Take away quarterback Bo Nix\u2019s 12 runs \u2013 most of them scrambles \u2013 and Broncos running backs RJ Harvey and Jaleel McLaughlin only rushed 10 times for 41 yards.<\/p>\n
ENGLEWOOD, Colo. \u2014 Sean Payton went into the playoff game against the Buffalo Bills with the intent of his Broncos\u2019 running the ball.<\/p>\n
The Bills were No. 28 in defending the run this season; No. 1 against the pass.<\/p>\n
The Broncos\u2019 attack didn\u2019t go as planned. Take away quarterback Bo Nix\u2019s 12 runs \u2013 most of them scrambles \u2013 and Broncos running backs RJ Harvey and Jaleel McLaughlin only rushed 10 times for 41 yards. Nix threw the ball a whopping 46 times.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, we just won the game,\u2019\u2019 Payton said sarcastically when asked about his lack of running game in a 33-30 overtime win in a Divisional Round playoff game. \u201cThere was a lot of talk how\u2014games unfold differently. Look, the first running play of the game for Buffalo went for 24 yards. I\u2019ll write it on the script for you today again, so that it\u2019s a reminder. The key is understanding how to win that game and then understanding how to adjust.\u201d<\/p>\n
With Nix hurt and the Broncos promoting backup quarterback Jarrett Stidham to start Sunday in the AFC Championship Game against the New England Patriots and their formidable defense, won\u2019t running the ball be important to the plan this week? Don\u2019t know because Payton cut off the question before it could be asked.<\/p>\n
Run the ball or not, Payton in his thought-veering way, said he believes Stidham can do the job Sunday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a calmness about him when \u2026 Now, I\u2019m not making a comparison, and yet I\u2019ll read 50 stories that I compared this player to Mark Brunell,\u2019\u2019 Payton said about the lefty quarterback who was his backup quarterback in New Orleans in 2008-09. \u201cI just can\u2019t help it. I\u2019m not making the comparison, but Brunell had this calmness about him when he was our [No.] 2. He\u2019d step in the huddle …<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s why I loved back in the day when the backup quarterbacks were the holders. They were the last ones to talk to the kickers. You could fake a field goal, and then at some point, the special teams coaches had a coup, and they said, \u2018Well, the punters get more time to work with them.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cBut Brunell just had that moxie, and so if it wasn\u2019t your starter and he stepped in, there was this smooth operation. I would say Stidham has that ability to step right in, calm things down, here\u2019s what we\u2019re doing, break the huddle. Yesterday\u2019s practice was a perfect indication of it. The key was making sure, and I said this offensively, let\u2019s not assume. \u2026 The cadence is the cadence, but one beat off, and we could have a couple false starts, so focus on making sure… Typically, most teams in the league, as the starter gets ingrained in his cadence, it\u2019s the others that begin to emulate it identically. We\u2019ve seen that passed down through the years. Just think about (Brett) Farve and the gun, and the foot forward, and how he stood, and then all of a sudden you started seeing the exact from (Aaron) Rodgers, and then you see the exact from their quarterback now (Jordan Love).<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s interesting when you see certain traits like that, that may be not\u2014like we\u2019re not talking about throwing traits\u2014but from a cadence standpoint, all of that was smooth yesterday.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Take away quarterback Bo Nix\u2019s 12 runs \u2013 most of them scrambles \u2013 and Broncos running backs RJ…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":697061,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2048],"tags":[215,214,53,2086,7,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-697060","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-buffalo-bills","8":"tag-bills","9":"tag-buffalo","10":"tag-buffalo-bills","11":"tag-buffalobills","12":"tag-football","13":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115940461450969223","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/697060","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=697060"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/697060\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/697061"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=697060"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=697060"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=697060"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}