Now that the Jay Culter saga is over, let’s take it back to 2005, prior to the season, we traded away our first round pick to Washington so they could select Jason Campbell (how ironic it would have been had we made the reported deal with DC?), in return we received Washington's 2006 first round selection. The Broncos had a good but not world-beating offense led by Jake Plummer, had a good but not world beating defense led by Champ Bailey. On any Sunday either side of the football could dominate a game, but mostly it was both sides of the ball playing well enough to lead to a whole lot of wins. 

When the 2006 draft rolled around, the Broncos had lost the AFC Championship game at home after taking down the previous season's Superbowl winning Patriots. We were in need of getting younger at a lot of positions, offense and defense. We also had 2 first round picks. We gave both of those up, plus a 3rd rounder to get up to #11 to grab QB Jay Cutler, even though Jake Plummer was the guy who led our team to within one game of the Superbowl.

How different would the last 3 years have been if we had made different decisions leading up to that draft? Would we have added key pieces to the defense so that it wouldn’t fall apart? Who knows, we could play "What If?" all day long, but never come up with an answer.

The next 2 drafts could go in a similar direction. We have 2 choices this year and next and a lot of people are thinking that we will take a QB with at least one of them, if not using them as ammunition to move up and grab The Next Big Thing. I'm willing to bet that won't happen. It might have were Shanahan still coach, he was never shy about moving up to get the guy he wanted - and I hope that Jarvis Moss still works out, but I'm not hopeful.

Josh McDaniels comes from a different style of acquiring players. The Patriots have had much success stockpiling picks and mostly building through the draft. We now have a whole lotta draft picks. The Patriots target guys that the rest of the league doesn't value as highly, specifically football smarts over athleticism. I don't know how Xanders, our GM, fits into that equation, but I suspect he's along the same lines given the turnover in the front office this year. I think Pat Bowlen has bought into "The Patriot Way" given their success.

I look for the Broncos to not make a lot of noise and buzz moving up in the draft, we may even trade down and get more (though I doubt it with 11? picks). No more reaching for "potential" or guys with "upside" early on.

Solid players and lots of them. We're building a complete team now, and for the long term.