No Jonathan Taylor. No Breece Hall. No Tony Pollard. No problem?
Denver Broncos rookie running back Jonah Coleman started against the Carolina Panthers last week and totaled 88 yards and scored a touchdown on 21 touches, but coach Sean Payton still isn't making any declarations about the backfield rotation.
"Yeah, Jonah did good," Payton said when asked about Coleman starting Sunday's game. "Those runners are going to be important. I'm not going to answer running-back depth questions, and certainly our running backs are not going to sit in front of a 15-minute interview about their playing time."
After J.K. Dobbins had a spirited exchange with reporters last week, Payton clearly doesn't want his running backs facing similar media scenarios later
this season.
"Man, those guys are really important. J.K. played, Jonah played, RJ [Harvey] will be back here shortly, and I'm glad we got both of them. I didn't feel like we ran it particularly well with either of them, and it wasn't back driven. It was ‘Oh, that was a Buffalo front.’ Like, it took us a minute. And now, we threw it better for chunk plays than we ran it, but we got the runs when we needed it later."
Payton can insist that Dobbins is "a huge part" of the offense, but the numbers suggest otherwise. Coleman (58 snaps) was far more involved than Dobbins (11 snaps) on Sunday, and the rookie received the best snap total and best snap rate of any Denver running back since Payton arrived in 2023, according to PFF's Nathan Jahnke.
It's clear that the Broncos believe they've found something in Coleman, and regardless of what the "unofficial" depth chart says, the rookie appears poised to serve as RB1 in the second half of the season after Denver did not add any more running backs to the roster before Tuesday's trade deadline.
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This article originally appeared on Broncos Wire: Sean Payton's not making declarations, but Jonah Coleman should be RB1
