Sean Payton’s stumbling Broncos would be innovative … if it was still 2013

IIt wasn’t until last season that Sean Payton arrived in Denver and turned everything that came before him on its head. He called Nathaniel Hackett’s tenure as manager of the Broncos one of the “the worst coaching jobs” in NFL history. It would be nice to know where he thinks his first two games of the season rank.

The Broncos are off to a 0-2 start to the season. Moving back in time, Denver has won just two of its last eight games, both of which came against a team with Easton Stick at quarterback. Through two weeks this season, the Broncos’ offense has laid an egg in four of the eight quarters. Payton, once the vanguard of the offense, seems out of ideas—or at least out of time. His offense is stuck in 2013 and led by a rookie quarterback, Bo Nix, who is looking over his head. advanced statistics This season, Denver’s offense is trailed only by the abysmal Carolina Panthers, a team that benched its quarterback this week in part because they fear he has trouble seeing across the line of scrimmage.

Payton seems as bewildered as anyone by Denver’s ineptitude. “We really have to take a look at who we’re asking to do what,” he said Sunday. “What scheme fits our players? What scheme fits our quarterback?”

You’d hope a coach would have the answers to those questions before sending an inexperienced rookie onto the field against two of the best defenses in the league.

At first glance, the Payton hire seemed like a no-brainer. He was a decorated coach who would bring instant credibility to an organization that had become a laughingstock. The Broncos were under new ownership, and they were happy to pay $18 million a year and a few draft picks to bring in a coach with Super Bowl pedigree. But there’s a hint of Phil Jackson about the New York Knicks’ Payton era: a legendary leader who’s a step out of time. Someone who’s amassed all the power in the organization but not the patience required to engineer a true rebuild.

Payton has been chasing sugar highs during his time in Denver. But his biggest decision came this offseason when he pushed away Russell Wilson, plunged the franchise further into salary cap hell, and hand-picked Nix as his replacement. Denver drafted Nix 13th overall, far higher than most draft prognosticators (and other team executives) had decried him for. Payton’s reasoning for falling in love with Nix was vague at his best, but he seemed to genuinely believe that the young quarterback could eventually become a carbon copy of Drew Brees, who turned Payton’s offensive ideas into an almost artistic feat with the New Orleans Saints.

But the early results have been dismal. Denver lacks talent at the skill positions, its offensive line is splattered and Nix looks lost in one of the league’s most complicated offenses.

By now, you’ve probably seen the clip of Nix from Denver’s 13-6 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday. The rookie stepped into the huddle to make a play call. Confusion ensued. Denver failed to get the snap in time and had to take a timeout.

If you missed that one, you probably saw the few other times the Broncos struggled to set up the lineup, with the team’s receivers looking toward the sideline, eyes bulging and arms raised, wondering what was going on.

All starting quarterbacks experience growing pains; it hasn’t been rosy for Caleb Williams and the Chicago Bears, either. NFL defenses are faster and often more sophisticated than college defenses. NFL offenses are more expansive, putting a greater burden on quarterbacks who played in watered-down college schemes.

While the gap between what is required of quarterbacks at the professional and college levels has become more widespread, however, as teams have gotten wise to how to help young quarterbacks develop. Coaches will twist the language of their playbook or mimic plays that helped a rookie succeed in college to ease their transition into the league. The Bengals imported Joe Burrow’s LSU playbook when they drafted him No. 1 overall in 2020 — and added college teammate Ja’Marr Chase to help the process. Andy Reid and the Kansas City Chiefs sat Patrick Mahomes during his rookie season. Once Mahomes was given the starting job, Reid twisted the language and design of his offense to match what had worked for his quarterback in college, slowly adding new elements. The same was true for Jordan Love in Green Bay, who got three seasons to sit and learn behind Aaron Rodgers.

Nix has been thrown into the deep end, into an offense without training wheels. The video of Nix’s struggles in the huddle is indicative of a broader problem with the Broncos: the Sean Payton problem. The coach is notorious for his wordy playcalling. Rookie or not, he drops the motherlode on a quarterback and expects them to pick it up quickly. Wilson, a veteran quarterback, struggled with the long calls last season, but for a rookie like Nix, it’s an area to get goosebumps about.

Nix spent five years in college running a system that relied on a few words or a graphic shown from the sideline to call plays. In Denver, he’ll be in the huddle for the first time and asked to call out the pro football equivalent of The Stand before the offense can execute a play.

Here’s an example. At Auburn, Nix’s first college stop, Nix ran a play that’s a staple at every level of football — a simple play-action pass. Its name: GAS NAKED. When he transferred to Oregon, the coaching staff in Eugene adopted the same language. They were already running the same play, but were happy to adapt to Nix’s language. In Denver, Payton asks Nix to call things the way the coach wants him to. Suddenly, the same play morphs from “Gas Naked” to a Tolkien-esque “KING SNUG RT ON 52 SMASH Z JERK KILL Q-8 Z SPEED SMASH (ALERT PIPE).”

It’s no wonder the rookie seems disoriented. There are good reasons NFL coaches favor extended play calling—one is that there are more plays to learn than in college, and they want to make sure everyone knows their exact role. But not offering a struggling rookie a play-calling lifeline is self-defeating.

When the Broncos have been able to get the ball off the mat in time, the results have been tremendous. Nothing is more telling than Nix’s numbers down the field. Payton has made a career of designing the best deep passing game in the NFL. Nix isn’t blessed with the strongest arm — but neither was Brees late in his career — and Payton’s offense is designed to create chunk plays for quarterbacks who lack Josh Allen’s flamethrower. Even pushing the ball past the sticks has been a challenge so far this season. On throws of 10 yards or more, Nix has thrown twice as many turnover-worthy throws and interceptions as he has completions, according to ProFootballFocus. He’s played against two great defenses in the Steelers and Seahawks, but those numbers are indicative of a player who can’t keep up with what’s being asked of him and throws in more hope than expectation.

It’s telling that Nix, like Wilson before him, is at his best when improvising or playing in the two-minute drill, when the playbook is leaner and he’s free to escape the constraints of the offense. Payton grew tired of Wilson’s improvisation, but it’s the one place where Nix has shown signs of promise.

Payton’s offense was once the wonder of the league. He was the trailblazer. In Brees, he had a ruthless and efficient conductor. But those heady days of Saints football are farther in the rearview mirror. In Denver, he’s filled his staff with friends from his New Orleans days — eight of the Broncos coaches worked for Payton in New Orleans. And it shows. They’ve continued to rehash the greatest hits of the past, but they seem to have forgotten that the frontman, Brees, was crucial in bringing it all together.

If a coach’s job is to put players in the best position to succeed, Payton has failed so far. He’s abandoned his rookie and stuck Nix in an offense that’s outpaced his capabilities—playing on a roster that doesn’t have the talent to cover up its flaws. If he’s not willing to adapt, Payton should let Nix sit on the sidelines for a while before the confidence is irrevocably knocked out of him.