The Denver Broncos Are Your Honorary “Team No One Wants to Face in the Playoffs”
Around this time every year during the NFL season, the sports media gets to talking about teams that have been under the radar but have what it takes to win playoff games against elite teams (if said team actually makes it to the playoffs).
In recent history, this distinction has almost exclusively gone to the San Diego/Los Angeles Chargers who would routinely find themselves scratching and clawing for a wildcard spot in the final weeks of the season after a slow start. Even this year as the Chargers are en route to finish with one of the best records in the NFL, they have maintained the title as the “team no one wants to face in the playoffs.”
But after beating those vaunted Los Angeles Chargers on the road and pulling out a tough win against the Pittsburgh Steelers at home, it is the Denver Broncos who have truly distinguished themselves as the honorary; “team no one wants to face in the playoffs.”
The Denver Broncos are the team no one wants to face in the playoffs because of how well they’ve matched up against good football teams. They started off the season with an impressive 4 point win at home against Seattle who are now 6–4 outside of that game. A few weeks later they’d find themselves up by 2 scores against Kansas City in the 4th quarter, only to fall victim to Patrick Mahomes’ late game heroics.
The Broncos would go on to be overpowered against the Rams and overpowered again in a later rematch against the Chiefs, but in both games they made 2nd half pushes to put themselves in positions to win late in the 4th quarter.
In the 3 games against two of the league’s three best teams, the Broncos lost by a mere 13 points combined. A week after their week 8 rematch against Kansas City, they went tit for tat with the 7–3 Houston Texans only to lose on a missed 51 yard field goal by Brandon McManus.
And now they’ve finally swapped out moral victories for actual victories with their wins over the Steelers and Chargers who are a combined 15–2–1 in the games they played against non-Denver teams this season.
It’s not just that the Broncos have been good against good teams by happenstance, it’s that their defense has been consistently great against great offenses. They held the Chiefs to their 2nd and 3rd lowest scoring totals of the season, most notably holding them to 13 points with 12 minutes left in the 4th quarter before Mahomes went apeshit on Monday Night in week 4.
In week 6 against the Rams they’d hold Sean McVay’s crew to their lowest point total of the season with 23, the Rams haven’t been held below 29 points in any other game. In week 11 they held the Los Angeles Chargers 7th ranked offense 8 points below their per game average for the season with 20 and yesterday they held the 6th ranked Steelers offense to their lowest point total of the season with 17.
This Broncos defense isn’t the same defense that dragged Peyton Manning’s carcass to a Super Bowl ring in 2016, but they are still an elite group and this time around they have a fairly competent ball controlling offense to complement them.
After throwing 10 interceptions and fumbling the ball 6 times (1 lost) through the first 8 weeks of the season, Case Keenum has gone 3 straight games without an interception or fumble. And with an offense that ranks 3rd in rushing touchdowns and 2nd in yards per carry, all the Denver Broncos need from Keenum is for him to limit his turnovers and deliver accurate short and intermediate throws off of play action, much like he did all of last season in Minnesota.
The AFC is filled with potential playoff teams that struggle to stop the run. So if the Broncos can effectively use their 3-headed backfield of Phillip Lindsay, Royce Freeman and Devontae Booker; they give themselves a chance to win against just about any football team.
The final reason and arguably the most important reason the Broncos could be primed to upset some of the AFC’s top teams is that the core of their roster is comprised of players with plenty of playoff experience.
On offense: Case Keenum shined in his first playoff start last season as his Vikings had a legendary last second victory against New Orleans in the divisional round and their star receiver Emmanuel Sanders has 8 playoff games and 2 Super Bowl appearances under his belt.
And on defense: Von Miller, Derek Wolfe, Brandon Marshall, Chris Harris, Bradley Roby and Darian Stewart were all integral parts of that 2016 Super Bowl winning team.
With a remaining schedule of 4 straight games against sub-.500 opponents and a week 17 divisional matchup at home against a Los Angeles Chargers team they’ve already beat on the road; it’s conceivable that the Denver Broncos could end up with a winning record and a wildcard berth.
And if they do, they’ll be the team n-..…you know the rest.
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