Gary Kubiak: I probably shouldn't have played Peyton Manning

Gary Kubiak, on why QB Brock Osweiler replaced QB Peyton Manning in the second half

"To be honest with you, I was protecting him because I was worried about him. Let me just say this, I am obviously very disappointed in the NFL game. Give Kansas City credit. They played a great football game. [Chiefs Head Coach] Andy [Reid] had them ready to go. I'm disappointed in myself. This is on me. I probably should have made a decision not to play him in the game and the reason, I needed to make that, probably, a tough decision there. He practiced Friday, felt good, came out of practice Friday and Saturday, as you all know, his ribs were bothering him a little bit. I probably should have right there said, ‘No, he's not going to go this week.' But he's a competitor. He wanted to play. [CB] Aqib [Talib] was out. [OLB] DeMarcus [Ware] was out. He wanted to go. He felt like he could go, but I'm disappointed in myself because I probably should have made that decision yesterday and I didn't. It's on me."

Peyton Manning, on his health entering the game

"I have a really hard time using that as any type of excuse. I had some injuries during the week. Greek [Athletic Trainor Steve Antonopulos] and the training staff worked overtime to get me to feeling like I thought like I could go out there and play. Obviously you have to give a lot of feedback yourself, and I felt good enough to go out there and play. If you look back on it now, I have a hard time saying that's why I played badly. Could that be the reason? I guess it always could be. But to me, that's an easy way out. That's kind of an easy line to say after the fact. So I was very honest with Greek and coach Kubiak that I felt like I could go. I wanted to go, I wanted to be out there for the team. I did feel like we had some guys down, with Talib down and DeMarcus down, and weren't really sure Emmanuel was going to be able to play. So I wanted to be out there. I was as honest with them with the feedback as I could give them, and certainly did not play well and am disappointed about that."

Brock Osweiler, on if he expects to be the starter at quarterback going forward

"I don't. Right now, Peyton [Manning] is our quarterback. I could sit here and speak for everyone in the locker room and say: We all support him 100 percent. He's been one hell of a leader and a football player for this team for a lot of years. I stand 100 percent behind him and I do not expect to be the starter."

Emmanuel Sanders, on QB Peyton Manning being pulled

"At the end of the day, Peyton is one of those players that is going to bounce back. I know all week he's been battling injuries and been in the training room the whole time. That's no excuse and he's not going to let it be an excuse, but we just have to keep working. That's all I can say. It is what it is."

Demaryius Thomas, on the last two games being humbling

"Yeah, the past two games, we haven't played good. People are going to say what they want to say, but we've just got to get better back here. We, as a group of guys know what we've got to do to be back on the winning side."

Thanks to the Broncos for providing the transcripts from which these quotes were pulled.