{"id":836543,"date":"2026-09-16T11:00:18","date_gmt":"2026-09-16T11:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/836543\/"},"modified":"2026-09-16T11:00:18","modified_gmt":"2026-09-16T11:00:18","slug":"how-do-broncos-plan-to-rebound-from-slap-in-the-face-loss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/836543\/","title":{"rendered":"How do Broncos plan to rebound from ‘slap in the face’ loss?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pick your grisly descriptor and the Broncos probably covered it somewhere in the aftermath of their season-opening, 31-10 loss at Kansas City<\/a> on Monday night.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn\u2019t play well enough, we didn\u2019t execute well enough and that\u2019s how you get your (expletive) kicked in the NFL,\u201d right tackle Mike McGlinchey said in the locker room.<\/p>\n

All-Pro cornerback Pat Surtain II said the Broncos \u201cneeded some humble pie, for sure\u201d and suggested that perhaps his team was overconfident heading into the regular season.<\/p>\n

Quarterback Bo Nix called the blowout loss to a division rival a \u201cnasty wake-up call.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

By the time Tuesday morning bled into early afternoon and head coach Sean Payton held a conference call with reporters an hour after it was originally scheduled, he and the coaching staff had taken a long look at the 21-point loss and also been over it with the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cCertainly a slap in the face,\u201d Payton said. \u201cWhen you come off training camp and your offseason program, it\u2019s one thing to lose in a hard-fought game where you feel like you played well. I don\u2019t feel like we played up to our standard, and certainly that starts with us as coaches, myself.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo yes, it\u2019s disappointing. That would be a great way to describe it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Payton, according to tight end Adam Trautman, told the Broncos in the locker room after the game that the key to moving on quickly was to flush the loss, not erase it. The veteran head coach is adamant about feeling the sting and working through all of the problems the day after the game, no matter how much material there is to slog through or how unpleasant that process may be.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to have that honest day where you come in as coaches,\u201d Payton said. \u201cWe first meet and we go through everything and discuss what are the things we would\u2019ve done differently? Then you have to have that\u2026 I know it\u2019s a shorter week, but there\u2019s no way we can get past today without looking at the tape and looking at the things that we have to improve on before we even play the next opponent.\u201d<\/p>\n

All-Pro defensive tackle Zach Allen said he thought that process went well Tuesday, calling it \u201ca really productive film today\u201d and that \u201cfor everybody the mood is that everybody is excited to get back to work and to get back to the practice field.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201c(The game) definitely wasn\u2019t up to our standard and it\u2019s been addressed,\u201d Allen added. \u201cWe\u2019ve bounced back from bad losses the past few years. We play a really good Jacksonville this week and that\u2019s going to be its own challenge.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s where we made the corrections in the tape and now we\u2019re on to Jacksonville on a short week. It\u2019s going to be tough, but we\u2019re excited for the challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even with a short trip back from Kansas City, the Broncos\u2019 charter didn\u2019t land in Denver until after 1 a.m. Tuesday. Players came in for treatment like usual the morning after the game, but unlike some short weeks, the Broncos are also planning on Wednesday being the players\u2019 off day before practicing Thursday and Friday, then ramping up Saturday for the Jaguars on Sunday afternoon at Empower Field.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously, your ego takes a hit in a game like last night; the whole team\u2019s ego takes a hit,\u201d McGlinchey said Tuesday on a conference call with reporters. \u201cBut when you can take out the emotion and the expectations of what we wanted to do vs. what we did, you can see it from a clear lens of why the mistakes were made, what situations did we put ourselves in, and how do we not put ourselves in those positions going forward? \u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cFlush the feelings that you have today, flush the embarrassment, flush all that stuff and just get on to the task at hand and take it at face value, which is that we have a job to do and we have to figure out how to do that job well.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lil\u2019Jordan Humphrey is back on the Broncos\u2019 53-man roster<\/p>\n

The Broncos re-signed wide receiver Lil\u2019Jordan Humphrey to their 53-man roster on Tuesday in an expected move.<\/p>\n

Denver cut Humphrey<\/a>, a vested veteran, Monday before the game but planned then, as The Post reported, to bring him back to the 53-man roster.<\/p>\n

The move was procedural and kept Humphrey\u2019s base salary from becoming guaranteed. It leaves the team with flexibility to move him to the practice squad if needed later in the season, though sources indicated on Monday that Denver\u2019s plan is for Humphrey to be on the 53-man roster going forward.<\/p>\n

The Broncos didn\u2019t have to make a corresponding move because they didn\u2019t promote anybody on Monday when they cut Humphrey.<\/p>\n

Want more Broncos news? Sign up for the Broncos Insider to get all our NFL analysis.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pick your grisly descriptor and the Broncos probably covered it somewhere in the aftermath of their season-opening, 31-10…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":836544,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3781],"tags":[45587,7,10148,2858,301,2863,187,3943,165,29260,6324,6,9,302,20405,8131,66,42244],"class_list":["post-836543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-denver-nuggets","tag-adam-trautman","tag-basketball","tag-bo-nix","tag-broncos","tag-denver","tag-denver-broncos","tag-denver-nuggets","tag-denvernuggets","tag-latest-headlines","tag-mike-mcglinchey","tag-more-broncos-news","tag-nba","tag-nfl","tag-nuggets","tag-pat-surtain-ii","tag-sean-payton","tag-sports","tag-zach-allen"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/117280376340668421","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=836543"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836543\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/836544"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=836543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=836543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=836543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}