Let's talk about that Broncos-Chargers game on Sunday. Wow! Where does that rank for all-time best Broncos games? For regular season games, I'd say easily top ten, maybe top five. I don't know. I've never sat down and made the list. Probably like everyone else, I thought they were sunk when Jay Cutler was intercepted at the goal line and the Chargers immediately turned around and scored a touchdown to take a 38-31 lead, completing their comeback from 18 points down. But no - the Broncos come right back down the field. Cutler turns the ball over once again deep in Chargers' territory, but thanks to the small miracle of an inadvertant whistle, the Broncos retain possession. They score a touchdown on fourth-and-goal from the two, and then Mike Shanahan holds up two fingers. I thought it was the right call all the way - win or lose, and one only a coach with Shanahan's job security can make. And so Cutler throws another dart to Eddie Royal. Broncos win.
Going in, I thought this was a huge game for the Broncos. If they had ANY ideas about winning the AFC West, they NEEDED to beat the Chargers in Denver. If they failed, they were probably no better than a wildcard contender. But now they have a two-game lead on the Chargers and suddenly, the AFC West appears to be theirs to lose.
I'm a pretty heavy consumer of Denver sports media, especially as it pertains to the Broncos. And people have been dumping on the Broncos since training camp opened up. The consensus was that they would be no better than 8-8 this year and it was pretty much the bleakest outlook of the past quarter-century. I'm usually an optimist when it comes to the Broncos, but I didn't know what to think with all the negativity swirling around me.
I went to the Broncos-Cowboys preseason game after a week of listening to the sports yakkers debate all week about whether the Cowboys would be 13-3 and go to the Super Bowl, or go 14-2 and go to the Super Bowl. They talked about how big and mean Dallas was and how Denver wasn't anywhere in their league. And then the Broncos came out and worked over the Cowboys for a half as Jay Cutler looked really good and Tony Romo-Simpson didn't do anything. Granted, it was the preseason, but still. . . maybe these Broncos weren't going to be so bad. And then they went out and did the same to the mighty Packers of Green Bay the following week.
Everytime I went through the Broncos schedule, I kept coming up with 11-5. No worse than 10-6. I was going to post all my predictions, but I didn't. Because I felt like I was probably looking at it through orange-colored spectacles. So I kept quiet and took the wait-and-see approach. I expected a tough game in Oakland - alas, the Broncos blew them to pieces. And now, they're 2-0. Suddenly 11-5 seems very possible. The schedule isn't too tough - Miami, Atlanta, Kansas City twice, Oakland again, Cleveland. . . I'm just saying.
I realize the Broncos also started 2-0 last year and then fell apart. So we shouldn't get too far ahead of ourselves just yet. But there are plenty of reasons to be optimistic. The Broncos offense won't be their downfall. They haven't been this loaded receiver-wise for awhile - Marshall, Royal, Scheffler, Graham, Stokley. The offensive line seems okay despite what the doomsayers might have led you to believe. They're scoring touchdowns consistenly, not settling for field goals. I guess we'll see what the defense does as the season goes along. It's probably not a championship-caliber group, but if the offense continues to averge 40 points per game that won't matter.
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