ENGLEWOOD, Colo — Here the NFL is in its 14th week and there are 16 teams with records between 7-5 and 5-7. Darn near perfect parity.
Somewhere, Pete Rozelle is smiling.
Sean Payton, the Broncos’ head coach, is more focused on Sunday’s game against the Los Angeles Chargers at SoFi Stadium than he is the overall state of the NFL. Still, the point is, the line is thin between the haves (7-5 teams) and have nots (5-7 teams).
The 6-6 Broncos and 5-7 Chargers will put parity to the test Sunday. Payton’s thoughts on the evenness of the league this season?
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“It’s not unusual,’’ he said in an interview this week with 9NEWS for the Broncos Huddle (6:30 p.m. Friday). “We just finished talking about it after practice if you divided the season into quarters, which we used to always do obviously with 16 games, we’re in that final quarter pole and I think a lot will happen with that group of teams you’re discussing. Fortunately we’re in that group and now it’s in front of us.”
The Broncos are coming off a down-to-the-final-16 seconds loss to the Houston Texans. Which means the conversation around the coffee machines this week were again on what Russell Wilson didn’t do, or didn’t see. In wins, the buzz is Wilson is a terrific off-script quarterback who is dangerous in the clutch.
The trick for a coach is to arrange a game plan that emphasizes a player’s strengths and limits his weaknesses.
“A lot of that has to do with philosophically what we’re going to try to do offensively,’’ Payton said. “What are the things he throws well, now you have to apply it to an opponent. And so when you look at the opponent, you look at their empty (how they defend a no-back backfield), you look at the naked reel, you look at the play-action, 3-step, 5-step. You look at all the movement stuff.
“You get a feel for making things that you want to run in this scheme and then more than anything it’s the attention to detail during the work week and getting the timing down and being prepared for those chances.”
Payton’s offensive coordinator, Joe Lombardi, held the same position the previous two years with the Chargers. Lombardi did a nice job bringing along Chargers’ quarterback Justin Herbert, especially in 2021 when Herbert was healthy (38 touchdown passes, 5,014 passing yards). How does Lombardi’s knowledge of Herbert, receiver Keenan Allen, running back Austin Ekeler and the Chargers’ offense help the Broncos’ preparation this week?
“I don’t think it helps much,’’ Payton said. “Joe spent a number of years there but we have all the film. So there aren’t really a lot of secrets. It’s really being able to anticipate what wrinkles come and then how do we respond?
“But we have all the film relative to what they do defensively. They have all of our film. I think he would only come up if we were discussing personnel and we were talking strengths and weaknesses of a certain player. But there’s so much transition in our league – a lot’s made of it, I don’t see it being something significant.”
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