The Miami Loss Fallout

I am concerned with Cutler’s play and attitude. I hope you are right with respect to Marshall’s comments causing Cutler to pull his head out and start playing up to his capability. If that doesn’t happen Thursday, well let’s just say things won’t look good.

I was disappointed with Torain’s debut. I think it was more the Dolphins defensive scheme and the lack of decent run blocking, but I honestly expected more. I was hoping Shanny would give him a second carry down on the goal line.

I wonder if this team could be imploding right now. In fact, I may not pick Denver this week. Sometimes a fan must hit rock bottom before they too can begin to regain their confidence in the team. And right now, I have more confidence in the Browns ability to score(27 again the Ravens stout defense) than I do with the Broncos ability to score.

Great post though, brought me back from the edge of the abyss there….

I have no gauge for this team right now. I’m not sure if they have hit rock bottom, or will slingshot like you say. Much of the mystery depends on injuries and confidence. Over the next two weeks, we’ll get some guys back and have to do without others. I believe getting Sheffler and Young back on offense should help Jay’s confidence, and losing DJ on defense could shatter the confidence of the already fragile D.

On offense, Selvin must return in the next two weeks. Pittman did not look like he had a whole lot in the tank, Torrian looked like he had not played in over a year, and Hall is not the guy. Adding Selvin to the mix will help tremendously. Sheffler is even more important. He has been Cutler’s favorite target in his short career, and his absence leaves a major hole in the offense and removes a comfortable safety blanket for Jay.

Selvin and Scheffler’s return coupled with the humility that goes along with poor performances, will help Jay in the second half. I totally agree that he was reading his press clippings, it would be hard not to. Let’s just hope he’s mature enough to read them now.

This already poor defense is now decimated by injury. However, there are signs of promise, especially the D-line. Thomas continues to improve. D Rob was causing some trouble up the middle yesterday as well. Kenny Peterson is solid depth. Ek is putting together a great year for himself. Moss made some great plays yesterday and continues to improve greatly. DOOM played to his expected level of excellence. I like what I see up front.

Linebacker and secondary must be keeping Shanny up at night. On the bright side, it will be great to get some youth out there and see what happens. As Nick pointed out, Hillis was huge yesterday, but will Larson or Woodyard step up in a similar fashion? I hope so. On the dark side, losing DJ is a massive blow. It was unsettling yesterday seeing Woodyard and Green out there as Pennington brought his team to the line on that long third down. WW blitzed and was eaten-up by a tackle, and Green gave up the huge play. Man I wish Boss was able to stay healthy. I thought he played great while in there.

The JMFW demotion is confusing to me, but I’d like to see him out there as well. I was thrilled to see Paymah make a big play. I don’t know much about x’s and o’s, but it seems to me that what Nick said was right on. It’s hard for me to blame Paymah for playing soft when that seems to be the coach’s call, but what do I know.

Bottom line is, the division is inconsistent (hell, the entire AFC is inconsistent), and barring complete implosion, this team still has a shot at the crown and the home playoff game that comes with it. The next two weeks are critical. If we lose both, I fear complete implosion and 5-11 are a real possibility. However, if we win just one of the games (I’d give this team a 25% chance in each game) and get some momentum with OAK (75% win chance), NYJ (50/50), and KC (75%) to follow, this team may survive. It shall be interesting.

I totally agree, I just wish that the injury bug went away. As every week i will still think my Broncos will dominate. They have it in them to be a great team. .. Wow, watching hillis was insane. What an athlete.. There was a lot in that game to very happy about, I just hate loosing.

Despite some sloppy play by the offense and the questionable defensive coverage schemes we continue to employ, there were positives from this ugly, ugly game.

Eddie Royal was clutch. The offensive line did another good job of blocking on passing downs (although run blocking remains an issue), Peyton Hillis is looking awfully good for a seventh round pick, and the defense did hold up their end for most of the game.

I think the Fins stand as a good contrast to the Broncos. They’re a 4-4 team that was 1-15 last year so almost anything they accomplish this year is an improvement. They are in full rebuilding mode but they know it. They play hard, they take nothing for granted and although they are still in my view a very average team, they take advantage of opportunities more often than not and that’s what gets them wins.

They take care of business, plain and simple.

The Broncos are a team still in rebuilding mode that continues to have delusions of playoff contention. Perhaps they can and will be a contender this year but in my view Denver needs to shelve talk of playoffs, of Super Bowl runs and focus on the little things. Fundamentals. Make tackles, checkdowns, hit your gaps, do the little things individually that contribute to the team effort and take care of business.

Right now the Broncos seem to be looking down the road at what they hope to accomplish overall and not at what is in front of them which is the individual task at hand, one play at a time.

There’s enough talent on this team to be above average this year, but not with the lack of focus and execution we’re seeing right now. Denver is a couple of drafts away from being a serious contender but as the Dolphins have shown us, regardless of the level of talent on your team what it all comes down to is execution.

An average or poor team that executes has a better chance to win every week than a good team that doesn’t.

I hope you are right about rock bottom. I thought our defense did a great job yesterday. When you think about it, without Royal’s return, we could have easily been down 28-zip rather than 13-3.

I hope Jay gets his act straightened out—his tendancy to focus on one reciever is disturbing—maybe a shaded eye guard would help—no easy answer here.

Its about time we got Hillis involved—what a great performance.

and once again—Great Post!!

But if he’s going to stay at FB, let’s put Hillis at RB.

Just curious – what was the “simple task” your DI’s kept making you do over again?

I disagree only on two points:

1) This isn’t exactly rock bottom, but it IS a moment of truth. From a gamePLAY perspective, this offense needs to get really simple really fast. We can’t run, and we won’t start winning until we can. Bottom line. The moment of truth is that the rest of the league knows this now, unlike the first 3-4 weeks, and now Shanny can’t hide it anymore. Somehow, somebody needs to get it done in the Broncos backfield. Whether that is playing through an injury or setting a record for learning how to contribute, this is on the shoulders of whoever lines up behind Cutler. From a gamePLANNING perspective, this team needs to reach new levels of creativity on offense, because they need to create opportunities for the running game from the most unlikely set of circumstances. Also on defense, they will probably end up getting away from the big cushions by the corners, since DJs injury means that they won’t have the speed and recognition underneath for it to work (and yes, it did work, but only at the beginning of games).

2)Cutler regressing. Cutler is doing fine, when you consider two points: the first is that he no longer has a running game, so even if the the defense isn’t bringing pressure (like MIA selling out to stop the run) the DBs don’t have to worry about run support. He is getting tons of looks from secondaries who only have to gameplan one thing, confusing Cutler. The second point to keep in mind is that at the beginning of the year teams feared the POSSIBILITY of a running game (even though one never materialized) and as a result of creative scheming (such as only requiring Cutler to read half the field) Cutler looked awesome. Remember how surprised we were in teh oakland game that he was THAT good? I mean, we knew he was getting better, but that performance seemed like too much to ask for. Well, it was. It was a result of scheming. Now that teams aren’t fooled by our pseudo-running game, Cutler has been asked to do more with less, and as a result he is forcing things, misreading coverages, locking in on receivers… basically the things that a second year player will do. He still has a couple of weeks before he is “officially” in year three under Shanahan, and that number isn’t a perfect number, but I expect that by the end of the year the things that are going on in the secondary will start becoming old hat to him. Remember that he is seeing things he has never seen before each week. That won’t last forever, and is the biggest reason it takes a few years for QBs to mature in the NFL.

So, as games go on this year, INTs will decrease and the running game will get more effective (hard not to be better than 14 total yards.) The more conservatively the offense plays right now the better, because Cutler simply needs to be protected while this is happening.

Boot camp was a hard time, mine was a little shorter than yours, but it still instilled whart I am today. Glad it worked for you, my son was changed after he left MCRD SD.
Now please tell me where Marshall called out JC. I have not heard that.
IMO JC’s problem is he is focusing on #15 too much. He heeds to look for the Eddies more and ever Graham, who should be used more. The run game is hurting because of the fumbles and picks. I am still hopefull on this team. The Defense stepped up yesterday and I hope they can keep it up. I would like Sahnny to take over the playcalling. Looks like teams have figured out bates. Also we have to remember JC has not even started 32 games yet. He is still learning. Sure I am upset about the picks, but it will drop as the running game improves. No great QB has ever been overly successfull without some sort of running game to offset the pressure without one. Dan Fouts last 3-4 seasons he was not very good because SD hhad not running game. Phyllis right now is having a good season cuz the threat of LT, who in Denver;s backfield scares other teams right now. I hope it becomes RT, but we will see. Well the 1st half is over. 4-4 is good. Maybe the realistally 4-4 is right on track. There are still 8 games to go. It starts Thursday. Denver controls its fate. On paper the schedule could be daunting. But they have to play sound football. This team is not good enough right now to overcome -3 in the turnover dept, soon they will be,
Sorry for being allover the place. I feel a lot better about this team today than I did 2 weeks ago.

BTW: Did anyone hear Joey Porter call out Marshall, calling him a quitter. I didnt see the game and listened to in on KOA, Porter claimed they got into Marshalls kitchen and he quit. If anyone who watched the game can tell me if it Porter being the POS he is, or is there truth to it?

Good work. I thought that 41-7 would be somewhat of a “bottom” for this team. We obviously had one more layer to go. I hope there are not too many. The poor drafts of the early part of the century are really starting to hurt us.

Percieved attitude problems arising from frustration…check
Inability to do the basics (run the ball, tackle, be in position)…check
Losing games that should be gimmes for an above average team…check
Best players on your team consistently moping…check
Players making excuses after every game…check
Coach seems exasperated with his team…check
Huge, diasterous problems in every phase…check
Lack of competitive games…check
No direction on offense or defense…check
Inability to do anyting consistently…check
Lack of any rhythm…check
Lack of depth…check
Abundance of injuries…check

Look, I am the biggest optimist ever when it comes to the Broncos, but let them be what they are. They are an immature, young team with no depth. The Broncos suddenly reek of a team that is unprepared and overmatched on a very consistent basis. I think the coach is going to take some serious heat if he can’t get his players to change the way they are playing. There is a serious attitude issue on both sides of the ball, but moreso on offense. Brandon Marshall was seen as complaining about the defense (specifically Paymah’s alignment), and rightly so, but he’s acting like what people that don’t want to see him succeed expect him to act like, no matter how dead-on correct he was about Paymah. Cutler needs to take responsibility and play and act like the best paid guy on the team. He’s acting like a petulant child. He is acting like a “kid” when the team neads a him to act like a “man”. The offensive line (that isn’t a run-blocking line) combined with the general lack of talent at running back is trulky killing the offense and isn’t helping the passing game at all. Because the opposing defense dosn’t have to worry about giving up big runs, they simply sit back and wait for Kid Cutler to get impatient. Like the past few seasons, Denver has started the “slow-fade” process, but this time I think that the ramifications fo such a poor finish will be far more servere. This team and their attitude has become a running joke to their opponents. Looking at the schedule, I see 2 wins: Oakland and KC. 6-10 is realistic. 10-6 or even 9-7 is not. 8-8 is the best case scenario and that’s a strectch.

The Broncos were at the ‘dark side of the moon" after the JAX and NE game and if they were going to ’slingshot back’ should have already done it.

At least the Nuggets made a blockbuster trade today to give me something else to think about. However as an announcer said during the Nugs playoff run last year, “if it’s this time of year and we’re still talking about how the Nuggets need to step it up on defense then at some point you have to acknowledge that that’s probably not going to happen”. Unfortunately I’m starting to feel that way about the Broncos this season.

As far as Tony Scheffler making the impact difference to turn things around, I don’t think so. This has less to do with Cutler not having enough weapons and more to do with the fact that Cutler is having a Sophomore slump. Cutler can, at times, give you the impression of a wily old veteran but the fact remains, he is a 24 year old kid who is learning to play football in the National Football League. Jay Cutler is going to be great in this league, but we must all suffer with him through these early years of struggle. He will succeed and he will be a better quarterback because of these early years. Other than that, the fortunes of this team rests squarely on the shoulders of Jay Cutler. We go only as far as his learning curve.

Here is some interesting stats for you:

Through John Elway’s first 29 games, he was 19-10 behind one of the most vaunted defenses in the NFL. Cutler is a wholly average 13-16 behind one of the most porous defenses statistically in NFL history. That is ultimately the stat that hurts the most, but there are some bright spots to look at. In Elway’s first 29 games, his completion percentage was a JaMarcus Russell-like 52, while Cutler gunslinging at 62. Elway only had THREE seasons in which he completed over 60% of his passes, Cutler finished last season over 60% and is on pace to do so again this season. Not only that, Cutler’s TD to INT ratio after 29 games is 44-29. Not bad. Elway was loose with ball security with a TD to INT ratio of 37-37. This includes yesterdays 3 INT debacle. The bright side is Cutler is managing the game better than Elway did in his first 29 games. Though, after Elway finished 4-6 as a starter in 1983, he did not have a losing record as a starter again until 1990. I would hope to see the same kind of consistency in the future for Cutler.

I really am worried about us winning another game. The way we have played has been so disappointing. We WILL lose to the Raiders if we keep up this level of play. I have this sinking feeling that the teams on our schedule are actually looking forward to playing us.

I will bleed orange until the day I die.
I will always try to stay positive, but having a heck of a time with it now.

I expect us to finish 12-4!!!

WHEW. I feel better now.

First off, I agree Hillis and Royal each excelled and it was great to see a FB that was used as a weapon. To me, when it is all said and done in ten years, I think we will look back at the 2008 draft and Hillis will be the steal of that draft, this guy has skills that I haven’t seen since Tom Rathman. That being said, I predeicted a loss because of the simple fact our coaching stinks and that is what is dooming this team. Simple fact, much like the New England game, man to man, position to position, this team has as much if not more talent than New England, or Miami, Yes I know our defense doesn’t have the star power, but outside of Porter and Bell, who on the Miami team do you think is better than our guys? The fact is Shannan and this coaching staff is not getting the talent on this team to play to their abilities. Some may blame it on youth, and maybe there is something to that. But for a supposed QB coach and offenseive “mastermind” this offense has been playing so poorly we really have to question if anyone is actually listening to Shannan or if this team has become tired of the same old. On Defense, once again, we went soft zone and got decimated in the 4th quarter. Why Slowvik and company can’t see what works and what doesn’t is another failing.

Now it is half empty, and the pour on this particular season has just started, I’m afraid. 3-0 start. They have lost 4 of their last 5, and looked pretty horrible for the most part in doing so. Now they’ve even lost their yearly staple, the running game. And DJ Williams is out too? Holy cow, circle the wagons, if there are any left.

I see some building blocks for the future. But this season is toast. San Diego couldn’t possibly match the Bronco’s sucktitude the rest of the way, could they?

Just think of what I have to put up with over here in Nastyville Tn! Things like, “The Broncos need to watch our game film. Maybe then, they could learn to play defense.” Or, “When do you think Selvin Young is going to start working on that 2000 yard season he was talking about?” Or, “When are you guys going to get a goodQB coach? Cutler was better when He played for Vandy!”

Well, If I still lived in Denver then i wouldn’t have to put up with all this, but then, I would have to listen to a lot more Denver fans who are “down in the mouth.” At least around here there seems to be a realy positive attitude, for some reason. Not sure what that might be coming from. Oh ya. 8 -0. Funny how far a no loss season will take the fans!

I totally agree with you. I voted yes because over the past three games I have not seen any improvement from the offense.

It is interesting that before the season started the question mark was on the defense and now it is on the offense. Something needs to be done to shake this team up. As Guru said in his show on gimick plays. Maybe we need to try a couple on Thursday if we find ourselves in a position to just the Browns for a loop. I am not expecting it all the time just every now and then.

with Cutler is eagerness. He is dying to show off his “stronger than Elway, hands down” arm and he wants to show how good he is. He is pressing the envelope with his talent, sort of getting ahead of himself. He needs to slow it down and just go over the little things like getting on page with your recievers. Bates Jr. needs to stay away from the down and out, the film on Denver is obvious when they are going to throw that and it is getting jumped often.

agreed we drafted him for the return game, and the play in the last game was huge. but remember why eddie was hurt for a few games, and we had no #2 receiver? he had his clock cleaned on a punt return. knocked him out of the game. several games, really. so do you put him in at returner, or try to keep him healthy at receiver for the next 8+ games? difficult decision. i say you put him back there only when we trail or really need a big return. i don’t see him staying healthy any other way. down the stretch, use him everywhere if we need the game to make the playoffs. my take, anyway