Locked On Broncos - Daily Podcast On The Denver Broncos - Denver Broncos, Von Miller REUNION Hinges On One Condition

Episode Date: February 21, 2025

The Denver Broncos could find themselves in a position to reunite with Von Miller if the Buffalo Bills release him, but it only makes sense under one condition. Would Miller be okay with being a role player while Nik Bonitto and Jonathon Cooper maintain the reigns as starters for the Broncos defense? Could this be one move that sets Miller and the Broncos up for a Super Bowl 60 push in a storybook setting that only Hollywood could write? 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!FanDuelRight now, new FanDuel customers can get ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS in Bonus Bets if your first FIVE DOLLAR bet wins!Download the app or head to FANDUEL.COM to get started. Bet with FanDuel—Official Partner of the NBA. 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.

Could the Denver Broncos and future Hall of Famer, Von Miller, find a way to reunite this offseason? We'll tell you why that's possible, but only under one condition on today's episode, Locked on Broncos. You are Locked on Broncos, your daily Denver Broncos podcast, part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. What's happening in Broncos country? Welcome into another episode of Locked on Broncos, your daily Denver Broncos podcast, part of the Lockdown Podcast network where you know it is your team every day. every single day, even throughout the offseason, because for the true fan, there is never an offseason for all your Broncos news content coverage analysis and more lockdown Broncos is the place to be. I'm Cody Rourke. Broncos reporter from our ice sports.

Join, as always, by Sarah Bedinger, site expert predominantly orange.com. I want to say thank you once again to all the everydayers out there in Broncos country. Thank you so much for making us your first listen. However, you choose to do so. And we got a jam-packed episode for you here today. Von Miller, could he return to the Denver Broncos this offseason? We have a whole episode dedicated to that. We'll wrap things up by talking about why it doesn't make sense for Miller to return to Denver this upcoming season.

We'll also take a look at two why he could return to Denver and why it makes sense for the Broncos. But we're going to also highlight the real strategy, the real topic here. Could he return to Denver? What does his offseason outlook look like? That's where we're going to kick things off on today's episode show. Brought here by friends over there at Fandu. And right now, new Fandual customers can get 100. $50 in bonus bets.

If your first $5 bet wins, just visit fandu.com to get started. All right, sir, hey, let's break it down here. This is a hot topic. Obviously, as the NFL new league year is approaching here on March 12th, legal tampering, March 10th, a lot of people are wondering who are going to be cap casualties, who's at risk of being cut so you can make some financial decisions. And former Bronco, obviously going to be a first ballot hall of famer. Super Bowl MVP von Miller was a name that was brought up on behalf of the

Buffalo Bills, and that is a move that absolutely could happen. What does this look like for Vaughn? Yeah, he's got a 24 million or roughly 24 million, just a little bit below that cap hit for the Buffalo Bills this year. And they can save over 17.4 million by making him a post-June 1 cut designation, which does make a lot of sense on their part. Cody, as we know, the Buffalo Bills have kind of reloaded the roster the last couple of years.

And obviously, we want to continue to surround Josh Allen with a bunch of pieces. And while I think the bills did kind of figure out how to maximize Vaughn this past season in terms of snaps played, you know, productivity as a pass rusher, just tough to justify a 24 million cap hit for a player that is going to be 36 this coming season. But shout out to Von Miller, a fellow member of the class of 1989, the birthing class of 1989, me, Von Miller, Taylor Swift, I know, maybe Travis Kelsey as well. Yeah, I know. How crazy is that? What a year, man. What a year. But Bonn, fortunately for me, is going to be turning 36 long before I will.

He'll be turning 36 in March as opposed to me in November, Cody. And look, being 36 years old this coming season has been an immediate deterrent when you talk about why fans don't want him. But look, let's talk about the season that Bond just had, right? 279 snaps for the Buffalo Bills, six sacks, you know, seven tackles for loss, eight quarterback hits, had 16 pressures. I mean, the guy's still productive in a very limited sample. I feel like, you know what?

He's going to have some. This is the analogy that I use with pass rushers, Cody. The last thing to go for a great basketball player is the shot, right? I mean, these guys, they'll be able to shoot until the day they die. It's not an equivalent, but for a great pass rusher like Von Miller, or you've seen it in the past with other older pass rushers, and the last thing to go is getting to the quarterback. These guys, they might wear down physically in other ways,

but they can still find ways to the QB. I feel like Von Miller can still bring value to a lot of different teams in 2025. Well, and I would say his role was a little bit reduced last season. And look, he was also coming off of an ACL injury at one point in his time with the Buffalo Bills. And look, the Broncos were in the mix initially, right? Because George Payton, the Broncos, they traded him way to Los Angeles Rams. He goes on and he wins another Super Bowl. So really at this point, it's like now he's going to be a free agent.

Okay, he's got the Rams. He's got the Broncos. The Cowboys were a team that were potentially thrown out there. and then all of a sudden he signs with the Buffalo Bills. And things didn't necessarily go as well, I think, as Vaughn had hoped for in his time in Buffalo. But I will say this, really kind of watching him down the stretch last season for the bills, especially on his last handful of games. It honestly seemed like for where he's at, at his age, he was just trying to get to the postseason.

Where it's like, hey, I'm saving everything for a postseason run. And obviously they faced the Broncos in the wild card round. He didn't necessarily have a big impact on the game. Bo Nix ran, you know, kind of around him a couple of times. avoided him, which was kind of cool to see, like, Broncos' former Super Bowl MVP, former second overall pick, you know, for the organization versus Denver's future there. And I would say one thing that, you know, I think makes the appeal for Vaughan to return to Denver. And Broncos country certainly is open to it. Ever since he has left the organization, he still talks about

Broncos country. He still says, we when he talks about the Denver Broncos. You know, he's on the Buffalo bills. He was really talking about we in a sense when he was highlighting that wild car. matchup there. So I think for Vaughn, you look at where he's at now. Sarah, I don't think he's going to command not even, I don't even think it's going to be a two year or a three year deal on the free agency market. We all know the salary cap. Thankfully, hey, it's going to rise up a little bit for every NFL team. So maybe that gives the Buffalo bill some wiggle room to maybe work on a restructure, tearing up the contract, maybe coming up with something new for him. But I think they have bigger knees at this point in time that they're maybe looking to address as they want to maximize

the window they have with Josh Allen to try to find a way to get over that hump that is the Kansas City Chiefs. But for me, I look at Vaughn and I just think that his market is going to be a one year deal. Maybe I don't know what the price tag would be on that. I don't know what you would be comfortable throwing at him, you know, for one year. But it makes sense because I feel like wherever he signs a contract to next will be his last stop. And ultimately, when he does hang it up, whether he signs a deal with Denver initially, he is going to sign a contract to retire as a Denver Bronco when his career is officially over. Now, could that be him signing with the Broncos this year and then doing that possibly,

but there are a lot of things we've got to look at with that. Yeah, 100%. And I think just to throw this out there, I mean, obviously you and I, we're reping, for those who are listening and not watching, we're reping Super Bowl 50, the white team jackets that obviously, you know, we're not on the team, but you know what? We found a way to get these jackets, dang it. And, you know, it just, I have Von Miller's jersey hanging up behind me, Cody.

I will say, like, in this whole discussion, Von Miller is my favorite Denver Broncos player ever. I mean, I grew up with Terrell Davis and John Elway and Shannon Sharp, all those guys. But as an adult fan, like Von Miller brought the Denver Broncos out of the depths. He brought the Denver Broncos out of the hole that Josh McDaniels dug this team out of. So I feel like Von Miller, you know, I know there's a lot of pros and cons to signing him and we'll get into that. But look, if Sean Payton doesn't sign Von Miller, I'm going to have a bone to pick with Sean Page because when he was with the New Orleans Saints, he was plucking old Denver Broncos left and right. Remember New Orleans Saints, Chant Bailey? Oh, man.

Chris Harris Jr. New Orleans Saints Emmanuel Sanders. Benny Fowler. Like how many guys do we want to go up and down this list? if Sean Peyton's still not on the train of signing old former Denver Broncos, I'm going to have to fly to Denver, Cody, and I'm going to have to get a press pass, and I'm going to have to ask the question.

Why did you not sign Super Bowl 50, Von Miller, after you sign all these other old Broncos when you were in New Orleans, you can't bring back Von Miller. A little bit of fan service here and there, Cody, never hurt anybody. But look, I feel like the timing is perfect for him to bring his career whole circle. if any time it's going to happen other than a one-day contract, like for him to actually play again for the Denver Broncos, like this is it.

Wouldn't that be an exciting team to watch happen to? Because really, at the end of Vaughn's career in Denver, the challenge was he was dealing with a couple of injuries. I mean, heck, go back to 2020. I remember it clear as day. We're getting ready. It's like Monday night football. The Broncos are opening up at home against the Tennessee Titans.

What's Drew Locke going to bring to the table? What's Jerry Judy going to bring to the table? And then we find out, oh, Cortland Sutton, AC joint injury on the day before the game even happens, he's not going to play in that game. Von Miller suffers a season-ending injury just on a freak thing in practice the day before the game even began. And I just remember just the doom and gloom that I felt inside when that happened. And then when Vaughn was able to come back 2021, obviously we've got to see him pair up a little bit, you know, with Vic Fangio.

But then what happened? He got traded away. Like that was to me, that was the painful part of that process here was seeing him traded away. What was it? It was right before that Cleveland Browns game or it was the clear after the Cleveland Browns game because he got injured in that game and then he got traded away. And I remember how emotional he was. That was just a rough time.

You know, I think that was a dark period in Broncos country because Vaughn was, you know, the face of the franchise there. He was, you know, one of the only guys. I mean, there were only a few left at that point from that Super Bowl 50 team on the roster. and Vaughn really was kind of the remaining catalyst of that. And then so you trade him away. And obviously, I think the Broncos did right by him. He goes on to win a Super Bowl.

But can you find a way to leave the light on for a legend in Broncos country history? That is the question here. And obviously, if the Buffalo Bills do release him, I do wonder if the Broncos will have interest in bringing him in and signing him. But we've got to take a look at the pros and cons of what that would look like, not only for the Broncos, but for Von Miller himself, especially as he gets one step closer to 36 years of age. We'll break down that.

But we're going to get into reasons why Vaughn's return to the mile high city could work here on today's episode, Lockdown Broncos. Today's Lockdown Broncos podcast is brought to you by our friends over there at Fandu. And Fandu, they are America's number one sportsbook. And even though the NFL season is over, the NBA action is still tipping off. And one of the things you can get into on the Fandu Sportsbook app is you can place live bets throughout the game. So even if you miss the opening tip-off of any of the games that are going on on the daily basis, or if you want to bet on a fourth core comeback, you can stay in on the action. And if you're looking for an even bigger payout, you can even combine your live bets into a same game parlay,

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could sign Vaughn Miller in the 2025 offseason. Hey, and if you missed yesterday's episode, we make a pretty compelling argument as to why Tason Hill might need to sign. So if you're an everyday listener, you might have already heard that episode. but if you're not an everyday listener, go ahead, become subscribed. And you can not miss a single episode of the show, Broncos Country, because you know your boys, Cody and Sarah, we got you every single day. And we are going to make a compelling case as to why the team should sign 36-year-old Von Miller to at least a one-year contract to bring him back for one more ride in Denver.

And look, Cody, I feel like this is, it starts off with the most obvious of arguments, right? If you're going door to door, you're selling stuff to people, you want to get them to admit they've got a need that you can fill, right? What's a need that every team in the NFL needs to be filled, right? You can never, ever have too many pass rushers, right? You can never have too many pass rushers in the NFL. And I think that's the number one reason why when you say, hey, let's bring in Von Miller, everybody's like, why would you bring in Von Miller? He's 36. I think the argument starts in favor with saying you can never have too many.

pass rushers in today's league. No, you can't because as we have seen historically covering this team in the past, there's been one or two injuries that position. Heck, Nick Benito's rookie year. How many injuries did the Broncos have at outside linebacker? And we were sitting there like, what does the pass rush look like? I mean, who is the guy that they brought from the New York Jets? They had to trade for a guy.

I can't even remember his name. Nick Benito's rookie year, right at the top of my head. But it was like. The past rusher. Jacob Martin. Jacob Martin. I was like, Jacob Martin, that's where we're going here. You can never have enough pass rushers.

And obviously, I think guys with experience, that's probably going to be a big thing here. Okay, so I'm going to go now to a reason why Von will work here in Denver, kind of to that point here about not, you know, you can never have too many pass rushers. You get a guy who is a very good mentor in that room, right? Von Miller holds the pass rush summit almost every single year. And I can tell you this, too, Nick Benito.

Von Miller is Nick Benito's favorite player in the NFL. He's talked about all year long. Jonathan Cooper said, hey, you're looking a lot like Vaughn and some of the postgame things that we've had back and forth. And he's like, I could only hope I could be like Vaughn one day. So bring in back a guy like Von Miller for a guy like Nick Benito, for a guy like Jonathan Cooper, for a young guy behind those guys like Jonah Ellis, like that immediately elevates that position room. But also, I think it's under this one condition, right? Sarah, if Vaughn comes back, it all hinges on him being a backup, being a rotational

player to Jonathan Cooper, Nick Bonito, Jonah Ellis. I mean, we even got a factor in Dandre Tillman to the mix. Like if Denver carries five, I think that's a pretty good room. And you can find a way to carve out roles for all of these guys, including Vaughn. Like, Sarah, you're telling me with what we saw with Vaughn and Buffalo this past year, you're telling me he can't thrive in a role where he's not the primary pass rusher, but you bring him in situationally. reduce the amount of wear and tear that he has on the field.

I would like that very much, not only for the mentorship aspect, but because of what you said, you can never have enough pass rushers. And we talked about this in the first segment, but 279 snaps is all Von Miller played last season. And he still had six sacks, seven tackles for loss,

eight quarterback hits. And then pro football reference that he had 16 pressures, but I know other outlets kind of vary in the way that they determine what a pressure is or isn't. So the point, is is that in less than 300 snaps, which is very reasonable to expect Vaughn to play going forward. I mean, we're talking about a guy that six sacks out of 200, basically 280 snaps. That's a pretty high percentage in terms of getting to the quarterback.

I mean, not a lot of guys can do that. Dandre Tillman posted, you know, a little bit less than that in a similar number of snaps this past season. Now you have Drew Sanders moving from the edge back to inside linebacker, Cody, that frees up one of the five spots, off the edge. And then people will say, well, what about then special teams? Guess who played more special teams than most guys on the roster last year? Jonah Ellis, Dondre Tillman, those guys play a lot of special teams. So you don't have to worry about that with Von Miller. It's a luxury that you can afford at this point if you're the Denver Broncos. And look, Von wants to be back, Cody. So you don't think he's going to be motivated to

take whatever deal the Broncos can afford to offer him. Like, I know we've seen some guys in the past. I'm not saying they would give this to Vaughn, but like, hey, here, let's do a, you know, one year deal worth two million and we'll give you a million per sack, basically, as an incentive. I don't know how that works on the cap, but like, that's what I think Dwight Freeney got those types of deals back in the day and, and a couple of other players. But you can get creative with this to fit a guy on your roster because, look, Von Miller makes an impact on and off the field for these players. They look up to him.

They watch the best of Von Miller. even Michael Jordan on the Wizards, Cody, could still put up 50 points, right? So you have to also be wary of the explosive game from a guy like Vaughn. Like he could go off in a huge game, in a huge situation. So that's the type of thing that gets me excited about this, is not like, oh, the Broncos need to build around Von Miller again. No, no, miss me with that crap.

It's not what it's about. It's about bring a guy back. Give me a little fan service with a little bit of, hey, six sacks on 270. snaps. If he can play at that level, I'm taking Vaughn Miller as a fourth or fifth edge all day. Well, you know how exciting it is as well. Like the Broncos that made the playoffs last year, they're trending in the

right direction and bringing Bonn back to a point where the Broncos are trending upward versus with Vaughn, they were trying so desperately to find the quarterback of the future, right, to pair alongside, hey, we got our star defensive player here. Now we got to find the quarterback. Well, now you got your quarterback. Can you bring Von

back for that kind of nostalgic run here? As Sean Payton said for, you know, the offseason. He believes this Broncos team, they're going to be a problem. And if you add Vaughn into the mix, and even if he's got a role player type of role where he's not as heavily featured as, you know, he has been or maybe he even wants to be, that still makes them, I think, even more dangerous there, especially on the outside edge. That's where I think that the Broncos can beefing things up. And, man, you know what? I think it's a, it's a nostalgic move for the franchise, but I also think players in the locker room would be on board with that as well. Like,

You're telling me, okay, listen to the defensive line here. Okay, you got DJ Jones coming back. Let's say you re-signed DJ Jones and nose tacky. You got John Franklin Myers. You've got Zach Allen. You've got Nick Benito. You got Jonathan Cooper. Now you add Von Miller to that mix with you have Patrick Sartan.

You have Riley Moss. You have Jayquam Macmillan. You have a safety in Brandon Jones. And you're expected to go out in free agency and get a linebacker and also a safety. Like, to be honest with you, Sarah, that right there pushes the needle and makes the Broncos was even more exciting on paper. That's one of the reasons I would love to see it happen here overall for Denver. He's also played in Vance's defense before because we even talked about the last time before

2024, the Broncos had a double-digit sack producer. It was back in 2018 with Von Miller and Bradley Chubb who had that, I think, 26 and a half sacks combined between the two of them. Von was an impact player. He's been in Vance Joseph's defensive scheme before. I just think he adds that booster. I mean, and we've also seen it before. Like Vance has had defenses where you have an older guy,

a legend, like he had JJ Watt at the back end of his career to work with before JJ initially retired. That could be the same exact scenario here for Von Miller. And let's say the Broncos make a little bit of a push next year, right? Imagine a swan song, right? We talked about it as well, why, you know, a couple weeks ago we did, why the Denver Broncos can get the Super Bowl 60. Imagine this.

Von Miller resigns with the Broncos. They make it somehow to Super Bowl 60. in Santa Clara 10 years after the Broncos were there for Super Bowl 50 in Santa Clara where Von Miller won Super Bowl MVP. You can't write a better Hollywood script than this right here. The vibes, Cody, the vibes are immaculate. I can't even, as you're even talking about it, I've already put Von Miller on the Broncos on Madden to show myself.

I saw that. I love that. So we're already educating. Does Von Miller not deserve to rock the throwbacks as well? I know we mentioned that. you and I were talking about that with Justin Simmons, but nobody's wearing 58. Nobody's wearing 58.

It's one of the unofficial retired numbers, just like 24 in Denver, which I love that they do that. But look, nobody's wearing number 58. Nobody's going to wear 58. It's Vaughn Miller's number. He's a living legend.

It makes sense as he's still productive late in his career. You have an opening off the edge. You have a bunch of cap space. Shoot, you're going back to Santa Clara for the Super Bowl this year. You might as well make it up. Marty, I love, Cody, this idea, I don't know, it would, it would take a lot of convincing to get me to believe. Yeah.

To our third segment, I mean, it's going to be like, you know, talking to a brick wall here. I am going to have to take some serious convincing to believe that this doesn't make sense. I mean, bring von Miller back to Denver 2025. I mean, it's not the primary objective of free agency, but come on. John Payton, George Payton, make this thing happen. Yeah, no, I'm with you as well. I was just thinking as we're saying, like we made such an appealing case. I feel like we've sold Broncos country.

Hopefully we'll see obviously how they react to this episode on why Vaughn coming back to Denver makes sense. But then we also got to get into the flip side of it, Broncos country. We're not done yet. Up next, we're going to discuss maybe why Von Miller and a return to Denver might not be in the cards here in 2025. You'll get that much more on today's brand new episode, Locked on Broncos. 2025 is just around the corner with a new league year approaching on March 12th, 2 o'clock p.m.

Mountain time, for Eastern time for all of you in Broncos country and Von Miller could be somebody that could become available in free agency for the Denver Broncos to pursue. We've looked at reasons why Miller could work in Denver. We also got to look at the flip side of it. Maybe reasons why the Broncos should avoid maybe going with the Von Miller route this offseason here. And there are some arguments for that as to why Denver and Vaughn maybe shouldn't do it. And I think a lot of it too, there are going to be some fans out there, who may be looking and say, you know what, as nice of a story it would be, it doesn't make sense for Denver direction that they're heading with the youth movement, so to speak there.

You're bringing in a guy who is part of, obviously, you know, older locker rooms. Does that interrupt the flow of these young voices that are now taken on leadership roles? I find that to be a very appealing reason maybe why the Broncos avoid going that direction. Yeah, and what's interesting to me, Cody, and maybe you can speak more to this than I can. I've not been in the locker room, but Von Miller, to me, seems like everybody's friend kind of guy in the locker room. Like he seems like the kind of guy who he doesn't want to ruffle a lot of feathers. He's not really looking to, you know, grab the microphone.

He's not the rah-rah kind of guy. He gets you fired up by setting the example and by what he does out there. I'm not saying chant Bailey in those kind of ways. He's a bit more of a talker. You know, we saw Vaughn get up to the mic and say they were going to kick the Cardinals, you know what, back in 2018. And then they did do that. So, I mean, he's willing to do that kind of a thing.

But to me, he's not the kind of guy in the locker room that's going to be. causing division in any sort of way. He's very much a laid back personality. Dude has a chicken farm. So, I mean, if that tells you anything about the guy, I mean, he's certainly forward-thinking. He seems like a guy who might buy a Bitcoin or something like that. Actually, club dub. Club dub with Von Miller.

That was it in our reasons why it could work factor. They're like, club dub, DJ sauce von the Don is, you know, another one. I mean, we're just, we're continuing segment two of reasons why. I know. It's hard. It is. I know. I think honestly. the number one reason why I think it wouldn't make sense to bring Vaughn back to Denver, Cody,

is unfortunately there are off-field situations that have to be, you know, discussed. And I don't know all the details. I don't know all of what's legitimate. He said, she said, you know, the truth is somewhere in between, yada, yada, I have no idea. I'm not going to speculate on that. I'm not even going to give an opinion on that. I just think that for a lot of folks, perception is reality when it comes to those things, right? If the perception is that Von Miller is a bad guy, then there's people that are not going to like him. And there's people in Broncos country that may, they may renounce their fandom for signing a guy like this

based on what he's been accused of doing. And so I think that in that regard, Cody, that might be the one reason why, okay, maybe a PR sort of thing or something that's like, hey, we're not bringing guys in who are even being accused of this kind of a thing. And so I think that would be the number one reason that would deter the Denver Broncos from a reunion.

Yeah, and to your point. And look, I think for those people who are wondering what that was, Von, I mean, he was accused of domestic assault. And what we initially know is that the NFL came out this past year. They suspended him for four games because of it. But there has been no, there have been no charges filed since then. I mean, realistically, there has been no movement on that side. He missed four games and played the rest of the season. And there has been no other development coming out of that.

So more than likely, I imagine those charges have been dropped. Or maybe it's just sitting there in the process. I don't know. I don't have a current update on that. But it's not something. Obviously, the NFL is we know, Sarah, they do their due diligence. And they, I mean, the NFL is the feds. They can find anything that you want.

They go deep in depth to a lot of different things that go on behind the scenes around the NFL amongst players, personal lives, off the field stuff. And if they had enough information to say, like, okay, because of the optics of it, they suspended him for four games, but there have been no charges filed. Okay, then that's something that says it's not currently on the NFL's radar, because if that was the case, he would be on the commissioner's exempt list at this time. So I understand some Broncos fans' hesitancy on that. I know there have been some things off the field, some instances with, you know,

the mother of his children a few times. But aside from all that, that's all we know. We don't actually have a lot of information on it. So it's not, we're not going to speculate any further. But I understand that will be a potential deterrence as to maybe why people don't want Vaughn on the Broncos. And I understand that 100% here. Another reason why I feel like it would not work here. We talk about it as well.

We bring it up. We brought it up with Tassum Hill. Age. Age is certainly a factor. Injury history is certainly a factor. He's come off an ACL injury in the last couple of years. So that's obviously a new piece of relevant information. But then again, I always go back to this as well, Sarah, and it kind of just negates it.

The Broncos have Bo Lowry. He's like the secret weapon. He's the secret sauce behind the scenes here for Denver and keeping guys healthy, keeping their bodies right in terms of the injury, prevention, the maintenance of that as well. But I would say this, if Vaughn wants to be a starter, Sarah, it's not going to work here in Denver because I think that has passed up. Von at this point of his career, especially when you got a guy like Nick Benito, who's producing at the rate in which he is.

You got Jonathan Cooper, who you just signed to an extension. And then you got young guys like Jonah Ellis. You got Dondre Tillman back in on the mix as well. If Vaughn wants to be a starter, I just don't see that happening here in Denver, which is the reason why it would not work. Right. And I think that's a good, like a good piece of information to know that, hey, like, he hasn't really been starting for the Buffalo Bills. Or if he's been running out of the tunnel, he's not been playing starter snaps. Like we mentioned, 279 total snaps last year. Everything right now is about keeping Von Miller fresh. Like you want him out there at the end of a game or on certain third down situations. Like he's a guy that you want to to use as a weapon in terms of situationally as opposed to this is our every down. von Miller that we knew and loved back in Super Bowl 50, right? It's not the same same type of player at this point.

And so I think that has to be understood from both parties. And like you said, if it's not, then it's not going to happen. Because like with Tastom Hill, you're talking about, there's only one ball to spread around offensively. So you're kind of worried about him eating up targets. With Von Miller, you've got four other guys off the edge that are going to play snaps. And they are going to play. Like the Broncos ain't getting rid of any of those top four guys off the edge this coming

season. So those guys are going to play, Von can find his way in wherever he may fit. And that's just the kind of nice thing about it is that shoot, I mean, you don't have to worry about whatever happens happens. It's kind of just a bonus. It's an added sort of thing at the back end of the roster to say, we've got this veteran pass rusher that's been in big games and a lot of big games. He's won two Super Bowls, Super Bowl MVP. So I think with Von Miller, Cody, it really would be about role situation and certainly whether or not Sean Payton's going to dig back into the old Denver Broncos vault, which he's done many times. And I think that that that right there to me, Cody, alone, is reason enough to believe that he would do this. But I think you're right. I think if Vaughn is wanting to be a starter,

that's not going to work out in Denver. Well, Broncos country, I feel like we've made a lot of cases for Von Miller's return here to Denver. I'd certainly convinced myself as we've come throughout the entire show of being able to do that. I feel like there's more pros than cons when it comes to bringing Miller back into the full. But how do you feel in Broncos country? Would you like to see Vaughn return on a one-year deal to potentially finalize his career in the orange and blue? And obviously, a first ballot Hall of Fame career at that. Make sure you let us know wherever you listen to your podcast or you can reach us on social media at Cody Roark, NFL, at Sarah Bedinger. Also at Locked on Broncos.

We got you covered here every single day. But that'll wrap up today's episode of the show. Broncos country. Next week is the NFL scout and combine. We know that George Payton, Sean Payton are going to be boots on the ground and we'll more than likely hear from them. So there's a lot you can look forward to on next week's episode. Lockdown Broncos.

We'll see you on Monday for a brand new episode of the show.