Can we cut Rich Scangarello some slack for crying out loud?

One of the most disturbing trends I’m hearing from our fanbase is resentment at Rich Scangarello’s offense.

Honestly, Broncos Country?

We started the season with the 2nd coming of Peyton Manning in Joe Flacco only to find out that he’s kind of a dud (which had you listened to my take on Joe Flacco dating back at least a decade I could have told you).

Hang on that thought for a moment. All offseason, training camp, and in every preseason game the only thing we heard from Dove Valley was that Joe Flacco was everything you want in a NFL quarterback and a bag of chips. So that means all of the offensive design, all of the practice, all of the repetitions, and all of the work the Broncos did was geared toward the limited ability of Joe Flacco who is about as mobile as Peyton Manning circa 2015.

Then you switch to backup Brandon Allen who is just that: a backup. And now we’re on to our third QB of the year in Drew Lock.

Let’s then turn our attention to our receiving weapons (since I think we can all see that the talent at RB is definitely adequate). We have a super star in Courtland Sutton who is now getting double teamed every play because he’s the only stud we have catching passes. Where’s the 2nd WR? Emmanuel Sanders left. There’s been no guy stepping up and making a real dent there. Where’s the stud TE? I know Noah Fant has been showing promise, but he’s not at the level yet to be a consistent game changer for the offense.

Now add to your thinking that our offensive line is no where near being a top 10 NFL offensive line. I’ve said a few times that I feel like we’re 3 starters away from a legitimate line. And this isn’t just to make the passing game work. Our run game can be blocked better too. All of this goes into making the offense hum and until you have your trench manned with some big nasties ready to eat Tom Brady’s children for breakfast or a top tier NFL QB who can make up for a lack of said big nasties, your offense isn’t going to be kicking on all cylinders.

Let me just say the actual play design we’ve seen from Scangarello this year is light years ahead of anything we’ve seen from the Broncos offense since around 2013. I do think it is fair to say he needs to figure out how to be more aggressive in the 2nd half, but until the offense gets some more of the pieces it needs, it is a really hard thing to say, “Hey, let’s go pass the ball on this team when they know the only real target we have is Sutton.”

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