By sticking with Trevor Siemian the Broncos have fully embraced the tank

On Monday, Denver Broncos head coach Vance Joseph came out and reaffirmed the teams commitment to Trevor Siemian as their starting quarterback over Brock Osweiler. And with that decision they have confirmed - to me at least - that the franchise is trying to tank the season as it looks ahead to 2018.

Why else would they continue to trot Siemian out there when he clearly is broken and unable to generate any kind of offense at this point. His confidence in himself is completely shot.

“I can’t speak to Trevor’s confidence,” Joseph said of Siemian’s confidence level. “I can say he has to play better. We had some missed throws yesterday, we had some missed reads and we had some plays that we missed that we had open. He has to make those plays for us, but I can’t speak to his confidence. Trevor, in my opinion, is a confident guy. He had a good week of work, so I can’t speak to that. Simply has to play better.”

Blah blah blah. That’s all I read. What else can Joseph say really? The season is lost and sticking with Siemian is a clear indication the franchise is tanking. I mean they are sticking with a guy who led the team to 3 points against a defense that had been giving up 35 points per game for the last five games.

As for the 2017 as a whole, who to blame? Blame John Elway and his front office. Many of us knew exactly what this team would look like with Siemian under center. It would look like the inept offense it had late in 2016 when NFL defenses had completely figured out Siemian’s strengths and weaknesses. It’s a topic we blogged about. It’s a topic we did film breakdowns about. It’s a topic we argued in the comments about. The hype just never justified the talent.

Instead, Elway’s hubris was on full display earlier this season as he apparently assumed Paxton Lynch would win the job easily. Frankly, I was convinced Siemian would win the job. Why? Because playing football is a heck of a lot easier when every play is scripted to perfection and the quarterback can never be hit. In those controlled environments, Lynch never stood a chance.

So here we are, two years wasted with quarterbacks that haven’t been worthy of a starting job in the NFL and a championship caliber defense that has seen its window closed. In fact, this team is probably two more years away from competitive football. Thank the Duke of Denver for that one.

Expect big changes next year - at least this fan sure hopes so.