Not one player on the Denver Broncos has played every snap on offense or defense so far this season, but that is mainly due to getting a series for the backups in the blow out win over the Cowboys.
OFFENSE
Offensive Line
The
loss of Ben Powers has shifted Alex Palczweski from the 6th OL to starting guard. AP’s quickness and hand-fighting skills have made him a plus guard. He played well at tackle last season when he had to fill in for one of the starting tackles. Frank Crum and Calvin Throckmorton have both been used now as the 6th OL with AP moving into a starting role.
Tight Ends and Running Backs
Jaleel McLaughlin has lost his role from last season. JK Dobbins is getting the majority of the RB snaps, with RJ Harvey getting the RB2 snaps and Tyler Badie getting the 3rd down back snaps. With Harvey’s performance against the struggling Dallas defense I would expect him to take a few more RB snaps in the second half of the season.
The loss of Lucas Krull and now Nate Adkins means that the Broncos were forced to bring in veteran Mercedes Lewis as the blocking TE. Evan Engram’s effectiveness in the passing game has made the other TEs almost non-factors in the passing game. Adkins, Krull and Adam Trautman have combined for 22 targets in 8 games, despite Trautman playing the most TE snaps in many games this season. It will be interesting to see how quickly Lewis picks up the playbook. The 41-year old former first round pick (2006) has never played for Sean Payton, but he’s a veteran so he should pick it up quickly. He played 220 snaps for the Bears last season and was targetted twice. He’s listed as 6-6, 267 lbs.
Wide Receivers
Courtland Sutton and Troy Franklin have been WR1 and WR2 for most games this season with the exception of game 6 when Pat Bryant get the same number of snaps as Franklin. Marvin Mims has mostly been WR4 with Trent Sherfield gradually losing playing time to Pat Bryant.
DEFENSE
Defensive line
Sai’vion Jones and Jordan Jackson have both played D snaps in only one game this season. Zach Allen has played the most snaps in every game except last week when Malcolm Roach did. The return of Roach from injury has relegated both Jackson and Jones to the game-day inactive list. Eyioma Uwazurike had been losing playing time until the last two games when he started trending up.
Outside Linebackers (edge defenders)
Que Robinson was active and played in games 6 and 7 when Jonah Elliss was injured. Other than that Nik Bonitto and Jonathon Cooper have been playing 55-75% of the snaps at OLB and Elliss and Dondrea Tillman have been playing 25-45%. The lone exception was the last game against Dallas when all four played about the same snap percentage.
Inside Linebackers
Free agent acquisition Drew Greenlaw was injured until game 7 and then he was suspended for game 8. Alex Singleton has been the every down ILB with Justin Strnad coming off the field on passing downs. Karene Ried, Levelle Bailey and Garret Wallow have not seen the field much on defense when they were on the 53 man roster.
Cornerbacks
Riley Moss is the darker blue and he has played almost every snap on defense this season. Pat Surtain was matching him until he got hurt last game. KAD took those CB snaps with Surtain out. I would expect that to continue unless Jahdae Barron proves he should be CB2 with Surtain out. Ja’Quan McMillian has played between 50-80% of the D snaps as the slot corner. Barron has been roughly between 20-40% in every game, but that might change with Surtain’s injury. KAD and Ja’Quan have both played CB2 for the Broncos in the past. It will be interesting to see how the roles and snaps are distributed while PS2 is out.
Safeties
Talanoa Hufanga and Brandon Jones have played almost every safety snap through the first eight games. With Locke and/or Skinner getting a handful in heavy nickle here and there. Remember Locke was one of our starting safeties last year and the play at safety in 2025 has been significantly better this year relative to 2024. Jones (56.3) and Hufanga (93.1) have allowed fairly low passer ratings this season when their men are targetted. Locke allowed one of the worst passer ratings in the league last season among starters with a 125.8. He allowed 40/54 (74%) for 484 yards, 4 TDs and 0 INTs.
