.
You know, I felt like they did pretty well initially.
Justin Sternard had a nice stick TFL to open up the game.
but it really was a 50-yard bomb from Mack Jones to, you know,
obviously their rookie wide receiver in San Francisco,
who's got some blazing speed to him that beat Jayquam Mac Millen inside the nickel.
I thought it was a well-placed throw.
But, you know, obviously that big explosive play brought them down into the red zone.
And then there was a play off the left tackle where Nick Benito was clearly being held.
They didn't throw the flag touchdown.
Okay, you live with that.
That's why the Broncos defense, they came back out there for a second series.
And Nick Benito said, hey, no more playing.
Let's get back to business here.
Obviously, he had some great plays.
Pat Sartan had a nice pass breakup.
This was not the sharpest showing from the Broncos starters overall.
I'd say out of all the starters, the defense, they bounced back on that second series.
But I like what we saw from guys like Karenne Reed.
And you look at other guys like Joshua Pickett getting involved as well, getting takeaways.
J.L. Skinner, the Broncos had a lot of standout guys defensively in this game,
including Jonah Ellis, guys that we talked about in our players to watch leading up to this game.
Your thoughts on the Broncos overall defensive performance in 30.
the 9 win against San Fran tonight.
Yeah, they just showed off their depth in such a big way, Cody.
I think that that was the biggest standout to me in this game is,
okay, your starters, yeah, they kind of struggle a little bit out there.
They're shaking off some rust, whatever you want to call it.
But when the backups came in, I mean, it was like we were playing two different leagues there.
It was like the 49ers were out there playing on all Madden mode and the Broncos.
We're just kind of having their way any way that they wanted, whether it was offensively or defensively, right?
but especially on the defensive side where they forced five turnovers in the game,
if you count the turnover on downs.
They just were all over the place, rushing the quarterback,
getting Sabian Jones got a hand up in the throwing lane.
Q Robinson made a nice TFL on a wide receiver screen.
These guys were making plays all over the field.
And you mentioned the interception by Karen A Reid,
a couple of really nice plays by undrafted guys.
J.L. Skinner forcing a fumble.
Man, it was just good stuff.
really, really good stuff from all of these Denver Broncos depth pieces, especially on the
defensive front.
Chris Abrams drain as well had himself a terrific game.
You know, he had the interception called back due to illegal, I think, has the face by Njoma
who was a rea.
But I came away.
If I had one defensive takeaway, I like the depth that they have here.
You mention all the guys there, the rookies made plays defensively.
They talk about, Jada Baron coming up well on the run game.
Jekwan MacMillan getting an I-N-T.
I mean, this was just a great overall,
from the Broncos, some starters, key depth guys here, came away impressed with that.
Broncos country, make sure you let us know your thoughts here on today's episode show.
Your thoughts on Nick Benito and the urgency in which the Broncos should or should not pay him right now.
We want to know your thoughts and also your thoughts on the defensive players from this game here.
But Broncos country, one thing that we had our eye on, the running that competition fell under the microscope.
And Blake Watson got off to a hot start as that whole competition heated up in Saturday's win.
We'll highlight that much more here on today's.
episode of the show.
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Blake Watson and the Denver Broncos running back room got this competition kickstarted
with some fire here.
We'll break it all down here on today's episode.
with lockdown Broncos, our post-game report here.
Sarah, I came away very impressed with the Broncos running back room initially as a whole, right?
When competition takes place, you're looking to see who emerges a little bit.
And I think there were various moments where all these other guys got it, right?
The clear pecking order, as we all saw, J.K. Dobb is an R.J. Harvey.
Those are the top two guys here.
But Sean Payton alluded to it earlier this week.
There could be one or two spots up for grabs.
And I thought Jilin McLaughlin initially got off to a pretty good start.
He had a nice run that would have been.
I don't know if it was going to be a touch.
or if it was going to be down into one, it got called back to do with a holding penalty on Pat
Bryant.
So it negated a really nice play from Jililil.
So when you look at the statute, you're not going to think that Jalilil did anything special
in that regard.
He ended up finishing the game with three carries for five yards and one catch for five yards.
So it kind of negates it for the people that watch the box scores only here.
He was, you know, did solid in the small reps he had.
But really, it was Blake Watson who knocked on the door.
Nobody answered.
He kicked it down.
he got off to probably the best start out of all the running backs on the roster in this competition,
a big night for the second year player who's undrafted last year.
I can't wait to see if there's any shuffling of the depth chart or the order in which these guys are playing here in the second week of the preseason, Cody,
because obviously you're going to want to see what these guys can do against a better competition or with the other guys around them.
And Blake Watson, you know, he's one of those players that this team really believes in.
He got regular season action last year.
And I do think this is going to be one of the toughest spots to cut players on this entire roster.
It's going to be fascinating to see how Sean Payton, George Payton, the scouting department, how they approach it.
Because I also thought Tyler Badey may have ran as well as anybody in this game.
He played really good.
And he looks healthy and fresh.
And all of these guys got involved as receivers.
That was what was most interesting to me.
You and I talked about, don't just be an outlet, you know, go make a play as a pass catcher.
I feel like we saw that from these guys, obviously, in both ways.
But really, after the catch, they all kind of shined a little bit.
I saw a really nice play from Audric Estime after the catch.
We saw a really nice play from Watson after the catch, and maybe his was the best out of them all.
But to me, it's, I mean, man, if this competition was strong before, if it was heating up at training camp, it is on fire.
here after this first preseason game.
And I don't know how to even sort it out after this one.
Yeah, it's going to be tough to decipher.
I mean, Watson's first carry went for, what, 18 yards?
And then on the very next play at a 16 yard catch and run out of the backfield,
that was the juice of it.
I agree with you on Bade.
I thought Badee's vision.
There were a couple times he had an inside run.
The gaps kind of clogged up.
And he saw, like he was able to bounce it and just get upfield and just make
extended plays.
I did feel like, like, Audrey Estimate's first carry, right?
you look at his first carry, he was for three yards, but I felt like it was a downhill,
hard three yards for him to get.
But I did feel like the offensive line.
I want to see Adrick work with that second team, you know, or even that first team in a little bit,
just because I felt like at times Estimate had to bounce stuff outside, you know,
versus he's hitting it downhill.
It gets closed down and he has to find a way to adjust.
I thought his 20-yard catch and run that he had was great.
I liked what we saw from Estima as well.
I mean, really, it kind of feels like all of these backs that are in this competition.
know that these preseason games matter the most for them,
plus the body of work at what we're seeing at practice.
And so there is no room for error, I feel like.
And we're seeing that kind of elevate this competition and rise things up a little bit here.
I want to ask you your thoughts on this because I think this is important when we talk about it.
We all know the preseason.
31 other teams are scouting different rosters and they're looking at the Broncos.
San Francisco might be looking at this Broncos roster as well.
Right now, would you say?
outside of J.K. Dobbins and RJ, who do you think that third back is out of Blake,
Jalil, Adrick, and obviously Tyler in the competition here.
If you had to pinpoint now, right now, who is that third back and then who is your fourth guy?
I think it's Tyler Badee.
I really do, Cody.
I know he was the fourth guy out there.
Yeah, as the third.
I think he's the third guy.
And that's just my opinion.
I don't know if that's what Sean Payton thinks.
but to me, I think he brings you that explosiveness.
He brings you the past catching ability.
He brings you that juice.
And I believe that, I know we only have one game really to go off of because of what happened last year against the Jets.
But I believe that he would have ended up as the lead ball carrier last season.
If he would have stayed healthy.
I really do.
I think that he would have been their number one back over Javante, over Jalil.
I think that that would have been the case.
And now it's just you've got to recline that whole ladder again because you were
injured last year. And now there's new guys in town. You overhauled the position. I think Bade is number
three. And then I would say Joliel's number four to me. And I think that those other two guys have a
chance to leapfrog. I would, if it was me, Cody, I don't know what, like I would be having such
a tough time with this right now. I'd be trying to maybe trade these guys to a team that I'd want them
on this year or, you know, I don't know. I don't know what they're going to do. It's going to be
tough. Yeah, I mean, I don't know who I would pinpoint as my third. I would maybe say Blake
Watson here. You know, I think Jolil's obviously, I think it's just got this role carved out for him that
John really, really likes with Jolil. And, you know, I don't think we're going to always see the best
looks for some of these backs with that second and third team offensive line, which was brutal.
I mean, you're moving guys who are playing tackle with the second team O line. You're moving them
to guard when they get to that third team O line in Paucheski, who had himself a rough game, I felt
like just on the initial watch through. He had so many penalties that brought back some promising plays
for you offensively. These are stuff.
that you want to clean up here.
But also I look at like J.K. Dobbins.
I look at, you know, RJ Harvey.
And if we factor in Tyler and we factor in Blake,
aren't all four of those body types very similar in a sense?
Like don't you want a bruising physical downhill guy like Audrey to be in,
you know, shortyarded situations?
Or is that something maybe you can come up and compensate for with good vision,
explosive cuts?
I don't know.
It's going to be tough for this team to make these decisions.
And I am so glad that we don't have to do that.
But George and Sean, the coaching staff, they're probably going to be stressed here in the next three weeks trying to formulate how this roster is going to go.
I would say my four is RJ, J.K. Jalil and Blake.
And yeah, I'm very, I feel like it's Blake and Tyler is kind of that, you know, if you had to put a slash between them, I think that's where I'm at with these guys.
And even Audrick, Odrick's had such a great training camp, too.
And I thought he had a pretty good game, all circumstances considered.
I don't want to make this decision.
No, nor do I.
I think that the Broncos are going to need these next couple of games.
They're going to need the duration of training camp.
And there's going to be a lot that goes into those decisions, right?
There's going to be the future will be considered, not just this year, but down the line.
Contract situations will have to factor into.
I mean, every aspect of that debate when you're building out this roster, when it comes to the third back on the team,
or the fourth back on the team or both, that has to be factors in the discussion.
All those things have to be because they're not going to be starting for you right away.
It's going to be Dobbins and Harvey at the top of the depth chart.
You kind of know that.
So like you said, there's so many different avenues that we could go down.
It's an impossible puzzle to figure out right now.
But I think it'll become clear, obviously, as we get deeper into the preseason.
We're excited about a Broncos country.
We always love the passion.
But remember, it's the preseason.
Don't overreact.
Don't get too crazy with the highs and the lows.
Let's find some middle ground here.
We appreciate you so much for rocking with this.
For all you every dayers, here's what you can expect on Monday's episode of the show.
Sarah and I, we're going to talk about how Trent Sherfield may be solidified the Broncos keeping six wide receivers on the 53-man roster and a couple of other standouts.
We'll go through that and much more here on Monday's episode.
Lockdown Broncos.
Broncos country.
We'll see you then.
