Win it NOW!!!

NOW is time to add a 3rd to this trophy case!

The last time the Denver Broncos won a Super Bowl was in Joe Robbie Stadium in Miami against the Atlanta Falcons. In the years since the Broncos have had some good teams and they’ve made the playoffs several times but only have 3 playoffs wins to show for it. One was against the Patriots in 2006, the Steelers in 2012 and the win last week against the Chargers.

The reality is since 1999 the Broncos have had only 3 excellent opportunities to win a Championship.

The first opportunity came in 2006 when Broncos run came to an end by losing to the Pittsburgh Steelers in the AFC Championship Game. The Broncos lost because they turned the ball over 4 times. All the Broncos lacked were a good QB. Jake Plummer folded up his tent in that game and after it his career was essentially over. By mid season of the 2007 season he lost his job to Jay Cutler.

The next best chance was last year when the Broncos had home field advantage throughout just as they did in the 2006 season. They lost to an inferior team in the Baltimore Ravens in part because of poor pass defense but also because Peyton Manning had 2 critical INT’s. The Broncos O turned the ball over 4 times. Many Broncos Fans seem to forget that part of the game and focus on Rahim Moore’s bad play that gave the Ravens a late TD. You can’t turn the ball over 4 times no matter how good or bad you’re D is and expect to win many games. You can’t expect to win games when the #1 QB in the game can’t make a play at the end of the game and expect to win either.

Without a heroic performance by Trindon Holliday and his 2 kick returns for TD’s the Broncos would have been completely blown out by the Ravens. Manning totally shrank in the cold weather of Denver, it clearly affected his game.

This year is the third great opportunity the Broncos have had to win a SB and just as in the other 2 they have home field throughout. This year the Broncos are a better team offensively than last year but on the Defensive side of the ball the team may be worse.

You can come up with every football clique to describe how the Broncos break through this year. In my opinion if the Broncos are going to beat the New England Patriots this Sunday it has to start with Manning because he’s the leader of the team and was hands down the best player in the NFL during the regular season. He must play well for 60 minutes. No matter how bad the D plays he must be able to overcome it and play his A game. The Broncos also need to slow the game down and run the ball just as much as they pass it and grind down the clock.

If the D can stop the run and force Tom Brady to throw the ball, the Broncos chances of winning increase. If the D doesn’t give up to many big passing plays that would contribute to a win as well. It’s the bend not break style of D that’ll help the Broncos advance. You’d expect Brady to make some plays but if they can limit the big ones the Broncos have a good chance.

Frankly I don’t care how they win the game as long as they win. The last few years have been football hell; the Broncos have blown too many opportunities to win another ring. They can’t blow this one. Manning maybe as one good year left and after that it could be a lifetime my friends before the Broncos have another chance as good as this one to win a Championship.

The Law Of Karma turns on the Denver Broncos

Manning walks off the field a loser after throwing 3 INT's against the Ravens.

I’m still grinding, mourning and angry over the Broncos playoff loss today, it’s impossible not to. I know I shouldn’t but these opportunities just don’t come along every day. When making the comparisons about some of the worst losses the Broncos have ever had this one clearly is lower on the list but the pain is no less devastating.

It took the Broncos 38 years to win their first Super Bowl and it was on their 4th try. That’s why when you get into a rosy position and lose it completely knocks the wind out of you. This one hurt bad, but it doesn’t compare to 1996.

The Jacksonville loss in the 96 playoffs is the worst ever. 13-3, best AFC regular season record, home field advantage throughout and playing a team that was lucky to be there. After the loss there was talk that John Elway might retire and who would have blamed him. That season just like this one was set up for them to win a Super Bowl and again they were denied. As we learned later it would have given them 3 championships in a row had they advanced and won in 96.

The Redskins loss in the Super Bowl XXII in 1988 was the #1 most devastating until the Broncos lost to Jacksonville but now it’s #2 on my list. The Broncos had a better all around team than the Redskins that year. Not unlike the Ravens game the Corners and Safety’s helped give away that game too. Back then it was Tony Lilly instead of Champ Bailey and Rahim Moore who gave up big plays. Elway had a horrible day and the running game was a joke. The Defense let a scrub RB and a scrub QB torch them big time. Tim Smith and Doug Williams to that point in their careers had never put up that big of numbers and even following that game would never repeat the performances they had that day against the Broncos.

To be sure the losses to the Cowboys, Giants and 49ers hurt in the other SB’s but the sting wasn’t as bad because the Broncos didn’t match up well against any of those teams.

After a few days to digest this latest disaster I have to move what I consider the #3 worst loss to #4 and say that the loss Saturday surpasses it. The old #3 was the Jake the Fake meltdown in the 2006 AFC Championship Game against the Steelers. The Broncos had just come off a big win against the Brady lead Patriots (The best team in the playoffs that year) at home the week before in the AFC Divisional Playoffs. Beating the Steelers should have been an easier assignment if not for the poor play of the most important position player on the team, QB Jake Plummer.

So, today as I set here grinding I think to myself, this time we supposedly had the best QB in the game to make a Super Bowl run and we lost? Plummer’s bad game is way easier to forgive than Manning’s lousy performance because of his past resume. All be it a great regular season resume, his post season resume stinks.

I personally believe in a Higher Power greater than myself and I also believe in "The Law of Karma."

Short cuts, hired guns and throwing out a player that lead you to your second playoff win in 12 years like so much trash is definitely bad Karma. I’m not saying that Tebow could have taken this team to new heights this year with his skill set being far less than that of Manning’s, probably not. Still...Tebow deserved better, he's a winner and winners don’t always do it pretty. I’ll take winning ugly over losing pretty anytime. Check that, there is no such thing as losing pretty is there?

The other irony or should I say injustice about this epic loss Saturday is that last year when the Broncos got creamed by the Patriots nearly every media type and Broncos Fan out there blamed it on not having a good enough QB.

Today after this loss, it’s: Champ got beat twice for TD’s, Moore lost the game because he didn’t play deep enough on one play, the pass rush was non-existent, losing Moreno hurt, Kuper didn’t play well, Prater missed a kick he normally would have made, the refs made bad calls, the Broncos had 3 timeouts and 31 seconds on the clock in the 4th Q and didn’t try to score, Fox and McCoy called to conservative of a game etc.

Then… As an afterthought: "Oh yeah, Peyton Manning didn’t play well either." Instead of being on the top of the list he’s on the bottom because after all this was a “Team Loss.” I don’t disagree with the “team loss” mantra but Manning should be shouldering way more blame than he has to this point. HE not Mike McCoy was calling the majority of the plays on the field. 3 INT’s, 2 resulting in scores and that God awful throw in over time. The stupid throw in OT made all the throws Tebow has made in his career look pretty damn good. Many didn’t really say it was a team loss after the Broncos got slaughtered by the Patriots last year did they? Oh no, it was that lousy Tim Tebow's fault, if we’d of had a QB like Manning or any other QB for that matter the outcome would have been different right?

The bottom line is Manning should have been the ONE person on the team that made the plays necessary for the Broncos to win a close game, period, end of story. I can’t see it any other way. The Law of Karma as it turns out works both ways, hopefully the Broncos can recover and get the good Karma back next season. It's going to be a very long off season but as always I'll be hopeful that the Broncos can climb the ladder and make a run to the big show. That is all.

A "Successful" Broncos Season is what?

First, you have to separate what is defined as a great season and a “successful” season. In 1996 the Broncos were a 13-3 team, had home field throughout and then proceeded to lose to the lowly Jacksonville Jaguars. After this one was over I didn’t call that Broncos season a success at all. After this one no hard core Broncos fan and no one in the media called that season a success either. It was such an epic failure that there was talk after the game that the great Elway might retire.

I consider that loss the worst defeat in Broncos team history, #2 was the Washington Redskins Super Bowl loss, then at #3 the epic fail by Jake Plummer when he blew his wad in 2006. The SB losses to the NY Giants and San Francisco 49ers were devastating but both teams were better than the Broncos so it wasn’t a big shock when we came up on the short end.

I remember the Jaguars game like it was yesterday. The day before the game I bought a brand new 32 inch Hitachi Color TV. I invited about 10 friends over to watch the game. I was absolutely convinced the Broncos were going to win the whole thing that year because they had the best regular season record in the AFC and I believed at the time no one could stop them. That one hurt, hurt bad, it crushed Elway and the City of Denver. Did they win a lot of games that year and put up great stats? Oh yeah but to call that season successful is bad joke.

The same would be true of the Redskins loss in the Super Bowl. The Broncos got a second chance after losing to what was a far better team than them in the Giants the year before. The Broncos were the best team in the NFL during the regular season in 1988. The Redskins were lucky to be there.

They let the Bucs QB Doug Williams and RB Tim Smith have career days when both wouldn’t even be backups on most teams. For whatever reason a pretty good Broncos D up until that point unraveled, especially in the secondary that didn't help matters either. Tony Lilly, who can forget Lilly getting beat like a school boy on every pass play.

Then of course there’s 2006, a team as it turned out that was one player, a QB, away from a SB.

After the last Super Bowl win in 1998 Mike Shanahan would go onto have what some would call “successful” seasons. None of them translated into a Super Bowl win however and the memory of the last one has turned into a 13 year wait for another.

The game is played to win championships period. If the Broncos blow a chance here with home field advantage with Peyton Manning at the top of his game and the D playing as well as they have in years I wouldn’t call it a successful season.

THEY MUST WIN THE SUPER BOWL! GO BRONCOS!!

I can't believe this actually happened!

I’ve been saying that since 1:30 Pacific Time yesterday and I’m still saying it today but not for the good reasons that some other Broncos Fans might be.

I was wondering what would motivate me to get started writing about this and it hit me. What inspired my blog today was when I heard what one fan repeated more than once in a video blog. He said that all of us in "Tebow Nation" needed to take a chill pill. It’s not fair and utter nonsense to group all of us who respectfully disagreed with the Manning signing into that category when for some of us it's about what the direction and the long term future of the team is going to be, not about Tebow. The “team” I’ll underscore that point, should always be the primary concern.

Dismissing smart fans isn’t right; some think that this was a quick fix and a big gamble to take as I do. Talking about Manning in the past tense is wonderful don't get me wrong. If he plays like he did in the past great but I personally doubt he's going to be the guy "Who'll takes us to the promise land" as many others have mockingly tossed around about Tebow.

Why? Because this is still the same rebuilding team that Tebow labored under, despite the criticism of how he ran the offense. He did an amazing job given he played under a very Conservative HC and OC, a young and inexperienced OL, a group inconsistent WR’s who dropped way to many balls when he did throw it to them, no clutch catching TE and a journeyman at RB who isn’t likely to give us another year like last year with no quality RB to back him up.

This isn’t excusing some of Tebow’s poor play in some of the games but given this set of circumstances and since by all rights it was his Rookie year he did more than a phenomenal job. This in part is why even though he’s still rough around the edges deserved at less one more year to see if he could improve. 

On D we need another Corner, a Safety, better Defensive Linemen and at least one if not 2 LB’s considering DJ’s age and Mays' inconsistent play in the second half of last season. I know Mays just signed a contract, maybe he gets better but he didn’t play well in the second half of the season. He had too many missed tackles and he didn’t always play well against the run or pass maybe some fans hadn’t noticed it but I did.

This is harsh criticism I know, but if you’re completely objective and honest and not being a blind homer Broncos Fan this is the reality. Let’s not forget about these pending suspensions either, what do you think that will do for the Broncos D to start 2012 season?

So now we’ve put all of eggs in Manning’s basket and will have to settle for less than’s or has been’s at the other positions through free agency. The money showered on him limits the amount of money to sign free agents or players from the upcoming draft also and thus affects who we draft. The little bit of breathing room the Broncos had for cap money is all but gone too.

The smart money would have been to go after some of the quality free agents that were available early and maybe look at drafting or trading up or down to get one of the QB’s that wasn’t likely to go early in the draft. Then, if either Tebow or said QB tanked we could look to 2013 to get someone else. At least in this scenario we’ve attempted to fill up some of the other holes on the team.

This Manning situation reminds me somewhat of the Broncos signing of Plummer. Plummer is no Manning we all know that but the same frenzy and impatience to get a QB who was really the only free agent worthy of signing became all consuming even though Plummer’s talent and resume hardly justified it. Why, because there were so few to choose from just like this year. After Manning you’ve got table scraps like Matt Flynn and a failure like David Garrard no wonder the bum rush panic was on. Since the only 2 guys who look to be sure things from the draft are Luck and RG3 the reckless chase for Manning was on.

The money and investment spent on Manning is enormous and I believe we should expect enormous results, like winning a Super Bowl, anything less and this signing was a waste of money and a failure since his window of opportunity is so small. If he’s great as everyone seems to think he is then this isn’t unreasonable to expect.

As always I’m a Broncos Fan first and last and on Sunday I’ll be rooting for Manning and the Broncos to win. If he wins a SB I’ll happily eat crow but in my view the odds are very long indeed of that dream ever happening. Hate me or love me it’s what I see from my armchair. Let’s pray he proves me wrong.

Kyle Orton lacks, "Controlled Desperation or Sense of Urgency"

Orton may be smiling but he's about to lose his job.

First and foremost I understand football is a team game, I get it. I understand it’ll take time for Fox’s Offensive and Defensive philosophy to gel. Got it, thank you.

 I see and understand how the Broncos D has already improved (Von Miller is awesome) and will continue to improve, how the Broncos Corners must improve, how the young OL still is not playing well in the running game or pass blocking, how the Broncos don’t have a young speedy or even a powerful RB on the roster, how they don’t really have a solid (Sorry, Lloyd isn’t it) go to WR and how they don’t have much depth at many positions. Understood, got it. Lastly, no matter how many fans want to avoid it or deny it, our starting QB is one of the worst in league and isn’t going to improve. So...DEAL WITH IT!!

That is where I choose to focus my attention because it’s the most important leadership position on the field. A good QB can make an enormous difference for a struggling team despite these problems and help the team win tough games. Orton is never going to be the guy, it’s pure stupidly to believe he’s going to shed his skin and turn into Brady.

Speaking of Brady, just remove him from the Patriots, or Manning from the Colts as we’re already seen and what do you have left? About the same sort of talent the Broncos have on both sides of the ball right now. So this ridiculous notion that a staring QB doesn’t matter in the big scheme of things is a big load of bunk and the lamest excuse ever to defend Orton.  

One of the things I’ve noticed is that the fans who support the idea of starting Tebow have less hate and discontent directed at them than by Orton supporters (Of the few who still do) than during our last big QB controversy. Tell me if I’m wrong here? We’re only at week 4 of the NFL season and the rats are jumping the Orton ship much quicker than the same fans that defended Plummer over Cutler in 2007.  

During the Plummer/Cutler nuclear war in Broncos Country back then at the very least you could say that if you loved Plummer or hated him he did play well enough to get the Broncos to within one game of a Super Bowl.

As much as I hated the overrated Plummer and was overjoyed that he finally lost his job at least he had a few more tools to win a game or make a comeback in the 4 Q at times. Though he lacked talent in consistently delivering a long ball, many times the short pass, threw to many INT’s, lost to many fumbles, telegraphed his throws and missed wide open WR’s (Sounds a lot like Orton) Plummer at least had a second chance to make a play with his feet. The other worthy intangible you could hang on Plummer was the guy was a warrior with some heart and passion and played the game that way even in failure. His feet and his passion made his game.

Orton has all the flaws that Plummer had and absolutely zero chance of making a play with his feet. On the field Orton never seems to have that “controlled desperation or sense of urgency” to be a leader when the chips are down and the game is on the line. Orton looks like a zombie who took 3 bottles of Xanax before game time. Being calm, cool and collected is alright if you had a team like Montana had in front of him but when you don’t being a benign disinterested stiff on a team struggling to win at crunch time doesn’t get it either. I’ll take some fire over ice; Orton isn’t ice he’s just frozen solid.

Given all of the flaws in Orton’s game, I just don’t see how the argument can be made that he gives the Broncos a better chance to win than Tebow. Tebow has 2 great intangibles that Orton doesn’t. He’s a big strong young man and is capable of either running or throwing for a TD in the red zone.

The only intangible that Orton can claim is NFL experience. If it were good experienced none of this would even be debated, his job would be secure. But as Woody Paige noted this week, “His overall record as the Broncos' starter is 12-19. The team has won four of Orton's last 20 — a winning percent of 20. He is 0.00 percent when the team trails by three or more at halftime.”

I’m a Diehard Broncos Fan but I’m not a homer, I’m a realist, the Broncos will get slaughtered by the Packers this week. It’s just a question of how wide of a margin it is. So after he leads the team to yet another uninspiring performance I have to believe that Elway and Fox would say uncle.

Like Tebow or not he absolutely cannot play any worse than Orton has over the last 2 seasons. He must be the starter for the Chargers game so we can see if he’s capable of salvaging what’s left of this season. If he stinks, fine, at least we’ll know and then the Broncos can figure out what to do with him next year. He’ll win some and lose some with Orton we could lose all. If nothing else with Tebow in there watching the Broncos won’t be like putting needles in our eyes, throwing rocks at the TV or falling asleep from 3 ½ hours of mind numbing boredom.

Orton Has Lost the Team and the Fans

11 long years of waiting and my patience is gone. First I have to evoke the, “Elway has nothing to do with the comparisons when it comes to our current group of QB’s” misnomer. I know it’s a team game, so let’s leave that out of it for now and just talk about the QB position alone. Simply put Orton is a Bum and comparing him, Quinn or Tebow to Elway is insane, so let’s get that obvious statement out of the way as well.

For 11 years we’ve had only one playoff win which was is in 2006. That year I remember very well. Jake Plummer was the QB of the team that lost big to the Steelers in the AFC Championship Game. For the most part Plummer crumbled under the pressure and choked big time in that one and it cost the Broncos what should have been their 3rd Super Bowl ring. They should have beat that Steelers team, they had talent enough on both sides of the ball to do so and would have kicked the Seahawks butt all over the field had they gone to the Super Bowl.

That year the Broncos had a better overall team than both the Steelers and the Seahawks. The Broncos had a great running game and serviceable WR’s. The only thing lacking was a better than average QB which Jake the Fake proved he wasn’t. Had the Broncos had such a QB the Broncos would own another Lombardi trophy.

Then a few years later, we traded the only good QB the Broncos had on the roster over that 11 year span which was Jay Cutler. For all of his warts and his immature ways he’s 10 times better from a skill set level than Orton, Quinn or Tebow. We can thank McDaniels for that move and the one that sent Peyton Hillis to the Browns. Not to mention the horrible draft picks he made his 2 years in Denver.

After the Broncos won a Super Bowl at least from my prospective nothing less than a playoff appearance is a worthy expectation with the hope of another Super Bowl bid and a win. This is what the hard core fan should expect nothing less. I for one am sick to death of watching a crappy football team week in and week out and lose just as often. Orton has had 3 years with the Broncos now and has not progressed one iota in fact he’s digressed. He telegraphs his throws, he can't move in the pocket, he has trouble completing not just the long throw but the short throw as well. He can’t seem to make a play in the red zone and score. But worse of all he doesn’t have one single intangible characteristic to make up for all of his other physical weaknesses, none.

That’s were Tebow comes in, he doesn’t have the experience but he won’t get any by setting on the bench. He has the intangibles that Orton does not. He can scramble, he’s a big strong kid who can pick up yards on running plays but most important of all he has a burning will to win. He plays inspired football, he plays to win and he’s not the kind of guy to give up on a game no matter what the score.

This can’t be said about Orton. Orton looks like he just woke up from a 3 hour nap when he’s out there. Being calm is one thing but being a stiff who doesn’t have that burning desire in his gut to get back in the game to redeem himself is something I just can’t take anymore. The Raiders were ripe for the taking Monday Night and Orton with his bumbling play blew a game the Broncos should have easily won despite all the other problems the Broncos have as a team. Orton just doesn’t have the leadership skills to pick up a team that’s down and bring them back; he’s shown that over and over in painful detail.

Basically Orton has pulled off a big con, he’s laughing all the way to the bank thanks to McD. He knows had the Broncos not traded for him and signed him to a big bucks deal he most likely would have gone to another team as a back up or cut from the league all together.

There can be no more lame excuses for Orton he’s a failure and it’s time the Broncos moved on. He’s lost the team except for Brandon Lloyd who Orton made a millionaire because he was the only WR he would throw a ball to last year. Lloyd is another phony, he’s a career bench scrub who can claim one good year as a Pro (last year) and will never repeat it. Lloyd is Orton's only friend on the team. Orton has lost the team, all but Lloyd for the reasons I’ve mentioned. He’s lost the confidence of the Fans and finally most of the morons in the media who claimed he was the best thing going for the Broncos before this game. I’m sure he’s lost the confidence of Bowlen, Elway and Fox but none of them can or will come out and admit it. Why? There are 8.4 million reasons why they won’t. Benching an 8 million dollar Bum isn’t in the cards yet I guess. They’ll probably wait until the Broncos have no shot at a playoff berth then remove him. It’s not a good situation to say the least and if so much money wasn’t involved Orton would have been benched this week after the god awful performance he made everyone suffer through Monday Night.

It’s Tebow time, we need to see if he’s going to be our QB of the future or not. At least if he gets some extended playing time now the Broncos can make an educated decision about whether to start him next year or trade him and look for someone else.

You can thank my good friend Darold for this rant he got me going with a comment he made on facebook. Damn straight my patience is gone Buddy and rightly so. TEBOW!! TEBOW!! TEBOW!!!

Jay Cutler a Dream come True...

I'm just so excited that Mike Shanahan made the decision to move up in the draft and take Jay Cutler.  The Broncos Fans on this site know that I'm the President of the Plummer Hater Club.  Out of the gate he has far better physical tools than Plummer has on his best day.

Jay Cutler

It'll take time for him to learn Shanny’s offensive but I wouldn’t be shocked at all to see Cutler starting by the end of the year.  Many Bronco Homers are saying we'll go all the way back to the AFC Championship Game with Plummer under Center.  I don’t think the road will be as easy as it was last year.  The running game of the Broncos will be a question mark going into the season.  Bell and Dayne will hopefully carry the load but I have concerns about either banging out yards all season long like an Anderson.

Hopefully on day 2 of the draft we'll address the defensive side of the ball and try to pick up a DT and/or DE and a SS.  I wonder to if Shanny may look for a sleeper WR.  If Walker's knee is strong he comes in and has an immediately impact, if not we have issues at WR.

I'm not convinced the front 4 on the D line is good enough to get the up field push we need.  The last half of the season last year the Broncos were not getting any pressure with the front 4. That’s why Pryce was traded.  We need depth at DL badly.

The good news is we have a great young QB to build around now.  I can't wait to see Cutler on the field.  Go Broncos!!!