On Sunday morning, several hours after he stood in the hallway of heartbreak at Empower Field, Broncos backup quarterback Jarrett Stidham called an old friend to process.
Josh Bulla has known Stidham since elementary school in Stephensville, Texas, when a young Bulla first noticed the kid who was a foot taller than everyone else. From that point, Bulla said, Stidham always knew he was headed for some greater destiny. Milestones came and went: he played college football at Baylor and Auburn, where he was a two-year starter , and got drafted by the Patriots in the fourth round in 2019. The final goal — become an NFL starting quarterback — came again on the night of Jan. 18, 2026.
Just not like this, Stidham told Bulla. .
He’d gotten his chances before. Two starts in 2022, when the Raiders benched Derek Carr. Two starts in 2023, when the Broncos benched Russell Wilson. Those were exciting. But Bo Nix breaking his ankle Saturday night, as Stidham told Bulla, was “gutting.”
“The first thing that came to mind,” Stidham said, as Bulla recalled, “was, ‘No.’”
“Like, this is Bo’s show.”
Over the past two years, Bo and Izzy Nix have become “like family” to Stidham and his wife, Kennedy, Bulla said. Nix’s second-year run ended shockingly after a divisional-round win over the Bills, and the emotions Stidham felt extend much deeper than his mentorship in Denver. In Stidham’s two years starting at Auburn, from 2017-18, he played a key role in recruiting Nix there.
It began as simple program ambassadorship, then-Auburn OC Chip Lindsay remembered. Stidham would talk to Nix and host him on visits. Eventually, though, Stidham started asking Lindsay how Nix did in his high school games. He knew that Nix was his successor, former Auburn wideout Ryan Davis recalled.
“Jarrett was basically, like, giving him the keys,” Davis said.
Seven years later, Nix is giving them back. In an Instagram post on Wednesday — Nix’s first public statement since breaking his ankle — the Broncos’ starting QB offered a hat-tip, saying he “couldn’t be more confident in Jarrett.” Denver’s season now lies in the hands of Stidham, a career backup who has started four career games in six NFL seasons and hasn’t thrown a regular-season pass in two years.
Bo Nix (10) and Jarrett Stidham (8) of the Denver Broncos take the field before the game against the Las Vegas Raiders Empower Field at Mile High Stadium on Thursday, Nov. 6, 2025. (Photo by AAron Ontiveroz/The Denver Post)
Across this week’s preparation for the Patriots in Sunday’s AFC championship, Denver’s locker room has heaped praise on Stidham to anyone with a microphone. They have no other choice.
“He’s going to rip it,” head coach Sean Payton said Wednesday. “And that will be our approach.”
In Year 2 in Denver, Nix and Payton found synergy as the second-year quarterback praised Payton for letting him be his “authentic self.” These Broncos formed an identity around Nix, a fiery 25-year-old whose white-hot competitiveness fueled a season of second-half comebacks. They are now rallying around Stidham, a cool 29-year-old whose serenity masks his own fire.
Stidham has kept the same routine for three years in Denver, left tackle Garett Bolles said. He eats the same food. He drinks the same water. He hits the steam room at the same time. He listens to the same music, on a Turtlebox waterproof speaker that he affectionately refers to as “Mr. Turtle.”
Nothing has changed in this week of madness. Stidham is who he is because he knows who he is. That is comfort, as these Broncos head into a war.
“He got some swag,” Bolles said Thursday. “He got some swag to him. So, that fuels us all.”
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In 2023, 6-foot-4 safety JL Skinner arrived in Denver as a raw sixth-round pick out of Boise State. He took plenty of flak from Stidham, who’d just signed as a free agent and who had no more experience in Denver than Skinner.
Stidham wanted Skinner to be better. And he let him know about it. The QB chirped at him in practice.
Safety JL Skinner (34) of the Denver Broncos tackles wide receiver Deebo Samuel (1) of the Washington Commanders during a kick return on Sunday, Nov. 30, 2025, at Northwest Stadium in Landover, MD. (Photo by Timothy Hurst/The Denver Post)
“JL, what are you doing? What are you doing?”
“I’m like, ‘Man, (expletive) this guy,’” Skinner said Thursday.
“And then in my head,I’m like, (expletive), he’s actually throwing that ball right over my head, too. I gotta do something about it.”
He was born with that. The now 6-foot-3 Stidham played offensive line in Pee Wee football in Weatherford, Texas, because he was tall. Future high school coach Joe Gillespie introduced him to former SMU quarterback Kelan Luker for some training in middle school. The first time Luker worked with Stidham, he walked out to a field, saw him throw a few balls, and noticed the kid never missed.
Stidham had never played quarterback before. To this day, Luker maintains he never really taught him anything over the course of a few years.
“I think what really happened – he was so talented, he could just watch what I did,” Luker said, “and he could imitate.”
In Denver, QB3-turned-QB2 Sam Ehlinger notes that Stidham’s ball “spins really pretty.” The RPMs came naturally. So did unassuming athleticism, a trait that most every teammate or coach notes about Stidham. Underneath six years of backup life in the NFL is years of life as a five-star gem, the No. 1-ranked dual-threat quarterback in the class of 2015 (above Kyler Murray, Sam Bradford and Joe Burrow).
“He’s just one of those West Texas boys who grew up spinnin’ it,” said Palmer, a former NFL quarterback who’s trained Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes — and Nix.
Stidham’s story has been one of relentless pursuit toward a goal shifted around by strange timing. At 18 years old, he moved out of difficult circumstances in his family’s home and in with Matt and Katy Copeland, a couple in Stephensville who became family; Stidham and those close to him have never publicly discussed the reasons why. He played a year at Baylor in 2015, transferred out amid widespread fallout from the school’s sexual abuse scandal, and regrouped for a semester at a local community college.
After two years at Auburn, Stidham arrived in New England in 2019. It was Tom Brady’s last year; the Patriots were treating Stidham as “the next guy,” as Davis said, a former Auburn receiver who spent six months in New England’s training camp in 2019. Stidham picked Brady’s brain, and Brady once left three of his custom hoodies as a gift in Stidham’s locker. But the Patriots brought in former MVP Cam Newton two weeks before training camp the next year in 2020, and drafted Mac Jones in the first round in 2021, and shipped Stidham to Las Vegas in 2022 without ever starting him in a game.
Old habits die hard, Bulla recalled. Stidham grew up as the guy. He never stopped believing he could be. After signing in Denver, he got a taste of it late in 2023, when the Broncos benched Wilson. He lost the starting job to rookie Nix in 2024. Bulla asked Stidham how he was feeling heading into training camp this past summer, wedged squarely behind a young franchise face.
Jarrett Stidham (8) of the Denver Broncos rolls out as Jaylon Allen (76) of the San Francisco 49ers pressures during the third quarter at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California on Saturday, Aug. 9, 2025. (Photo by AAron Ontiveroz/The Denver Post)
“He’s like, ‘It’s the NFL,’” Bulla said . “‘Everyone’s talented. Crazy things can happen. And I still have to act the way I always have, and that I want to be the starter.’”
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In December 2017, Carson Wentz tore his ACL, and the 11-2 Philadelphia Eagles had to recalibrate around backup quarterback Nick Foles. Offensive coordinator Frank Reich set about watching the “Foles highlight reel,” as he dubbed it — cut-ups of every single Foles completion from five previous NFL seasons. He sat with Foles and had the quarterback walk him through some preferred concepts: a few post routes here, a deep ball there.
Outside the Xs and Os, though, Reich and the rest of the Eagles’ staff didn’t do much to try to control messaging to the team. They let Foles roam free as a personality. And Foles — whose confidence earned him a provocative nickname in Philadelphia — became legend across a Super Bowl run in the weeks to follow.
“If you’re trying to cover up what you perceive as some weakness, some leadership weakness of the backup quarterback, then you’re in trouble,” Reich said.
Reich, a former quarterback himself who once stepped in as a backup to Jim Kelly for multiple Buffalo Bills playoff runs in the 1990s, has taken an interest in Stidham’s particular situation in Denver. He’s watched clips of his interviews. He’s detected moxie.
“It seems like the kid’s a winner,” Reich said. “Like, he’s a winner. And everybody knows it.”
Emotion crested and fell in Denver in the span of a single hour after the Broncos’ 33-30 overtime win over Buffalo. Sean Payton went to a podium in street clothes, told reporters Nix was out for the season with a fractured ankle, and the Broncos’ locker room came away as stunned as the rest of the world. Offensive coordinator Joe Lombardi found out from his son, driving home from the stadium. Receiver Courtland Sutton literally didn’t believe it was true.
Bo Nix (10) of the Denver Broncos roars after throwing a touchdown pass to Marvin Mims Jr. (19) during the fourth quarter of the Broncos’ 33-30 overtime win over the Buffalo Bills at Empower Field at Mile High in Denver, Colorado on Saturday. (Photo by AAron Ontiveroz/The Denver Post)
Utter chaos has swirled around Stidham in the days since. The Copelands were deep in the woods of West Texas on a hunting trip, cracking open a few Coors Originals and playing cards, when they got the news he was starting. Friends have let Stidham know they’ll make it to Denver in any way possible for Sunday’s game. An entire fanbase has turned its social-media avatars to pictures of Stidham in a strange form of solidarity. This shot is “everything he’s ever dreamed for,” Bulla said.
Stidham has yet to flinch, in public or private.
“Is he getting sleep this week? I don’t know,” said Brian Hoyer, a longtime NFL backup who was with Stidham in New England in 2020 and 2021. “I talked to him (Tuesday). And either it hasn’t hit him yet and he doesn’t have any words, or he hid it really well.”
There is a “calmness” about Stidham, Payton said on Wednesday. There always has been. The most worked-up Bulla has ever seen Stidham — in a circumstance not involving family or football — was when Bulla pranked Stidham in high school by hotwiring his beat-up 1995 Chevy Silverado and hiding it in a different parking lot. On-field mistakes have always brought the same reaction, Palmer described: Aw, shucks, and move on.
These days, Stidham carries that “Mr. Turtle” speaker into the team shower on the daily, blasting an assortment of Kate Bush and Fleetwood Mac and country tunes. He has a rookie football card of cornerback Riley Moss pinned to the front of his locker, for some reason. He wore a full-body lion costume to the Broncos’ Halloween party in October.
“Every time I see him,” practice-squad receiver Elijah Moore said, “he’s playing music. I guess he’s just got the vibes on him. I love that.”
Stidham did not always present this way. Take it from Washington head coach Jedd Fisch, who coached New England’s quarterbacks in 2020.
“Really?” Fisch said, told the tale of Mr. Turtle. “He wasn’t like that. Yeah, I don’t remember. Maybe it’s because we were in the middle of COVID … I would not have guessed that one.”
The years have brought Stidham’s self-awareness outward, as he’s moved into a comfortable stage of life. Stidham and wife, Kennedy, welcomed their third child in October. When he and Bulla catch up these days, they spend roughly two minutes talking football and the rest figuring out “what the hell” to do in fatherhood, as Bulla put it.
“I see a direct correlation,” Palmer said. “When people have their personal lives figured out and then get put into the spotlight on a big stage, I see that go better for the guys that have their lives figured out …. I would say Jarrett’s about as stable as it gets, for a guy his age.
“There’s no reason to change,” Palmer continued. “There’s no reason to do it different. So I’m sure that Jarrett is going into this weekend with a lot of confidence that – he is enough.”
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Sean Payton, Skinner said, does not keep “bums” on his roster. Backups. Practice squad. Doesn’t matter.
Stidham was one of Payton’s first signings upon arriving in Denver in 2023, even as the Broncos already had Wilson. The organization made it a priority to bring Stidham back this past free agency, on a two-year deal worth $12 million. The money signals trust around the league. Moore — a 25-year-old receiver who’s now been on four NFL teams — said he’s heard of Stidham’s reputation in the past, before signing with the Broncos a month ago.
“Stiddy got signed back-to-back-to-back for a long time now,” Skinner said at his locker Thursday. “And nobody knows why, from the outside. But we know why, from the inside. Because that mother(expletive) can throw that goddamn rock.”
Payton believes Stidham’s inside the 32 best quarterbacks in the NFL. So does Patriots defensive play-caller Zak Kuhr, who told New England reporters Thursday that Stidham “could be a starter for a number of teams.” Stidham’s arm talent and sneaky mobility aren’t in question: quietly, he ran for a combined 84 yards in two starts for the Raiders in 2022.
Sean Payton called Jarrett Stidham a “real good foot athlete” today. Of note: Stidham ran for a combined 84 yards in the first two starts of his career with Las Vegas in ’22.
Here’s a first-down scramble against a top defense in the 49ers in ’22. Plus a ball-flick celebration. pic.twitter.com/YbCcUZHwK0
— Luca Evans (@bylucaevans) January 23, 2026
The major issue, heading into Sunday’s conference championship, is whether Stidham has enough between the ears to handle the “kitchen sink” that the Patriots’ defense throws at opposing quarterbacks, as Hoyer described. Under Kuhr, a swarming New England attack stumped Los Angeles’s Justin Herbert in the wild-card round and picked off Houston’s C.J. Stroud four times in the divisional round.
“They’re going to bring a lot of (expletive), and that’s where he has to rely on Sean Payton, and the preparation, and I’m sure there’s gonna be a lot of checks and – ‘When you see this look, you gotta get into this play or change the protection,’” Hoyer said.
The counter-move is that New England has no shred of Broncos tape on hand to prepare for Stidham. So, how does Denver design a gameplan around him in the span of a week?
Payton has made clear he sees Nix and Stidham as two different styles of quarterbacks. Others disagree. Stidham spent much of 2020 with Fisch studying tape of Jared Goff, and San Francisco’s Jimmy Garoppolo, and quarterbacks in West Coast systems with plenty of under-center looks. This Denver offense has shifted more in that direction across the second half of 2025, and Palmer and Hoyer don’t see Payton’s established system needing to change much from Nix to Stidham.
“When they can run the ball and throw the play-action game, he can reach anywhere on the field with the ball,” former Auburn OC Lindsey said. “And try to create some explosives off play-action – that would be the first thing that would come to my mind.”
On one hand, Stidham’s in a position where three weeks and a Super Bowl ring would forever change his life, Bulla said. On the other hand, friends and confidants don’t see Stidham stretching himself much for Sunday. Quarterbacks who finally receive their shot, as Palmer said, generally fall into one of two mental buckets. Some hope it’ll go well. Some think it should go well.
Stidham feels, Palmer said, that he should play well.
“When we win that game,” Skinner said, “what they gon’ say now? What they’ gon say now, you know what I mean. They gon’ say — ‘Stiddy this. Stiddy that.’
“Stiddy gon’ get a brand-new contract off this, bro,” he continued. “That’s how I’m looking at it, man. We riding out with Stiddy.”
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