Former Denver Broncos running back C.J. Anderson is now the head football coach at Benicia High School in California. Anderson was part of Denver’s Super Bowl 50 championship team, and he sees many parallels to this year’s 11-2 squad.
Believe it or not, Anderson told The Denver Post’s Sean Keeler that the 2025 Broncos are “probably better” than the 2015 team was on offense. Peyton Manning quarterbacked the 2015 Broncos, but that team’s offense wasn’t the ‘Star Wars’ unit of the preceding three years.
The model Sean Payton has put in place this year has Super Bowl 50 alumni thinking back to the team’s last World Championship squad, and Anderson is the latest to draw the comparison.
“They take care of the football. They move the ball. They’re scoring,” Anderson told Keeler. “They’re converting third downs. They play great on defense. That was our formula to winning the Super Bowl. And that’s the same thing from them now.”
Media Disrespect? Check
Feb 7, 2016; Santa Clara, CA, USA; Denver Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning (18) hoists the Vince Lombardi Trophy after beat the Carolina Panthers in Super Bowl 50 at Levi’s Stadium. | Matthew Emmons-Imagn Images
Anderson also pointed to the national press’s relative disrespect for the 2025 Broncos. Back in 2015, he and his teammates heard similar things throughout the season, especially concerns about Manning’s age.
Yet, the 2015 Broncos won the No. 1 playoff seed in the AFC, beat the Pittsburgh Steelers and New England Patriots in the playoffs, advanced to the Super Bowl as underdogs, and vanquished Cam Newton and the Carolina Panthers rather convincingly (24-10).
Enter the Packers
One of the turning-point games of the 2015 season was Week 8 vs. the Green Bay Packers. The Broncos hosted Aaron Rodgers and company, and absolutely manhandled them 29-10.
More than a decade later, the Packers are on their way back to Mile High, this time for a Week 15 showdown with the Bo Nix-led Broncos. Anderson views this week’s tilt with the Packers as a “big, big game.”
Adding to the uncanny similarities to the 2015 season, the Super Bowl this year will be played at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, CA, where the Broncos hoisted the Lombardi Trophy, and then-GM John Elway proclaimed, “This one’s for Pat!”
If the 2025 Broncos are able to go the distance and even make it to the Super Bowl to compete at Levi’s Stadium, it will feel like we’re living in the Twilight Zone. But Stranger Things have happened, and it is the NFL.
Fuel For the Fire
History has a way of repeating itself. Despite being 11-2 and in possession of the No. 1 playoff seed, the Broncos aren’t viewed nationally as a top two or three team. Some media power rankings even have them as low as 10th, with seven-loss teams like the Kansas City Chiefs ahead of the Broncos.
As farcical as that is, the reality is, the Broncos aren’t blowing out all opponents — with the exception of the Cincinnati Bengals and Dallas Cowboys. Although the Broncos have won 10 straight, most of them have been one-score games, including last week’s victory over the Las Vegas Raiders, though the box score in that one makes it look a lot closer than it was.
The Broncos keep winning, even though it isn’t always pretty, but the national press is entirely unconvinced in this team’s outlook. Let them hate. Let the Broncos continue to fly under the radar.
It’s just more fuel for the fire. This week’s game against the Packers presents the Broncos with the opportunity to tie the 2012 squad’s 11-game winning streak.
At 9-3-1, Green Bay is playing great ball. But this is the same team that tied with the Cowboys, whom the Broncos absolutely decimated in Week 8 in all phases.
The Packers are highly motivated this week, with the Chicago Bears at 9-4 and the Detroit Lions at 8-5. The NFC North crown is still up for grabs, and the Packers need a win to maintain their position atop the division.
Meanwhile, the Broncos have a two-game lead over the 9-4 Los Angeles Chargers in the AFC West, a team that refuses to go quietly into that good night as the Chiefs have done. This isn’t exactly a must-win game for the Broncos, relative to the division, but if they want to maintain their edge in the tiebreaker over the 11-2 New England Patriots, they’ll need to prevail.
We’ll see how it shakes out. As the 2025 season marches down the stretch, Broncos Country might be treated to even more reminders of the 2015 team.
However, there’s only one way the 2025 Broncos can put themselves in the same conversation as the Super Bowl 50 champs. Best not to count those chicks before they’ve hatched, though.
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