Supposedly, this was one of the easier away games on the schedule for the Denver Broncos. They faced a team led by Daniel Jones at quarterback and were down two starting cornerbacks.
On paper, this should have been an easy win for the Denver Broncos. But any given Sunday in the NFL, any team can win, and a perfect storm of bad play, questionable referees, and a scrappy opponent that wanted the win more led to a loss for the Broncos.
There’s a lot to unpack in this game, so let’s dig in.
Leverage
Let’s start
with the 300lb gorilla in the room: the leverage call at the end of the game. Let’s start with the rule from https://operations.nfl.com/the-rules/nfl-rulebook/ Rule 12, Section 3, Article 1p:
“Placing a hand or hands on a teammate or opponent to gain additional height to: (1) block or attempt to block an opponent’s kick or apparent kick, or (2) attempt to jump through a gap to block an opponent’s kick or apparent kick.”
I’ve seen other mentions of not being able to touch the longsnapper in media posts about this game, but I do not see that listed in the unsportsmanlike conduct section here. So let’s first off rule out anything about Eyioma Uwazurike, who clearly does put both hands on the long snapper and push him down.
If you look at Tillman on the play, he leaps up while pushing on the guard in front of him with one arm. That’s a clear violation of the rule.
The most hilarious thing to me about this call is that you can go watch the Colts on our missed field goal earlier in the game and see two of them doing a far more obvious job of the same thing, and that went uncalled.
I don’t have problems with refs enforcing penalties according to the rule book. What I have a problem with is how they let the Colts get away with the same exact thing (and most teams, because I’d wager this behavior happens in more than 50% of all kicks for points).
It makes it even worse that at the end of the game, they make the call when it had literally no impact on the play. That’s a play that usually has the refs swallowing their whistles because it had no impact on the play whatsoever. If I were in the Colts’ fans’ shoes, I’d feel pretty lucky about the call and pretty disappointed that my team needed a 15-yard penalty to save the game instead of their team having the stones to make a 10-yard pass and earn it themselves.
Offense
Sean Payton surprisingly wanted to establish the run game this week. I honestly was scratching my head as the Colts were down two cornerbacks and a pass rusher. Why not pass to set up the run?
Early on, we really can’t complain as the offense put up 21 points in the first half in a very successful manner.
The problem was the 2nd half when the offense just couldn’t sustain its success. The 3rd down plays faltered, they got a tipped pass for an interception, and penalties kept screwing up their drives.
I honestly expect more from an offense in its 3rd year (arguably 2nd given the quarterback change) under Sean Payton. They had a hot hand in Franklin that they seemed to get away from as the game wore on. They had a cold hand in Sutton, who was getting double-covered that they seemed to be forcing plays to.
Quarterbacks
I thought Bo Nix played an excellent game for the most part. His touchdown passes were absolute money. He had a big run of 18 yards on a 3rd and 4. I thought there were maybe two passes he had that stood out to me as bad throws (both low).
The interception for Nix was unfortunate, as he had to pull his pass back to keep his arm healthy, and even then, the pass was tipped. Given that we were on the Colts’ side of the field, it wasn’t the worst turnover for the team. It honestly ended up being like a decent punt. While I do think Nix has stuff to work on coming out of this game, he’s not rating anywhere near the top 5 on the list of problems that cost us this win.
Line
The run blocking this week was some of the best we’ve seen from this group of linemen over the past year. I thought they were consistent in opening up holes and giving their backs space to work with.
They kept Nix clean throughout the game, not giving up any sacks. The only mishap came from Quinn Meinerz on the interception play, where he just got outplayed by Groover Stewart (who made a superb move to get penetration and get a hand on the ball).
Running Backs
J.K. Dobbins put together a solid game with consistent plus plays as a runner. He went for 18 yards on the first play of the game. He gained a first down on a 7-yard run on 2nd and 7. He also housed another touchdown run this time from 6 yards out. If the line can block well for him, I like the consistency and play potential that he brings from start to finish. He finished the game with 76 yards on 14 attempts with a touchdown.
R.J. Harvey took a beautiful wheel route out of the backfield for 10+ yards. He had a bad choice going to the outside instead of cutting back inside on 2nd and 10 later in the game. I’m glad we keep finding snaps for him to work out the kinks. To my eyes, he looks like a young back still getting a grasp of the speed of the NFL game. As he settles in and is able to just react, his production is going to increase a great deal, as I can tell he’s got the ability to make plays at this level.
Tyler Badie absolutely bails the offense out of a horrible situation with a 3rd and 15 catch and run for 19. He didn’t do much outside of that in the game, but it was a pretty impactful play for a guy who only touched the ball 3 times on the day.
Receivers
Troy Franklin got his own drive in this game, and it was a beauty to behold. He had a superb read of coverage when he saw Nix start to scramble and just jetted past his defender to space for a big gain. Right after that, he got a slant route and nearly took it to the house, bouncing off the first tackler. He finishes the drive with a walk-in touchdown to the outside. I’m not sure why he mostly disappeared from the offense as the game wore on. I’d like to see the offense move him more to get favorable match-ups, as he looks like a downright playmaker this season. Franklin led the team with 8 receptions for 89 yards and a touchdown, with 1 run of 11 yards to boot.
Pat Bryant runs a perfect in route and heads upfield to get a first down on his first NFL catch. He also converted a tough 3rd and 6 as well.
Marvin Mimms, Jr. had a long fade for 23 yards to get the first touchdown of the game.
Evan Engram was invisible in this game outside of a false start penalty. Finally, in the 4th quarter, he gets a huge conversion on a 2nd and 12. I’m honestly wondering where our Joker is, though. I thought we signed a free agent tight end that would open up our offense, and instead, I’m seeing the output of an average tight end that rotates in for a few snaps a game from him.
Defense
The Vance Joseph defense likes to run a lot of man free with typically off coverage by the corners. It honestly seemed like the Colts did their homework and knew exactly what to do to beat this all game long.
It didn’t get dicey for the Colts until Joseph adjusted play calls more later in the game and started heavily mixing in some blitzes to shake things up.
The biggest thing we saw in this game was our coverage in the middle of the field being exposed once again. Unlike last season, we don’t have a weakness at safety to go along with it, but the Colts beat that drum early and often.
I do think it is unfortunate that so many busted plays happened, and we didn’t see Joseph bench the player responsible. Captain or no, blue dot or no, you can’t let a player throw a game in the toilet like that without repercussions.
My biggest disappointment with the defense outside of its weakest link comes from the defensive front’s inability to create pressure. This unit has consistently created havoc for opponents, and the Colts completely tamed them.
Front 7
Jonah Elliss is a player we need to see more of. He was not fooled for a second by the fake handoff for a big tackle for a loss. He makes a lot of plays with his small sample of touches, and I’d love to see him get a bigger role in this defense.
Alex Singleton spent most of the game completely lost in coverage, which is common for him over his career. He gave up two plays in the first quarter for huge yards. Started off the 2nd half giving up another 10+ catch. Missed tackle again on the big Taylor run in the 4th quarter. His lack of ability to play coverage as a linebacker was the #1 reason this game was lost, and it isn’t even close. The Colts don’t have half of their points if he can just make a tackle on 2 of his 4 gaffes that I had noted in this game.
Deondre Tillman had a superb stop on 4th and 1, shedding his assignment and tackling the ball carrier short of the line to gain. He gets a hand on the ball to break up a key 4th and 2 later in the game to get the ball back for our offense.
As far as our starting OLBs go, Bonitto had a phantom personal foul. Copper had an illegal contact in coverage. You’d think two players that the team extended could have a little more impact on the game.
Secondary
Much ado was talked about Patrick Surtain getting “targeted.” That has me rolling my eyes. He had a lower leg injury and was playing hurt. And he was still right on his guy on their completions. Credit to Daniel Jones for having an absolute fire game (his throws were REALLY impressive), but let’s not start thinking Surtain isn’t a great player. He’s a trooper for even staying in the game, honestly. To be fair, you typically don’t want your cornerback leading the team in tackles (11).
Outside of Surtain, we saw pass defenses from Riley Moss, Jahdae Barron, Brandon Jones, and P.J. Locke. But largely, the Colts had success wherever they threw it in the secondary.
Special Teams
The Wil Lutz miss was quite surprising to me. The team is in a dome, and that’s a very doable distance. It goes without saying that’s one of the big blunders of the game for the team, but there’s tons of blame to go around in this game.
Jeremy Crawshaw had a good punt in the 3rd quarter to pin the Colts inside the 20-yard line. I don’t really want to see much of him in any game, but he’s doing a great job so far in his rookie season.
Final Thoughts
The referees were honestly embarrassing in this game. They did let the Broncos get away with pass interference early two times (Surtain and Moss were early, hitting the player before the ball was there). They then started handing the Colts mystery calls all over the place. There was a roughing the passer on Bonito that was nonsense. There was a facemask penalty on Trautman that had me scratching my head, as Trautman’s hands never touched the facemask on the play. I stopped counting non-flagged holding penalties on the Colts’ line at 4 early in the 3rd quarter. That crew was plainly horrible, inconsistent, and decided to give a team a do-over to end the game based on a penalty that had nothing to do with the field goal kick.
But sometimes in the NFL, you have to beat two teams. Great teams are able to do that. This team was not.
At the end of the day, the Broncos in every facet of the game deserved to lose this game. There were mishaps offensively, defensively, and in special teams play. The players played sloppily and executed poorly. The coaches looked like they were on the ropes for most of the game and were too slow to adjust.
Hopefully, this will be a great learning opportunity for the Broncos. If they can get this kind of poor play out of their system, they still have a great season ahead of them. If they keep showing up and just expect to win because they have good coaches and good systems, this season could get really ugly in short order.
