In 2022, the tale of the Denver Broncos was the complete cratering of the offense with Russell Wilson, and a defense that ranked 13th in DVOA was a sub-story, at best. The Broncos made all kinds of changes in the offseason, including the trade that allowed them to hire Sean Payton as head coach, and replacing defensive coordinator Ejiro Evero with Vance Joseph.
Through the first five games of the 2023 season, the script has flipped about as much as it is possible to do. Wilson is actually performing decently in Payton’s offense — not nearly what he was at his Seattle best, but at least out of the figurative gutter.
No, the problem for the 1-4 Broncos now is a defense that is historically bad. No team has ranked worse in Defensive DVOA through the first five games of a season than Denver, and DVOA goes back to 1981 at this point. Denver has given up 13 opponent touchdowns to just three interceptions, and their opponent passer rating allowed of 124.6 is by far the NFL’s worst — the Chicago Bears rank second at 111.1.
The run defense is just as bad, which is kind of remarkable — usually, subpar defenses are sub-par in one direction or the other. Kudos to the Broncos for filling out both sides of the equation. Denver has allowed a league-worst 938 rushing yards and a league-worst 5.9 yards per carry and eight touchdowns, which is only the league’s second-worst total, behind the New York Giants and Carolina Panthers, who have each allowed nine.
The nadir of this defense this season — at least, so far — was the 70-20 Week 3 loss to the Miami Dolphins, when the Broncos became the first team in pro football history to allow 10 offensive touchdowns in a game. But things haven’t been much better since. On Sunday, the New York Jets beat the Broncos, 31-21, and it wasn’t Zach Wilson who beat them — it was a run game that amassed 234 yards, the third-most allowed by any defense in a game this season. No. 1 in that category? The 350 yards the Broncos allowed to the Dolphins in that 70-20 laugher.
One more DVOA tidbit for tonight.
The Denver Broncos, who had the worst defense ever measured by DVOA through 4 games, also have the worst defense ever measured by DVOA through 5 games.
— Aaron Schatz 🏈 (@ASchatzNFL) October 9, 2023
So, it’s clear that the Denver Broncos have a historically bad defense. Why has this happened, and how in the world do they fix it?
The pass rush is nearly nonexistent.
The Broncos came into the 2023 season light on pass-rushing talent — they lost Dre’Mont Jones to the Seattle Seahawks in free agency, and Jones led the team in 2022 with seven sacks and 45 pressures. It was thought that the signing of former Arizona Cardinals lineman Zach Allen would help, and while Allen has amassed two sacks and 11 pressures this season, there isn’t much else going on. Edge-rusher Nik Bonitto leads the team with five sacks and 14 pressures, and Bonitto is the only guy in range of the best in the league at this point.
This has manifested itself in a negative sense all over the place. Denver doesn’t blitz a lot under Joseph; their 21.6% blitz rate is middle of the pack in the NFL. What’s truly disconcerting is the amount of pressure this defense doesn’t get on enemy quarterbacks, blitz or not. Denver’s pressure rate of 13.6% is the league’s lowest, and the examples of quarterbacks getting explosive plays off against an invisible pass rush personify the problem.
On this 32-yard pass from Zach Wilson to Garrett Wilson last Sunday, the Broncos tried a five-man rush to create one-on-ones against the Jets’ offensive line, AND they blitzed linebacker Alex Singleton. But nobody got free, and when Wilson booted to his right, he had all the time in the world to hit his target. Tight end Tyler Conklin stayed in to block, so it was then six-on-six, and the Broncos weren’t going to win with that math. All the Jets had to do was to slide their protection, and Denver’s pass-rushers got lost in the wash.
Justin Fields of the Chicago Bears had this 29-yard pass to DJ Moore in Week 4, and this was a straight four-man rush with no stunts or games against Chicago’s six-man protection, with tight end Cole Kmet chipping edge defender Jonathon Cooper before he went into his route. See if you can guess how that went.
And of course, there was Tua Tagovailoa’s 54-yard pass to Tyreek Hill in that Dolphins game. Tagovailoa had time to do his taxes and make a sandwich before turning it loose. This was five-on-six in Miami’s favor, and again… what don’t you see? Any kind of line games to get guys free to the quarterback. Right guard Robert Hunt pulled to his left and had to go looking for work. Not great for the Broncos.
The linebackers are lost.
This is especially true in coverage, where Denver’s three primary linebackers — Alex Singleton, Drew Sanders, and Josey Jewell — have allowed 35 catches on 39 targets for 378 yards, four touchdowns, no interceptions, and an opponent passer rating of 141.2. Sanders is a rookie, but neither Singleton nor Jewell were this bad in coverage in 2022. Denver’s linebackers seem to be in a two-way purgatory in which they’re either biting too hard on play-action and opposing quarterbacks are throwing behind them, or they’re dropping into coverage, and they’re getting singed underneath.
And on this 19-yard Zach Wilson completion to Tyler Conklin last Sunday, Conklin hit Singleton with a stutter-step, and Singleton zigged when he should have zagged.
On this 15-yard Tagovailoa completion to tight end Durham Smythe, you can see both Sanders and Jewell flowing to running back Raheem Mostert on the counter fake, which leaves Smythe open once Singleton takes a step in the wrong direction. Understandable when the Dolphins ate the Broncos’ lunch in the run game all day, but still less than optimal.
The pass defense is too passive.
Joseph’s coverages have a specific archetype. It’s heavy Cover-1 and Cover-3, with some Cover-6 mixed in, and cornerback Patrick Surtain II — probably the best player on that side of the ball — is the only defensive back playing press coverage to any notable degree. Surtain has played press coverage on 70 of his snaps this season, and on those snaps, he’s allowed just four catches on 11 targets for 12 yards and this interception against the Jets. When you watch Surtain follow Garrett Wilson through his route, you understand why this is the way.
The Broncos are seventh-highest in the league with a 62% rate of defensive snaps in which no defenders are in press coverage. Their rate of 29% of defensive plays with one player in press is among the league’s lowest, as is their rate of 7% with two players in press, and 2% with three players in press. Not that you want the Broncos to bump everybody off the line like they’re the Mike Haynes/Lester Hayes Raiders, but in a modern NFL where quick game is the order of the day, you’d better at least contest those routes off the line to a point or you’re going to give up a lot of stuff.
Of course, when everybody IS in press, and you still have cornerback Damarri Mathis allowing an easy 13 yards to River Cracraft of the Dolphins… well, sometimes it’s more about the Jimmies and Joes than it is the Xs and Os.
The run defense is horrid in its own unique ways.
Onto the run defense, which is just… woof. Payton addressed that issue on Monday after watching the Jets tape.
“Just going through it, our gap integrity has been poor. We got wide yesterday on the big run. That was the first topic this morning. In other words, this has been — it’s going to be tough to win games if we can’t stop the run defensively, and we have to get it cleaned up. I’d start with pitting the right gaps and then understanding, scheme-wise, what we’re getting and how to restrict those holes. A lot of it — it’s not communication, it’s technique, but that has to get better.”
The big run in question was Breece Hall’s 72-yard run early in the third quarter, and I’ll hand this one over to two of my favorite football analysts.
This Broncos run defense is so bad. 2i gets washed. Where is the edge? Pulling G doesn’t have to block an edge so he goes upfield. This is horrific. https://t.co/lI9ywMw4If
— Ted Nguyen (@FB_FilmAnalysis) October 9, 2023
How do they fix it?
Vance Joseph seems to be in an impossible position where he might like to throw more things at opposing offenses, but he doesn’t trust his players to get things done in those more advanced concepts. But it’s especially worrisome to see a defense without a lot of line stunts and coverage switches in an NFL where those things are necessary — especially when you don’t have the pure talent to just line up and go.
“It was a combination of a lot of things,” Joseph said after the loss to the Dolphins, and their crazy quilt of motions and shifts. “Obviously, I didn’t get them ready for the speeds and angles and those things and have them in the right positions. Again, I take it first, and we go back and look at it and make sure next time we game-plan [for] a team like that, we do better.”
Well, that hasn’t happened for the most part. Still, when the Broncos put some extra spice in the game plan, things get better to a point. On this sack of Zach Wilson, Denver overloaded their right side and ran a T/E stunt with Allen and Cooper. Basic stuff for most defenses, but that’s just fine.
The Broncos don’t have a lot of time to get over what’s happened to their defense so far — they travel to Arrowhead Stadium to face the Kansas City Chiefs Thursday night. That could easily turn into yet another unpleasant experience for a defense that has been historic for all the wrong reasons.
“We’ve got to put a complete game together and it has to be all 11 guys, you know, run game, pass game,” safety Kareem Jackson recently concluded. “We’ve got to put it together. Until we can do that, stuff like this is going to keep happening… We have to be where we’re supposed to be, be sound… We got to be all of that.”
Being any of that is a start.
