Nuggets in Top 100 | Do Payton and Nix need counseling? | MHS Today
I’m down. Hi everybody. Welcome to Mile High Sports Today live from the new Mile High Sports studio at number 38 in Rhino presented by Folo. You just saw them and our friend at Vimos Bay and the Vimos app, the Denver Nuggets. We’re instead of worrying about the one or two Denver Broncos and what’s going wrong, we’ll do that with Nate Lundy in just a little bit and our friend Justin Adams from CBS News Colorado. But you know what? Let’s look at a team, not that called themselves Darkhorse championship contenders, but you know, the idea that maybe they could sneak in there, but teams that are legitimate championship contenders. Let’s start with the Denver Nuggets and our friend Ryan Blackburn, the lead writer for Mile High Sports and the host of the Pickax Roll podcast. As we get close to Nuggets training camp, uh obviously we know that on paper this is a really good team. The Denver Broncos thought on paper they had a really good team, but injuries of course has started to derail that already. And some of the expectations were probably unrealistically high. With the Nuggets, the expectations couldn’t be higher. They are about trying to go win another title, but at least on paper, things look really good. Out of ESPN’s top 100 players, they have yet to unveil 10 to one. But we know that Nicole Yokic is on there somewhere. That means that all five of their starters and their main player off the bench, at least when it comes to importance, Jonas Valenunis, all landed in the top 100. In a league in which you have almost 30 teams, having every one of your starters and one of your main backups be in the top 100 players, that’s impressive and it gives you an idea of just how deep this roster could be. 100%. Thanks for having me on. I mean, look at look at that. Jonas Valenunis at 87. That’s it’s a little bit higher than I would have him personally. I’d also think that that’s probably the wrong bench guy to have on this list. I’d say Bruce Brown is more likely to be a top 100 player when the next iteration of ESPN’s top 100 comes out. But as you can see, Cam Johnson at 67, that’s a pretty solid rank. And Christian Brown at 62 really caught me by surprise. That’s a good one. Jamal Murray at 46 is a little low. I’m not not going to lie. I think I’d probably swap him and Aaron Gordon and And you feel a little bit better about that. I I don’t think it’s any question really that Jamal Murray’s the second best, second most important player on the Nuggets based off of just how they run things. So, interesting placements to start here. I would guess that Nicole Yokic pops in at number one, although ESPN has been uh surprising sometimes and where they rank Nicole Joic from year to year. So, we will see. Luka on the Lakers this year, so keep an eye on Luca being number one. Still have clicks to get, you know. Yeah, that’s if there’s if there’s an opportunity to get them to chase the Lakers are available. Yeah, they’ll find a way. Dig right into that Lakers fan base as much as they possibly can. So, we’ll I mean, we’ll see what happens. But, uh yeah, it’s a it’s a good day for Nuggets fans to see, hey, six top 100 players is high. And I I think the only other team that you could say this about, there might be two. One is most certainly the Oklahoma City Thunder who the Nuggets lost to in the playoffs last year. Maybe another is the Minnesota Timberwolves, but outside of them, I I think that like Denver is the deepest team from at least the the top level placements on this list. So, nice to see Denver get some credit there. Yeah. and the and the rankings themselves aren’t that important because as we talked about, right, that that’s that’s uh that’s it’s so subjective and obviously there are things that that that uh ESPN needs to pursue that they want to be people to click and look at it. But I think in general, you look at that and you say, “Yeah, that that’s probably pretty reasonable to have all those players there.” And I agree with you. Bruce Brown is going to be the sixth man for the Denver Nuggets. Uh I do think that Valenunis’ importance is immense because the ability to hopefully give Nicola Joic a break. But as we get ready for training camp and you start looking at the potential depth here, let’s actually work from the bottom of that list up to Valenunis’ role. What is the expectation? Is he going to play just a traditional backup center with traditional backup center minutes? Do the Nuggets do you think have expectations to do more? As ESPN pointed out, he he had more games coming off the bench last season than he did his in his entire decade plus career prior to last year. Yeah, it’s a it’s a change for him for sure and it’s one of the reasons I think why we saw some of the rumors to Greece uh because it’s it’s difficult sometimes with players when they they have to deal with their own mortality, their own age curve, their own age span and and being passed up or being put into a place like this where Yonas Valinus got traded to the Kings last year. He was a primary backup for Damonte Sabonis. They were able to play together a little bit, not that much though. And ultimately what it looked like was Valenunis playing about 16 17 minutes a night. I would expect it to be about the same for Denver. I’d expect it to be about the same with him backing up Nicole. Now to be clear, he’ll play every night. That is a a matchup that is a uh aspect of Denver’s game that they’re very excited to have. They want 48 minutes of great center play every single night. And it’s something that they haven’t had in a long time with DeAndre Jordan and Zeke Naji and uh they they’ll try to factor in Don Holmes here at some point and we we’ll see whether he’s a small ball option for them. But I think Denver loves the idea of Valenunis playing a little bit next to Joic, not necessarily a lot. And you try to get him 16 to 18 minutes a night if you can. And if you’re winning games like especially kind of in that fourth quarter, that’s where you really start to see Valenunis rack up some minutes and Joic being able to rest down the stretch of games. Yeah. Uh, and that’s the part that’s so important because it it’s not only resting down the stretch of games, assuming the bench doesn’t just bleed out whatever lead the Nuggets have had, which is what the problem has been for the last few years, but also the idea that let’s say you’re playing, you know, a handful of of games in a short span of nights, that perhaps even Jokic could have a game off here and there because you obviously still can start Yonas Valenunis. So, that’s a big part of it. But when you you talk about Valenunis’ fit, let’s go to to Bruce Brown, who you and I both agree is going to be the the most important player off the bench because of his versatility. The Nuggets don’t have a lot of ball handlers, at least primary ball handlers behind Jamal Murray. Obviously, with Nicole Yokic on the roster, that’s different when your center is your primary ball handler. But Bowen’s case is, pardon me, Bruce Brown’s case is going to be really interesting because you’re talking about the the fit here of not only being the ball carrier coming off the bench, but also a guy expected to play defense, hence my Bruce Bowen uh you know, brain laps there. A a and fitting against multiple positions. So, Brown’s versatilities, we’ve seen it with the Nuggets before. Is he going to just step into the same role or do the Nuggets have something else in mind because the composition of this roster is somewhat different? It’s a good question and it’s something that the Nuggets will try to figure out heading into training camp and into the regular season and I wonder if it changes and evolves over the course of the year based off of how successful the bench actually is. I mean, on paper, I think Denver’s bench is better than the 2023 championship run where Bruce Brown was the sixman for much of that time, but he was playing next to Bones Highland early in the season, Reggie Jackson kind of in the middle of the season and then kind of took over as the backup de facto point guard later in the season. Jamal Murray is going to factor into the second unit in some way, shape, or form when they stagger. Cam Johnson will probably do the same thing, but I’m so curious as to what Adelman actually decides to do with this bench unit and and the kinds of lineups that you put together from night to night. Is it going to be a consistent nine or 10man rotation where you just know what everybody’s going to do on a consistent basis, or is he going to change some things up? Is he going to keep things fluid? Could Bruce Brown go from playing 28 minutes on one night to 15 the next? I think there’s a fair question as to what that role looks like, especially when you’ve got a third point guard in Jaylen Picket, who I think did a pretty good job in stepping in to a role last year and and proving that he’s an NBA player. So, there’s a lot of flexibility that can be had. I do think that you’re right that ball handling can be a problem for Denver, which is why you’re going to see the staggering of a Jamal Murray or a or a Cam Johnson at various points. But you don’t want to do that too much during the regular season because then you’re tiring those guys out for the playoffs even more. Well, we’re familiar with the starters coming back obviously Jokic, Murray, Brown, and and Gordon. So, let’s talk a little bit about Cam Johnson and for a lot of the the ways you look at his game. Could be an upgrade over Michael Porter Jr. He’s obviously got catch and shoot ability. He also has a couple different things he does that’s different than MPJ. But the part that is interesting to me is that instead of looking at a lot of that, people are looking at, oh, well, you had to move MPJ around because he’s not durable. Cam Johnson’s never played more than 66 games in a season. Durability has been an issue for him his entire career, whereas MPJ, quite frankly, has become more durable as his career has gone on. So, what are they envisioning for Cam Johnson? You’re talking about the stagger there and he’s not expected to produce as much as he did with the Nets obviously, but it could be that efficiency may set him apart. There’s certainly a possibility for it. I’m I’m again, it’s one of those things that we’re going to need some answers on media day and then in the residual training camp and preseason games just to see what kinds of lineups they’re playing, what kind of role he’s expected to fill. I would guess that for the first part of the season, probably the first 15 to 20 games or so, you’re looking at Cam Johnson as the pure Michael Porter Jr. replacement. Get him comfortable with the starters. Get him comfortable playing off of Joic as much as possible. And then once he’s in that role and and understanding that role, then you can start experimenting with staggering his minutes and maybe playing him with the bench a little bit. He did run some point guard for the Nets while he was there in lineups where they were playing guys like Keon Johnson and Zire Williams in the back court. Cam Johnson was their de facto point guard, the guy who was initiating offense a lot of the time. So, you want to see what he can do and whether he could be Denver’s kind of answer for that playmaking situation. It would expand his role at least a little bit more than what Michael Porter Jr. is playing, but it would alter things and and give Denver a little bit more variety and versatility that they can use. And that to me is the most important thing during this regular season. Figuring out more answers for the rotation and for the roster than they had the previous season. Obviously, it’s a challenge when you have some depth to try to keep all the mouths fed and at a certain point, you’re not going to be able to. But this is a team that was trying to find time to to help Julia Strawther mature. Pton Watson continued to grow. Now we’re talking about getting into the bench obviously with Bowen and Bowen. My goodness, Bruce Brown. I’ve had a lot of concussions. Uh Bruce Brown and you notice Valenunis when you’re talking about these two guys coming off the bench, but we haven’t talked about Strawley. We haven’t talked about Watson. You just mentioned Picket. We certainly haven’t mentioned Zeke Naji. Some of the players that the Nuggets kept trying to have to rely on are guys that aren’t regularly going to see the court anymore in a lot of cases. When you look at the deeper part of the bench, what is what is the disadvantage of that? Especially when you’re talking about younger players that still have to establish themselves at the NBA level. It’s hard to do without minutes. Of course, and that’s one of the things about the NBA season that people have to fully appreciate. Denver was in a position of weakness last year with their bench just trying to survive trying to survive with the the limited amount of players that they had going into it. They they were down Don Holmes. Dario Sarich proved incapable. Vlaco Chantar was injured and and in and out of the lineup. Hunter Tyson was pretty shaky. And then you that’s when you get into guys like Zeke Naji and Jaylen Picket and DeAndre Jordan and and players that didn’t end up playing major roles for Denver. Now you’ve got guys that could potentially give them some flexibility. what this does and and you you mentioned it earlier with Jokic when when you say getting games off and having Valenunis be able to step into a lineup like that. Now your hope is you could do that with the entire roster. You could do that with the entire starting lineup and basically say, “Hey, Jamal Murray, you need a night. We’re going to start Bruce Brown. We’re going to elevate Jaylen Pickicket into that backup role.” And that’s how you get the depth. You could do the same thing with Christian Brown, who played more minutes than he had ever played last year, almost doubling his minutes from the previous season. You could do the same thing and put in Tim Hardaway Jr. or Julian Strawler or even Bruce Brown again. So, there’s a lot of mobility and flexibility that the Nuggets are going to get from just having other options. And I hope they take advantage of it. That’s the the key factor that you’re looking for when you have depth is you do not want to just ignore it. You want to be able to utilize it especially during the 82 regular season games. Yeah. And it’s funny we’ve gotten this far and we realize we had a weird situation where David Adelman did not uh obviously spent a lot of time in the regular season. Spent his time primarily, you know, in the playoffs jumping into it. And so watching him navigate the regular season is something we don’t know yet. Now, obviously, he’s been Malone’s assistant for a long time, but based on what we saw in the playoffs, based on what we saw thus far in the limited part of the end of the last season, how do you think Adelman will handle things differently than Malone did? Is it an idea that, you know, they’re he’s not going to probably go full Greg Papovic and punt certain games, but is he going to handle it the same way Malone did with the idea of going out there and trying to win 82 out of 82? That’s a a fascinating question and I think it boils down to the way he handled Russell Westbrook versus Jaylen Picket in at the end of the regular season last year where Russell Westbrook was going through a pretty tough stretch. He had that horrible Minnesota game where ultimately made some some foibless that uh just ruined that that stretch for Denver. And then he was in a not awesome place just kind of with his decision-m and with his reliability. So the Nuggets went to Jaylen Picket in the very first game that David Adaman coached in Sacramento. Pickicket made some plays, made he closed the game down the stretch for a lot of it and ultimately was a factor for Denver when they needed him to be. And so I wonder if you can go to Pton Watson or Julian Strather or Jaylen Picket or Don Holmes and say, “Hey, we need to work in these young guys. The veterans cannot be adversarial with that and with that responsibility that the Nuggets have to keeping themselves healthy and keeping themselves engaged throughout an entire regular season. Last year became a little bit of an adversarial relationship. I would say not anybody’s fault, but certainly when you have the dynamic with Malone and Booth in the background, that was an an undercurrent through all of it. Now you kind of remove that. David Adelman can potentially actually play those young guys without making it seem like it’s any sort of agenda that he’s trying to follow. And the hope is that you’re just doing what’s best for your team to succeed and your team to win, not just in the short term, but the long term. Yeah, that’s the part that’s important, I think, when you look at it. And maybe one of the things obviously with with Michael Malone that had been a challenge at times is is the idea that you you’re still thinking longer term, right? not only not only the the the month or the the time of the year, but the whole season and making sure you’re healthy and peing at the right time and the Nuggets in the last couple years, you know, might have had a chance to go further, but just ran out of gas. Now, that’s not all on Malone because the talent there obviously was not really good enough to you could deploy them for a significant amount of time. Hopefully, it’s better. But yeah, it’s pretty remarkable to see how much of a change this team has made in in one off season because it really doesn’t look like there are any significant holes. I still look at ball handling a little bit, but the Nuggets do have the opportunity, I think, to to make some adjustments mid-season. If you were to look at it and say today, if there’s something that makes me worried systemically, I look at this roster, I look at the coaching staff, I look at the setup and say, here’s the one thing that I’m not sure they’re prepared for, what is that? It’s a good question. I I wonder whether it is the so one one of the weaknesses that Denver had last year was when they ran up against an offense that they could not keep up with. They would panic. They would struggle and it it’s very rare because Denver was the second ranked offense in the NBA. So or second or third and it was very rare that Denver was getting outscored. I think Denver needs to find ways this year to drag some of those elite offenses down to down a level so that they don’t feel like they have to score 130 just to keep up. That’s the that is a lot of pressure. It’s a lot of pressure to put on Joic. It’s a lot of pressure to put on Murray. And it often manifested in those games in situations where at the beginning of the fourth quarter, Denver’s already given up a hundred. they go through a rough stretch because their bench struggles and the opposing team rattles off a 15 to4 run or something and then the game’s out of reach at that point and you’re just climbing up a a mountain trying to push a boulder up a hill like Seisphus. So, I I think that there are factors that they’re going to need to address that the defense is going to have to be engaged throughout the entire season or pretty close to it. And nobody’s expecting them to be perfect throughout that entire time. But if they can’t find that gear against these elite offenses, they’re probably not going to win the title. And that’s just it’s just a reality of the situation that most teams have to face and champions always have to face. It will be a fascinating year. Obviously, a lot to look forward to the potential. Again, the Nuggets, you know, now won a championship. There are a lot of people that have been around this town for a long time that thought maybe that would never happen. And here we are talking about how they could realistically win another one and they are among the favorites. So, you want to follow Ryan for all the latest, check out the Pickax and Roll podcast. You can check that wherever you get the podcast or right here on this channel as well as the training camp gets underway next week and the season will be upon us sooner than you think. So, thanks for the primer. really appreciate it. Look forward to having you on more regularly as things start to get percolating down at Ball Arena. Appreciate it, Ryan. Thanks. Thanks, Sean, as always. All right. Always good to talk to Ryan Blackburn about the the Nuggets. Obviously, all of you who are already following Ryan know that. And so, make sure if you’re not, get on top of it because he has his finger on the pulse as you can tell. Of course, we’re proud to be sponsored by so many different folks here. And one of the ones that we’re really happy about is our friends at Pekish. Our friends at Pekish who our sponsor are SCO show the uh the SCO show latest one out now with me and our friend Payton Craft looking at the game that they ended up winning last weekend over Wyoming. Now they get on a stretch in the with Buffalo Ste where it’s three straight against ranked teams and we get to do that thanks to Peckish. Two different locations if you’re familiar with it up in Boulder. Obviously, uh you think about Peckish and the Wings and now the pizza and a great place to watch sports. Well, they have a new location, but don’t worry, it’s literally steps away from the other one, but it’s three times as big. So, now you’re talking about more space, more TVs, more room. There’s an outside area as well to go check it out. If you’re up in Boulder, how can you beat it? You’re thinking about, you know, football on a Saturday and uh you know, what beats pizza, wings, and beer. You can get that all at Peekish. And by the way, check it out in its other location. If you’re not up in Boulder, that’s okay. They’re in the Denver Tech Center right at Belleview Station, I25 and Belleview. All the everything you expect, the menus the same. All of it, the wings, the pizza, all the beers, the terrific setup for TVs. It’s a blast. Even on Thursdays, our friend Nate Lundy goes out there prior to Thursday Night Football. Gives some of his best bets for the week. Does that PKish and will be up at both Peckish locations as the football season goes along and we get into the basketball season as well for the Buffs. So, if you haven’t had a chance to check out Peckish, peckishco.com is where you need to check out the menu, check out all the sauces. They’re all great. I am a hot hot sauce guy and uh it’s all really good. Sometimes if you’re one of the folks that really likes hot sauces, you can be a little disappointed. You won’t be a peckish. In fact, there’s even one there that I haven’t been bold enough to try yet and I do like the hot sauces. So, whatever you like, mild or the spicy, you’ve got it. Boneless, a bone in. Yeah, I know boneless are basically chicken nuggets, but that’s okay, too. I don’t really judge. I just want the wings. And you can get them all over either of the Pekkish locations. So delighted to have them as part of the program. Check them out. peckishco.com. When I go to court, these aren’t my clients. These are my friends. These are people that I believe in. And they have one shot, just one shot for justice. If they’ve come to me and we’ve gotten to trial, their life has been turned upside down in some awful way. Uh, and I am their only hope. I need to be their champion. to quote Prince Oberin from Game of Thrones, they need someone in this trial by combat that can fight for them. I’m all they have. So, if I haven’t put the time in, if I haven’t trained, if I haven’t humbly looked in the mirror and thought about ways I can be better and I don’t present my best self in court, then I failed them. And that’s what motivates me as a trial lawyer. Because when this is over, that client goes home. And if I haven’t done my best for him, I haven’t been his champion, then I have failed. We’ll have a chance to talk a little bit about the Denver Broncos with our friend Justin Adams of CBS News Colorado in just a little bit, but we want to start with the Broncos discussion here today by talking about what’s going on with Bo Nicks. Obviously, Nicks is off to a pretty poor start for the most part. uh not as but the funny thing is you actually look at his stats compared to last year and they’re not really that far off. The completion percentage isn’t that far off. The touchdown interception ratio is better. But at the same time, it’s just not as effective, right? And so you look at it and think, why is that the case? Is it the talent? Did the talent change quite a bit? Well, it did. It’s arguably better, but you have Troy Franklin trying to establish himself where you had Devon Fe being successful as a rookie. Broncos move on from him. And Franklin’s had a good performance. He had a really good performance against the Colts and then kind of vanished when you were talking about the game against the Chargers. Basically, everybody vanished. Uh virtually nobody had receiving yards except Courtland Sutton. And that’s part of the problem. So, when you take a look at how to how to look at this, where can you go? We know that Evan Ingram has not been able to be effective. Got hurt uh again in the first game of the year. has not been effective for the Broncos missed the game against the Chargers. Uh we don’t know and we don’t know in this case if Ingram we talked about this with our friend Troy Rank from the Denver Post yesterday is Troy used Troy brought up the question I don’t think he is but Troy brought up the question is he just washed. Uh he he didn’t really pop in training camp. He looked like he would be a valuable addition but he really didn’t stand out and obviously hasn’t been able to get going here. This is one of the problems the Broncos have had in general. their four free agents who are all very very talented guys all have lengthy injury histories JK Dobbins has looked good and Teleno Foga has looked good but the idea that all four of these free agents with lengthy injury histories would make it through the season unscathed that was always kind of a fool’s bet and uh obviously the early part of the season it’s costing them but now what do you do so if you don’t really have a weapon at tight end because you don’t know what’s going to go on with Evan Ingram and you can’t assume that he’s going to make the position a lot better. What do you do? Well, the bright side for the Broncos is you do have a lot of really tall guys. Shawn Peyton, as we’ve talked about in receivers, he has a type, right? Courtland Sutton 6’4. Uh Troy Franklin 6’3, Pat Bryant 6’2. They are tight end height. They’re not necessarily tight end weight, but if you’re looking for the receiver side, why not mix and match? Because the Broncos aren’t using the middle of the field down the field very much at all. When you look at what Nicks has been doing between the numbers, more than 10 yards downfield, he’s thrown exactly six passes, six pass attempts. Between the numbers, the spot where the Broncos themselves have a tough time defending and most teams do. Now, on the bright side, he’s three for six with 83 yards. So, maybe just try that more. There’s even a touchdown there and then no interceptions. It’s been the best part of the field for Knicks, but they’re not going there very often. And and while it’s valuable to go to the numbers, I get it. But maybe moving some of these guys around helps. if you don’t have the tight end ability to attack the middle of the field because Adam Troutman’s not going to do that. Maybe they can get a little bit more out of Lucas Crowley was the third leading receiver in against the Chargers with nine yards, but third leading receiver is third leading receiver. Using the middle of the field is a big part of it. And if you can’t do it with the tight end, you’ve got to be creative. You can’t make things so easy on the defense by not using that part of the field just because Evan Ingram is not there. Yeah. Could the Broncos have gotten more at the tight end position? Yes. Should they have signed another one? I argued yes. Should they have drafted one? I argued yes. They decided that Evan Ingram was enough. And here’s hoping that he still might be. But you’re going to have to start compensating some way around. The other part about this that is important. Obviously, you know, run the football. JK Dobbins is having a very good year thus far. RJ Harvey is showing promise. Not that you’d be handing it to Harvey very much because Dobbins is doing exactly what you’d hope. But run, set up the play action, and then things work better for Bo Knicks. Nicks was a good play action quarterback last year. He’s good at selling it. He’s good at being make making the decision and being decisive. More play action would help. These are things Shawn Payeyton can do so he can run the ball more, set up play action, invest in the run early, so then things become a little more effective when you’re trying all your clever substitutions and fakes. Use the middle of the field if you have to with your wide receivers. There’s no rule that’s saying that you can’t put Courtland Sutton in the slot and let him work the middle of the field and let Bryant and Franklin or, you know, even Marvin Mims work on the outside. That’s perfectly fine. You could also do the same thing with Franklin. Franklin, when you look at his chart with Bo Knicks in Oregon, Franklin did the vast majority of his work in the middle part of the field. So maybe maybe that’s the answer. Maybe you don’t want to mess too much with what Courtland Sutton has been doing because Knicks and Sutton have a good rapport. Obviously, they’re effective. They were effective last year. They look effective this year. The Colts game notwithstanding. So, if you use Franklin a little more in the middle of the field, not only is that something he’s has proven that he has the ability to do in college, it’s also how Nick Knicks was used to playing uh with Franklin. So, that’s an option, but they’re gonna have to get creative. They’re gonna have to run more. These are the two things. The other one, however, probably just has to do with Knicks not having to rush so much, and that’s another Shawn Payeyton issue as well. That one is the more difficult one to deal with and to fix. We’ve talked about this before with with Troy Rank, the Never Post, and others. Shawn Peyton does something a lot of teams don’t do anymore. Teams on offense nowadays in the NFL try to function by deception. They they try to put you in a base package. They try not to show very much of what they’re going to do. They use the same personnel to run different plays. They expect a little more versatility from their starters. Shawn Payeyton understanding that for the most part, historically, you know, your starters may not be all that versatile, but you can get some guys on the bench that basically can do the things you want them to do. It’s kind of the equivalent of a moneyball strategy for football, right? And Shawn Peyton is not wrong for pursuing it. The idea is, okay, well, we need this guy to run this route. You know, we have a a a type a Pat Bryant type who’s going to take over for Devon Bailey and he’s going to be the guy that on third and 12 we’re going to get him to the sticks and he’s going to run the the curl and we’re going to hit him on the sideline. Okay, and maybe that’s better than what Troy Franklin does. Sure, that’s fine. So, you sub out Franklin and you put in Bryant. There’s nothing wrong with that strategy because finding starters that can do everything well is tough. When you do, it’s expensive. The salary cap league, that’s hard. And so the idea of grabbing guys who could do certain things and substituting them in in certain packages does make sense. The trick is that no teams do that anymore, at least very few teams do that anymore. The deception is baked in to the half. That also means that they’re giving their quarterback more time. Right? So, one of the things you’re doing when you have your offensive players set up to do more things and you look, you sit there in 11 or 12 personnel and you don’t make a lot of movement. Now, the defense doesn’t know what to do. Also, of course, you get control of the pace if you’re not substituting because then, you know, you can move faster and the defense doesn’t have to. If you’re substituting, you have to allow the defense time to substitute. So for the Broncos now, because that’s not the way they do things, there’s a couple problems. You are to an extent giving away what you will do. Because when people start watching Payton’s substitution packages and they start watching who he puts in in what situations and then the plays he calls, when you realize he doesn’t call some of these plays for his starters, he calls them for these packages, it makes the team more predictable. It makes the Broncos more predictable. Even though Payton is a heck of a play caller and he’s really good on the whiteboard coming up with creative concepts, but everybody has a tell. And so when Payton is working on some of these things over time, teams can see what’s happening. Teams can see on the other side what is going on, start predicting some of it. So that makes it harder for Knicks, too. Moreover, the substitution means that Nicks has less time to get the play into everyone on the huddle and then get up to the line of scrimmage, then hopefully, you know, identify the mic, move forward, do all those sort of things, and then get the playoff in time. Knicks in this season at least looks rushed. That is not a shock. I’ve talked about that earlier this week. When you’re talking about the the growth of a quarterback, Bick snuck up on the whole league last year. The whole league. He’s not sneaking up on anybody this time around. So teams have gone over every single bit of video they can find. They’ve started to to classify and and and go ahead and figure out what they’re he’s doing every time and then work on schemes to stop it. So Nicks now is facing a defenses that are more prepared for him and more ready to take away what he wants to do. In this case, a lot of that is the run. The run surprised so many people. People realized on the opposite side that causes a lot of problems for us. So, in the early going, the Titans, the Colts, and the Chargers have all limited Knicks’s ability to tuck it and run. They’re daring him to beat them through the air. Right now, with the loss of Evan Ingram and the fact the Broncos didn’t add to that room, that’s obviously a challenge and it can’t that one can’t be fixed until Ingram’s actually impactful. But fewer substitutions not only gives the defense something to think about, but it gives Bo Knicks more time at the line of scrimmage. If he doesn’t have to wait for substitutions to come in before he can start explaining everything in the huddle. If he’s not making sure that everyone’s on the same page all the time, who just came into the game after being out for x amount of time and when they’re not rushing to the line of scrimmage. How many times do you see Bo Knicks come up at the line of scrimmage this year? He’s doing that. He’s trying to get the ball. is trying to get snapped cuz they’re getting up to the line with 6 seconds or so left on the clock. Well, you don’t have the time to diagnose the defense. Payton Manning would take the time and diagnose the defense. Drew Brees would diagnose the defense, but the way that Shawn Peyton is calling the offense right now, it’s not giving Nicks time to diagnose the defense. And I don’t expect a guy in his second year to to diagnose a defense like Drew Brees did or like Pton Manning did. I don’t expect him to do that. But when you do look at the the time frame there, that’s something that they can get better at. Fewer substitutions, more time for Bo Knicks to get to the line of scrimmage and tell what he’s doing. Go ahead and and let him slow his heartbeat and make the right decision. Those are things that Shawn Payeyton can do. We’ll find out if they do any of those going forward because this Denver Broncos team has to find a way to close games. have some jarring numbers for you about how the Broncos have performed in the second half of the last couple games. We’ll talk about that with our friend Justin Adams in a moment. But I want to remind you it is now almost October and in a lot of states you’re thinking, “Well, golf season’s over.” Not in Colorado. It’s gorgeous in the fall. And you know where you want to go. That’s Denver Golf. Eight unique and distinctive courses. You have mountain settings, you have urban settings, you have everything in between because that’s what Colorado has to offer. And the beauty of Denver Golf’s courses is they’re scattered all around the metro area. Sure, you can play City Park, but the courses are everywhere. So, no matter where you are, there’s likely to be one near you. And this isn’t one of those uh extra fancy country clubs or if you’re not a scratch golfer, everyone’s going to get frustrated with you. Everyone is welcome at Denver Golf Courses. All skill levels. Everybody top to bottom. Come out and learn the game and learn to love it like so many of us have. Even if you’re not particularly good at it, like you know who, but you know, you can always go out there. There’s always the next round. So look at booking your team time today at cityofdenvergolf.com. That’s cityofdenvergolf.com. Come home to play. Denver is your neighborhood course. get a chance to talk to our friend Justin Adams of course from CBS News Colorado, one of the anchors there and a man who played tight end at the University of Colorado. Do have the Broncos reached out because without Evan Ingram, that middle of the field, that would be that would be nice to hit on there, Justin. But but I finished with the idea something you and I talked about before the the program, the fact that the Broncos in the last couple games have had eight drives in the second half in which they have had an opportunity to take a two-score lead, right? 0 for eight. And then you lose the next those two games on last second field goals. Not only are they sort of heartbreaking, brutal losses, but the truth of the matter is your offense is not doing the things that could make it a lot easier on everybody. The defense had a breakdown against the Chargers at the tail end of the game. They allowed Justin Herbert to complete his last eight passes, the touchdown to Keenan Allen included in there. And if this was a two-score game, maybe you’re you’re not in as much trouble. How do they find a way to close? and and and you played. So, how when does this get into your head a little bit where you’re going, man, we we just need some points on this drive? It’s two straight games in the second half. We can’t do it. We can’t get anything. Well, and there were also it also happened two different ways, too, right? I mean, you look at the game where the Chargers, you settle for a field goal where you were inside the goal line. You’re a goal to go situation with a chance to go and score. You couldn’t do so. So that gets inside of your head where you say, “Hey, if we just scored a touchdown here, the game is much different. Oh, by the way, they can’t win with a field goal. Now they have to score a touchdown in order to get the job done.” You know what that also does? It changes your play calling. Now you’re not on third down and 10 trying to throw what I call like a jackpot ball. You know those 500 balls when we used to play like as kids? You’re not throwing up that type of pass hoping that it could be completed to Courtland Sutton. Maybe your play call is different where you could run the ball a little bit more now. Now you could do some intermediate passing. Now you could go and help out Bo Knicks with some simple plays to be able to get the ball down the field knowing that all you need is a first down or two and you have won the football game. You go up against the Colts, you don’t have those silly penalties that take you away from being inside the red zone. Now you’re five yards back immediately because of delay a game. Then you’re 15 more yards back because of a personal foul penalty. Those are the things that do start to get in your head when you say, “Hey guys, look, we have a chance to close the door. All we have to do is execute.” That’s the biggest thing that I’m not seeing from this team. It’s a missed block here. It’s a misread there. If you’re going to do a quarterback draw with Bo Knicks, it’s not having him burrow his head with three of your linemen and try to go and get something, you know, find a try to find an opening from there. There are different ways you could be able to go with these games and it comes down to making that one play, that game-winning play. This team just hasn’t done so yet. Yeah. You talk about the penalties. In the three games, the the Broncos have been flagged for 30 penalties. Now, six have been declined, so it’s 24 accepted. But that’s 30 penalties. It’s 10 a game. That’s the kind of stuff you’d look back in the in the, you know, in the 80s and 90s and go, well, that must have been the Raiders. I mean, that that’s what they had on double digit penalties, you know, sloppy sort of uh o overaggressive penalties. and the Broncos, the overaggressive penalties were something they were guilty of with the Chargers, but but when you talk about I mean, I’ll just explain the way Shawn Peyton does, right? Confidence comes from demonstrated ability. So, right now, this offense h has uh the one game it won was a one-sore game technically, eight points over the the Tennessee Titans. They haven’t been able to get the score they needed against the Colts or the Chargers, both of which could have put those games away. So there there hasn’t been the demonstrated ability to get this done. Shawn Peyton’s teams now are two and eight when he’s been when Bonix has been the quarterback. Two and eight in one score games. Now they were one and six last year. When Shawn Peyton was asked about that, he said, “Well, that’s last year.” And you know what? He’s that’s fair because it’s different players in a lot of positions, different scenarios. That’s fair. But he’s one and two this year. You’re off to the same start. So, how do you build the confidence when you haven’t demonstrated the ability to go down and put a team down two scores when you have the opportunity to take control of that game? How do you tilt it? Well, the first thing you do is it starts with your preparation. So, it starts in practice. You will focus on red zone. We all know this. Um, and for those who don’t know that during the week, you have your overall, hey, here’s our playbook that we have. this is what we’re going to go. Uh these are the plays, maybe 150 or so plays that we’re looking at this week or whatever they could be. Uh this is our our game plan that we’re going to have. Then you go from your game plan and say, “Hey, we’re having red zone specific or we’re having third down specific practices, right?” You really hone in on those and say, “What are the things that B Knicks does well within the red zone? What are the things that our offense does well in the red zone to be able to go and help us out so that when we play against the Bengals on Monday night, we’re able to go and finish our drives in the end zone and not selling for field goals. What are the type of explosive plays that we could do? Um, you have the guys buy in. They all believe in the plays and you keep them simple. You’re not having a whole new, you know, grouping. And even if you do have a new grouping, you have practiced these plays so much that you know where to go. Bo Nicks will know once he breaks the huddle, hey, this is where the ball needs to go. I think another thing too where we talk about him clapping his hands a lot to get the ball. He’s on the road. How would things look when he’s at home? That’s what I want to see now. Hey, you’re right back at home. You’re comfortable at home. You’re not going to deal with that crowd noise at home. Can you be able to now go and go through your reads faster? get the ball faster without having that extra second where you look at frantic in the back field, right? And so those are the things you could be able to do to help out your team to be able to finish drives in the end zone, especially when a defense is doing everything they can to keep you out so that they can stay in the game. Knicks has not uh obviously performed up to his his expectations or even a lot of fans expectations, but I would argue that he hasn’t necessarily looked bad. The the misses have not been for the most part misses by a lot. that they’re relatively small, but some of the some of the bad habits that I’ve seen, the the throwing on the run, he’s gotten in a habit where he isn’t setting his feet and that’s causing some of the inaccuracy. But again, it it feels a little bit as if that he’s just he seems rushed. And is it as easy as saying, “Hey, you faced off against two teams that are right now unbeaten in the AFC, have are better than people expected, and maybe you need to take a deep breath and say, you’re going to get back and face a Bengals team that’s bad. you can slow things down, but how do you help in the huddle a quarterback that seems rushed, that seems a little bit frantic for whatever reason, how do you help him get his bearings, take a deep breath, and calm down, pair down the playbook. You don’t have a a, you know, a five ring binder. You take that down to one ring. You may even take it down to one page, right? A couple of pages. No, honestly, I mean, a lot of coaches do this, right? And we we know Shawn Peyton has so many plays at his disposal and so many concepts and so many, you know, groupings and whatnot. Like, hey, I want to have everything up. I feel great about this quarterback. I feel like in year two, we could go and open things up. Sometimes what is the best thing you could do is to be able to go and not have as many plays, but have plays that he’s the most effective on. And that’s the relationship that Bon Knicks and Shawn Payeyton have to go and develop where you could go and say, “Hey, these are the 10 plays, 15 plays I’m very comfortable in. Hey, we’re in the red zone. I like these plays. These are what I like.” And we just don’t hear that from the professional ranks. We hear that from college. We hear that from high school. It’s the relationship between coach and quarterback. Well, this is the opportunity and the chance for you to be able to say, “Hey, these are the plays I’m comfortable with. We are on the same page.” And that takes some maturity as well. I understand that we look at Bull Knicks and we want him to be, you know, this top flight quarterback. And I understand we look at Shawn Peyton and say, you have already worked with these guys before with Drew Brees, right? Carrie Collins, you were able to get him to a Super Bowl, right? But at the same time, it takes time for a relationship to be able to grow. And this is just in its second season. So when you are continuing to grow in a relationship, you got to make sure you have the plays that work the best for you. the quarterback and also the coach and put your guys in the right position to succeed. If you don’t, your drive will end in field goals and not in touchdowns. That the the part that you were talking about about, you know, he’s still a young quarterback in the second season and I think when people maybe overreacted to this, you know, you’re talking about two losses that are last second field goal games. It’s not as if the Broncos weren’t in it. Are they playing the way everyone hoped? No. No, they’re not. But there there is the temptation of of looking at this and thinking that buying into some of the hype of which some of it was, you know, created by the head coach that the Broncos were ready to compete for a Super Bowl and and topple the the Chiefs in the AFC West right now. That to me felt a little bit overconfident. And I think maybe what we’re seeing is it might not have helped Bo Nicks who who is still, you know, I get it. He’s a coach’s kid. He’s he’s kind of a gym rat. I understand that. loves the film room, but he’s human and he feels those expectations. And now he’s he’s, you know, with a league that is doing something a little bit different than they were last year. How when you look at the way the Broncos approached this off seasonason and the idea that they were going to be right in the mix right off the bat, I don’t know if it did Nick any favors. So, how when you look at the that these early starts and you think about quarterbacks in the second year, how far off is he really on the maturation process? cuz I look at it and nothing he’s really done this year has has shocked me and gone, “Oh, wow. That’s that’s a huge regression.” For me, this is just a league that isn’t going to walk in and be surprised that Bonix is good anymore. The Broncos are six points away from being undefeated. I mean, I know they lost by three points against the Colts and also against the Chargers, but you can make the argument they’re just seven points, eight points away, right? You get that extra point against the Chargers, you get that extra point against uh the Colts and we’re having a total different conversation. You know what we’re saying? if they’re actually able to get four points and end one of those drives in the end zone or end one of those drives with a field goal. We’re saying, can you believe how this team has grown? Last year, they’re one and six and one score games. But look at them now. They’re able to go and win these close games. They’re able to finish them off. You know what? That’s the type of things that you need in order to win win in the postseason. We could see this team be able to do that. It’s a total different conversation. But the issue with the squad is this is that because you’re not finishing now you’re having those questions brought up. I think the Broncos need to go and have a reality check from the sense of this. You’re not as far away as you want to be, but at the same time, you also need to do the little things to get yourself over the top. Here’s a great story that I heard from Will Smith. And Will Smith, you know, he has all these podcasts and whatnot. And Will Smith was talking about how, you know, for you to be able to go and get to 90% is not that difficult. It’s not hard to get to from zero to 90%. But it’s that 10% that you almost have to break your neck to get to that 100% which makes it the most difficult. The Broncos are at that point right now where they’re at that 85 90%. But they will have to break their neck to be that Super Bowl caliber team that they want to be. To be that team that gets that extra score to put you up two possessions, to be that team that wins by one or to be that team that’s able to go over the top, frankly, to be that team that we saw in 2015 that was able to win the majority of their game in close contest and did so in the postseason as well. So, if you want to go and get to that next step of your maturation process, what do you need to do? Well, you need to figure out the small things in order to get yourself there. You got to figure out how not to have those penalties, the silly penalties. You need to figure out when do I lay out for the ball and be able to catch one, even if it’s a little bit overthrown. How could I be able to make that happen? You need to figure out how to set your feet and to make the right throw. Those are the things that you have to do, especially against two opponents that you just faced that will be in the postseason. Yeah, obviously that’s important as well, but the schedule does get easier. Obviously, you have Cincinnati with the injury to Joe Burrow. Uh they are very very vulnerable. We saw what happened uh ever since then, certainly this week against Minnesota. But then you get the Eagles. That’s obviously going to be a very very tough pull. But after that, you have a Jets team that isn’t terribly good. You have a Giants team that’s going to be starting rookie Jackson Dart. You have a Dallas team that doesn’t appear capable of stopping anybody defensively. Then you you have a Houston team that who knows maybe they’ll be right by then, but they’re they’ve had a wobbly start and the Raiders are are building. They’re I I think they are building in the right direction, but they’re still building. So all of a sudden, you look at going into mid November and there’s only I mean I I guess you could argue depending on where Houston is, but you should beat Cincinnati now. It’s fine if you lose to Philly. You should beat New both New York teams. You should beat Dallas. Uh let’s say Houston’s a tossup. should beat Vegas, especially here in Denver. I mean, you’re talking about a chance to win, you know, five or six out of the next seven games. And if they do that, all of a sudden, we’re back to talking about what you’re talking about. Like, oh, it it’s fine. It’s all back on track. So, it’s obviously important to make sure that even though things aren’t the way you want, like you said, now because the schedule’s easier, it’s an opportunity to look yourselves in the mirror and say, “All right, you know what? we have the opportunity to to to adjust, adapt to make sure that we’re we’re dotting every eye and crossing every tea. And who knows, in a month maybe all this seems like a bad dream. And that’s the main reason why you don’t go too overboard in September. You make the corrections. It’s a long, long season. I mean, this season goes into next year, right? It’s a long, long year. Now, you don’t want to get on that losing streak, which will take you away from an opportunity to still win the division or to still be able to get a really good seed in the postseason where you want to be, but you make the corrections now. Now is the time to be able to make the corrections. You would love to be like the Eagles were last week where you didn’t play well for one half, had a great second half, was able to go to win the game. That would have been nice, but you still have an opportunity to make to do everything that you want. Every goal that you have is still right in front of you. The Chargers aren’t going to go undefeated. You know, the Colts are going to be in a team that goes undefeated. We all know that. We all know that injuries and different things happen. But what do you need to do? You need to take care of the business that’s right in front of you. And that starts on Monday night against the Bengals. And I say this even against the Eagles. We know that they’re the defending champs. Tough team to play. You’re flying across the sea. I mean, not across the sea, but across the country on the road to Philly early game. We know all the different things that are up there against you. but you just faced a team that also played on Monday night, then they went home and then they just beat you without having their their fast ball. You could be able to do the same as well. A lot of crazy things happen in the NFL. But you better believe the first thing you need to do is take care of business at home against Cincinnati. Get some good mojo, get some good home cooking, and then go on the road to go across the sea and see what you could do from there. the Broncos come back on a winning streak, but again, it’s the little things that will b that will have them be able to go over the top. You got to get the plays in earlier. You got to stop the silly penalties. And when you have a team to where you have a chance to step on the throat of another team, you got to be able to do so because if you do, you will find yourself on the right side of things when you enter October, November, and most importantly, December. Yeah, it’s important not to panic this early. It’d be different if they were getting the doors blown off by by the Colts and the Chargers, and they weren’t. And and both of those games, they can look in the mirror and say, “We probably should have had those.” So, if that’s the case, yeah, your talent is still good enough to be a difference maker. Well, but we don’t want to let you go without turning our attention to your Colorado Buffaloos. Got a big win over Wyoming. Got right in the 37 to 20 game. Now, I’m not discounting Wyoming, which was two- one coming into the game. They had a better record than the Buffs, but a lot of their metrics not particularly impressive. Even though that game was 000 after one quarter, it didn’t feel like Colorado was in a lot of danger. But the most important thing was four games in, you finally solved your quarterback issue. Uh they let Kaden Salter be Kaden Salter this time and it worked out very very well. That’s great. Nice to be back to two and two. But now the the uh the schedule gets nasty. You’re talking about BYU this week. They’re ranked 25th in the country. DC is ranked 24th there after that. Iowa State 14th. No shock. You’re in the Big 12. You’re going to play the the big dogs. But now you you have they done enough in four weeks that you’ve seen that they’re really ready for three straight weeks against ranked teams because I to be honest, Justin do not. In the words of Gary Kubak, we’re fixing to find out what’s going to happen with the Buffs right now. I know this is that they have to get things together on defense. Before we talk about anything on offense, this team needs to be able to go and make a stand defensively. It was interesting uh Deion Sanders, Coach Prime was talking about after the the postgame uh comments after the game against Wyoming. He said, you know, the the third drive, they tripping. We know what’s coming on the third drive, the defense tripping. And guess what? They gave up a big run. Well, you’re playing in the Big 12. You can’t do that. Now that you shift over to Big 12 play, you can’t have that. But you know what? It’s this big plays are going to happen. you’re going to give up big plays. So like that’s they have scholarships too. They have NIL too, okay? Right. They make more money than us too, right? So you got to be able to go and limit the big plays, limit those big play opportunities and not have those drive in the touchdowns, right? When when it does happen. On the other side too on offense, Kaden Salter, be that dual threat you are. This is most likely the final football that you’re going to play, especially at the quarterback position. I would hope it’ll be in the pros. But this could be it for you. So what do you do? You go and say, “Hey, I’m a dual threat guy. When I have the opportunity to run, I run. When I could throw, I throw.” And what happens then? You’re going to have those big plays. That long touchdown pass that happened in the second quarter. Those are the plays that can happen. And they will always be open. And now what do you do to defenders? Now defenders are wondering, “Oh, is he going to run or do I need to stick with my man?” That gives you an opportunity to have the advantage. The one thing that scares me the most though about the Buffs and Sean, you know this very well on third down and two, I’m concerned. I’m very concerned on short down situations because I saw this several times from Georgia Tech. I saw this when they played up against Delaware, Houston, and even against Wyoming last week. It’s third and two. They give the ball to the quarterback in shotgun and he picks a lane, picks a gap, he picks up the first down. That has to change. And I don’t know how you change it, but you got to figure out a way how to be able to change it. You cannot be in a game that’s going to be this closely contested and just give up third down or short of third down short. That has to change. Yeah, the the quarterback’s running has been a real problem. Uh obviously we knew about Hannes King of of Georgia Tech coming in a really good runner and he was tremendous in that game, but then you know against Houston Connor Weman had a had his careerhigh in rushing yards by halfime. That has been a weakness for the Buffs. And some of the numbers are are pretty ugly because you’re right when you talk about the offense and how problematic that’s been. Offensively, they’re 83rd in FBS. Defensively, they’re 112th. They’re 122nd in rushing, giving up 195 yards a game. Many of that to opposing quarterbacks. Uh that’s the kind of stuff that’s not sustainable. Uh, a and obviously not only if you’re giving up those big yards on the ground, you are now also seating the tempo to the other team and you are letting them give your defense whatever levels of fatigue they want that are going to cost you. And I know that that yeah, the Buffaloos are accustomed to playing at altitude up in Boulder, but humans human bodies still get tired at altitude whether you train there or not. So, when you’re allowing teams to just grind you down, even the Buffaloos at home can’t sustain their defense and they become open and and really vulnerable to the big plays late. We’ve seen that happen as well. Wyoming grinded them down last week, too, if we’re going to be honest. Yeah. Just frankly, I mean, if we’re going down in the second half, 17 to 16 and we’re in the fourth quarter. It’s a 30-20 game. Right. Like, it’s a close ball game. But what’s the solace that we have with this team? The solace is this is that we know that one shot, one side with DJ McKenna will be taken care of. So at least you have that, but now it’s about can you rally tackle to get after these guys. I mean, you’re going to lose one of your big boys up front um because of a targeting penalty. Um so you’re going to lose it for a half, but can you be able to go and rally to the ball and make things happen defensively? I love what I saw immediately out the game. The first drive defensively, the Bucks really got after Wyoming. And don’t get me wrong, yes, there were a couple of pass interference penalties. I would take those in a game like that knowing that, hey, they’re really getting after the football. They’re making great reads. Well, now you’re going up against a freshman this week and you have to go and make that freshman see stars. You have to really go get out for coverages, whatever you can to make it very difficult for him. If you can, you have a chance to be able to go and win this football game. This is not one game that’s impossible to win. This is a game that you can win at home, but you have to have your best defensive performance of the season in order to get it done. Yeah, obviously by a lot. It is an opportunity, as you pointed out, to make a statement. Really watch those third downs. As you talked about, the Buffalo’s giving up a lot of third downs, especially the short ones, but they’re not converting them very well either of the buffs under 40% just by a little at 39.6% in third down percentage. That’s 73rd in FBS. BYU, by the way, is really good defensively on third downs. They’re only allowing 22% conversion rate, which they, you know, if you think, wow, that’s really good. It is. It’s sixth. So, obviously, those third down plays, the ability to make sure that you have third and shorts instead of third and long, is going to be a big big deal for the Buffaloos. But, I think you’re right. I think they have I think they have more than a puncher chance in this game. I think if they do what they need to do, they can win this game. But, they can’t find themselves behind you in the early going. No, they can’t make the same kind of mistakes because you just can’t let people gash you for these long runs. You have to find a way to be consistent defensively against the run first and foremost. If the strength of this defense really isn’t its defensive backfield, then they need to be able to take advantage of it. And by doing that, you have to shut down the run. And you also have to force turnovers. This is a game where turnovers will batter. Can you force a couple of turnovers? Can you be able to take full advantage of the mistakes that BYU can make? This is the biggest test that their freshman quarterback is going to have on the road. Rockets environment late at night. Trust me, you and I both know it’s late at night. We’re not going to get home until about 1:00 on Sunday morning, right? And so exhausted, okay? Our body’s not built like it used to be. Okay. But you use all that to your advantage. The crowd has to be losing their mind in this game. It’s a gold rush game. The crowd has to play a huge part in this. And what does that mean defensively? You got to go get after this quarterback as fast as possible. make it as tough as possible early on, get up in this game, and be able to hold off from there. That’s the That’s the recipe for the Buffaloos to be able to win this game. Can they get after a BYU team that hasn’t, frankly, played anybody yet? This would be a big test for them, too. They’re excited to play this game. They know it’s nally televised, but it’s up to you to be able to make it happen at home. Yeah, it will be interesting. Obviously, a big opportunity for the Buffs should they get the win. Obviously, if they they don’t get the win and don’t look good, then the next two weeks look really really sketchy. and getting to a bowl is challenging. So yeah, there are quarter there are sort of, you know, pivot points in a season and they felt like they got through one with Wyoming. Now you know who your quarterback is. Now you had success calling plays. I thought it was one of the best games I’ve ever seen Pat Shurmer call pro or college. Uh keep that going and then you got a chance and who knows, you knock off BYU, you make a statement on national TV and then you you you put a little fear to TCU who you know that went well last time you played them. totally different teams, but still they’re going to be stinging from that a little bit. And now you have an opportunity to make a bowl. To which my mind, look, this year it’s a transition year. Making a bowl is the goal. You You’re not trying to go ahead and win the Big 12. That’d be great, but go make a bull. And you have to do that one week at a time. Just start collecting those wins. Don’t worry who they’re against. We’ll find out if they get it done. But obviously, it’s great to be able to talk about both the Buffs and the Broncos with our friend Justin Adams. Make sure you check him out on social and follow everything that he and the terrific CBS Colorado team put together. Justin, thanks so much for the time. Hey, brother, as always, thank you so much for having me on, Sean. I appreciate it. So, so good to talk to Justin about all of it and hopefully things go a little bit better uh for his Buffaloos as well. We’ll have a new SCO show later in the week. Previewing that game against BYU. Looking forward to that one already uh with our friends at Peekish. So, thanks to Justin Adams for joining us. Thank you to Ryan Blackburn for joining us as well. The Nuggets get training camp underway as we talked about there. And you see there, uh six Nuggets in the top 100. their starting five and Yonas Valentunis and I agree if you missed it. Ryan Blackburn talked about how Bruce Brown will probably be by the end of the year in that as well. So everything is in front of the Denver Nuggets as they get going. The Colorado Avalanche, by the way, their roommates there, uh they will get their season going two weeks from yesterday. That’ll be the regular season already. So things are going it’s great time to be a sports fan. Great time to be down here at number 38 in Rhino, especially right here at the number 38 in my live sports studio presented by our friends at Vololo and Vimos Pace. So, thanks so much for joining us. We’ll get back at it tomorrow as you know, not a lot of days on football, right? You have Monday night, it’s just Tuesday, Wednesday, back at it on Thursday, NFL Thursday night football. We’ll talk about that tomorrow as well as look at the Broncos game against the Bengals and what they need to do better. So, we’ll get look get back at that tomorrow. Look a little bit at the Rockies as their season finishes up and baseball sets gets ready for a big big change in 2026. The robot umps, they’re finally coming. We’ll talk about that with Drew Krieman as well. Danny Billy is the man, the booth that makes all of it work, but we’re really doing it all for you. Thanks for tuning in anyway you do live or on recording. We appreciate it. We look back forward to getting back at it tomorrow with all of you. So for everybody here at Mile High Sports, I’m Sean Droar. Thanks for watching Mile High Sports today. Hey. Hey. Hey.
Ryan Blackburn joins the show as the Denver and the rest of the NBA get ready for training camp. Reacting to the placement of the Nuggets listed in ESPN’s Top 100.
Sean Payton can, and should, do a variety of things that will help Bo Nix develop into the franchise QB he can be.
Justin Adams joins the show to diagnose why the Broncos can’t win close games. Also, what does the Buffs’ play against Wyoming mean for their upcoming schedule.
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