The Denver Broncos ran over the Cincinnati Bengals last night, but I was on a flight that didn’t have free wifi that would have allowed me to watch the game, so I will watch the recorded game tonight.
Before my flight boarded I was able to see the most of the first quarter. Then I was able to see some of the third quarter after my flight was on the ground. I was able to listen to the 4th quarter while I drove home from the airport, but there is much of the game that I have yet to see.
The Bronco run game produced 189 yards on 35 carries last night (kneeldowns removed, since they should not be counted in rushing stats). That’s 5.40 yards per carry which is sweet. Oddly enough none of the top five rushing teams (by YPC) have a winning record. The Ravens, Jets, Commanders, Broncos and Cowboys are either at 0.500 or worse. The 512 yards by the Bronco offense was the most since 2014.
Oddly enough, the defending Super Bowl champions, who were the best rushing team last season, are currently 29th in YPC at 3.5. They are second in carries with 131, behind the Bills with 133, but they have 200 fewer rushing yards than Buffalo (654 to 454). It seems that defenses have figured out how to stop, or at least dramatically slow, the Jalen Hurts, Saquon Barkley rushing combo. Let’s hop they don’t have a break-out game against the Bronco defense next game.
JK Dobbins is currently 8th in the league in rush success rate at 57.9%. Former Bronco, Javonte Williams, is currently 3rd at 65.1%. I will eat crow here. I thought he was washed up last season. He is running like he did as a rookie prior to his ACL/MCL tears. RJ Harvey had his best game as a pro with 98 yards of total offense and one TD. This is good to see after he was invisible in the previous two games with 40 total yards on 11 touches. Listening to the broadcast of the fourth quarter, Dave Logan said you just looks more confident and comfortable running the ball now relative to his first three games in the NFL.
There were two Monday night games last night, one was a close game (ended with a one-score margin – 8 points or fewer) and the other was a blowout (difference of 21 or more). So far this season there have been a really high percentage of one-score games – 59.4% which is the highest in the past decade.
2022 was an odd year with an extremely small percentage of blow-outs and a fairly high percentage of 1-score games. It was also a year with a fairly low average combined score at 43.7. In most years over the past decade the the average scoring margin (or difference) appears to be about 11 points. We had a tie on Sunday, but those are exceedingly rare in the modern NFL. 2015 to present there have been 11 ties in 2688 games.
The NFL has a vested interest in close games, because casual viewers don’t watch blow-outs for long and then the league loses ad revenue. The Broncos have not been on the good side of many blowouts since winning SB 50. That game last night was only the ninth.
Four of the nine have come in the 2+ seasons with Sean Payton as head coach. The previous seven seasons produced only five.
On offense the Broncos are 11th in YPP, 16th in scoring, 20th in ANYA, 21st in passer rating and 18th in completion percentage.
The Bronco defense is tied for third with 67 points allowed through four weeks. That’s 16.8 ppg allowed. The Texans defense is leading the league at 12.8 ppg. Of course they are still 1-3 after three one-score losses in the first three games. Their shutout of the Titans was their first win on Sunday. The Bronco defense only allowed 159 total yards last night and the majority of that was on the first drive of the game which led to the Bungals only points of the game.
The Bronco D is not good in percentage of drives allowed that end in a score. They are 26th, allowing scores on 45.7% of opponent drives. Of course, many of those scores are FGs. The Bronco defense has been called for 38 penalties which is the second worst in the league. Only the Giants with 46 have more.
The Bronco D is 10th in YPP allowed with 4.66. The Browns are leading the league at 4.06 and the Bears are the worst at 6.72. The Bronco D is leading the league with 15 sacks and 33.8% pressure rate.
Nik Bonitto is tied for second in sacks with 4.5 and third in pressures (PFR) with 12. According to SIS he is leading all OLBs with 18 pressures. Jonathon Cooper is tied for 5th with 15. Zach Allen is our best DT/DE for pressures (SIS) with 12. Micah Parsons leads all defenders with 26.
Jeremy Crawshaw had another decent game with four punts, but the touchbacks are troubling:
- 62 yarder from the DEN 38 that ended in a touchback
- 42 yarder from the DEN 44 that was returned for 16 yards
- 55 yarder from the DEN 45 that ended in a touchback
- 40 yarder from the DEN 44 that ended with a fair catch at the 16
That is one successful punt in my opinion and three failed punts. In the world of punters (and punt coverage), touchbacks are bad. The coverage failure may or may not be on him, but I have not watched that punt so I can’t tell if that was outkicking the coverage or just poor tackling.
