Good morning, Broncos Country!<\/p>\n
Sean Payton made the media rounds while at the NFL Combine this past week, checking in with Rich Eisen and Pat McAfee, among others.<\/p>\n
And amid the funny stories from past teams, he offered a few insights into his mindset this offseason \u2014 primarily that nothing is guaranteed and this Broncos team, as successful as it was in 2025, is starting over.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s like freaking Chutes & Ladders. The table gets flipped up, dice get put away, you open back up and start at zero,\u201c Payton told McAfee. \u201cYou start the journey again.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are a young team, one of the younger teams in the NFL, and a lot of guys played earlier than expected. And that significant time is going to help.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2014 – SEAN PAYTON<\/p>\n
But this time the Broncos are starting without a huge cap hit, giving Payton and his GM some breathing room as free agency is just around the corner.<\/p>\n
And Denver certainly has some gaps to fill.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are a young team, one of the younger teams in the NFL, and a lot of guys played earlier than expected,\u201d Payton noted. \u201cAnd that significant time is going to help.\u201d<\/p>\n
Still, that doesn\u2019t mean Payton isn\u2019t looking intently at a few key positions. He pointed out that once you take away your own free agents \u2014 which this season includes running back RK Dobbins, and inside linebackers Justin Strnad and Alex Singleton \u2014 a roster can look a little thin.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think when you remove your own free agents, often you go, \u2018holy cow, we are thin here.\u2019\u201d Payton told McAfee.<\/p>\n
Payton categorizes roster holes according to \u201cmusts,\u201d \u201cneeds,\u201d and \u201cwants.\u201d He likes filling the musts through free agency as much as possible so he can head into the draft free to get the best player available in the first rounds, and aim for players that fit the team\u2019s vision as well as needs in the middle rounds.<\/p>\n
With both Strnad and Singleton entering free agency, inside linebacker is definitely a position Payton has his eye on. And George Paton seems poised to try and keep them.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe see those guys as Broncos,\u201d the GM said in the Combine presser. \u201cIf we let those guys leave, what are we doing? Those are good dudes, and that doesn\u2019t mean we can get them. Everyone is watching tape. You look at both. When you are getting your plan for free agency, you look at the draft \u2014 \u2018Where it\u2019s strong there? OK, maybe it\u2019s strong at receiver.\u2019 It is a balance and you do develop your plan, so it is a good question. With some players, you just want to get back regardless of the strength.\u201d<\/p>\n
As the Broncos\u2019 brass spend the next few months locked in on finding new players and piecing together a stronger roster, Payton wants his current players to get away from football as much as they can before getting back to the grind \u2014 and starting over.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou want a gap. They need that, and we need that,\u201d Payton said, referring to time away from the building, away from training, away from football altogether. Even when guys are back to lifting and working out at the facility, Payton wants conversations to be about their families, how much weight they\u2019re lifting now or vacations. \u201cWhen they join us again, I don\u2019t want anyone talking about football.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Good morning, Broncos Country! Sean Payton made the media rounds while at the NFL Combine this past week,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":788893,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2062],"tags":[232,231,258,1151,2426,7,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-788892","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-denver-broncos","8":"tag-broncos","9":"tag-denver","10":"tag-denver-broncos","11":"tag-denver-broncos-news","12":"tag-denverbroncos","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116165046965796018","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/788892","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=788892"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/788892\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/788893"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=788892"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=788892"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=788892"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}