Orange Colored Glasses: Broncos suffer their first loss, remain undefeated on the season.
“The anticipated one-quarter plus of work most thought Brock Osweiler would get never came to fruition, instead the creaky Peyton Manning took every punishing snap for the Broncos.”
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Boooooooooooooooo!
According to one contributor at “Yahoo! Answers”, “A “Trap Game” is a game that is played before or after a tough or rival opponent. Teams have a tendency to look past an opponent preparing for the following week’s game, or have a letdown after beating a tough or rival opponent.”
In facing the awful Jacksonville Jaguars at home yesterday, coming off a thrilling 51-48 win at Dallas and with an historic trip to Indiana ahead of them, the Broncos were involved Sunday in a classic “trap game”. The Jaguars had no chance whatsoever to win regardless of how well they played and everyone on and off the field knew it. The tilt was, as many have called it, “Jacksonville’s Super Bowl”. They came into the game the biggest underdog (undercat?) in NFL history so they had something to prove.
The Denver Broncos were unconcerned about covering the spread. They wanted to put together a quick victory, try to stay healthy and get back to work planning for more significant opponents. The Jaguars were determined to, at the very least, make Denver work for a win. Because Jacksonville was able to keep the Broncos on their toes Denver’s starting offensive players stayed involved in the game until the end. The anticipated one-quarter plus of work most thought Brock Osweiler would get never came to fruition, instead the creaky Peyton Manning took every punishing snap for the Broncos.
The Jaguars smacked Manning early and often, forcing three turnovers (two fumbles and an interception) for which no other Bronco could be blamed. They got licks in on the quarterback whenever they could, even hitting him well after he had released the ball. Manning showed that there are weaknesses in his game, despite his having passed for at least 300 yards in every previous game this season.
Journeyman quarterback Chad Henne had a decent performance for the Jaguars. He found the wildly talented young receiver Justin Blackmon open as often as Tony Romo found Dez Bryant open. Denver’s secondary continued to be tested as the pass rush continued not to help. Jacksonville’s passing game has been nothing to write home about, but against Denver it was able to put together some statistics, which promises to be a concern for the Broncos moving forward, regardless of the improvement the reintroduction of Von Miller may bring.
As distressing as the performance of Denver’s pass defense was on Sunday, the woes the team has suffered along the offensive line only got worse. Orlando Franklin, who has been a stand-out , was injured in the game and could miss significant time. Denver has shuffled the deck at the tackle positions already and appears to be fixed on shuffling it again. This is bad news for a team that lives and dies by the health of it’s 20M dollar quarterback. It’s particularly worrisome competing in a division with the also-undefeated Chiefs, a team with perhaps the scariest front four in all of football. Kansas City ripped Oakland’s Terrell Pryor to bits at Arrowhead on Sunday. You can bet that their QB killers are foaming at the mouth to get their shots in on number 18.
The Broncos racked up another win yesterday, and they remain undefeated. But the booing fans at Mile High sensed that not all was well in Broncos Country – and not all is. In many ways the Broncos suffered their first loss.
The Jacksonville Jaguars to not offer us much of a measuring stick with which to judge these Broncos, but the Colts will. The coming match up on NBC’s Sunday Night Football starring Peyton Manning and Andrew Luck in the “House that Peyton built” will give fans much more to go on it terms of telling them how the Broncos really size up against the better teams in the AFC.
