Broncos currently hold the 12th overall pick after 11 games

According to Tankathon, the Denver Broncos are currently slated with the 12th overall pick in the 2021 NFL Draft. Despite five other teams with the same record, Denver has the second strongest strength of schedule in the NFL so far behind only the New York Jets which kills their tiebreakers.

The NFL essentially screwed any chance the Broncos might have had at making a run to .500 this season, so we might as well begin looking ahead to 2021. The strength of schedule thing is going to hurt the Broncos in the end, but looking over the schedule and the schedules of the teams ahead of them there is a good chance they can pull out a Top 5 pick this year.

They likely won’t catch the Jets or the Jacksonville Jaguars, so you can forget those. But let’s say the Broncos lose out, which is a distinct possibility given how the remaining schedule looks.

• at Kansas City Chiefs (9-1)
• at Carolina Panthers (4-8)
• vs Buffalo Bills (8-3)
• at Los Angeles Chargers (3-8)
• vs Las Vegas Raiders (6-5)

Don’t count out the Panthers there. They are playing good football right now. The Broncos also needed an unlikely fourth quarter collapse to beat the Chargers at home earlier this season. The other three games are against teams with winning records, so we’ll just do the national media thing and assume those are defeats.

At 4-12, the Broncos strength of schedule may not hurt them too bad. If they win just one game it could mean the difference between a fourth overall pick and a 12th or worse pick.

Just something to think about as they head into the final five games.

I’ll take this opportunity to end the post with a thank you to the NFL league offices for ending the Broncos season and giving the Baltimore Ravens another day to get ‘competitive’. Solid job and very consistent in how you deal with this sort of thing. We are sooooo thankful that our trust and faith is well placed.