Transcript

Bourbon, Broncos, and No BS. Good evening, Broncos Country. Welcome to yet another edition of Bourbon, Broncos, and No BS. My name is Kevin Dean, as always. And I've got the one, the only, the Spotty dude. There's just something about the cowboy hat — you pull it off, man. I'm jealous. And it's even the black cowboy hat. I feel like the black cowboy hat doesn't get enough love. You see a lot of folks with their tans, and the tan's the summer hat, really. When I go to the rodeo in another month or so, I'm going to wear my tan because the black's too hot. But I'm telling you, man, I'm looking for the perfect suit/outfit and an event so I can wear this out. I want to be cowboy Spotty in real life. Hmm. So let me ask you, then — is part of this outfit going to involve a bolo tie? Dude, that — but see, then I put on my glasses, like Von Miller. Obviously he's a little beefier than me, a lot more beefier than me, and probably got a lot more money, but a bolo is nice. I won't lie, man. I'm a fan of the bolo tie as well. So I'd give it a try. I'd give it a try. You know, only a few people can pull off the bolo tie look. And I think with the cowboy hat, you could do it. But anyway, you did mention something — about a month from now — and something else we found out is starting about a month from now. Any idea what that might be? That's football. That's football. July is the last month without official football, right? It's the last month without a football game. But I think you mentioned we still have OTAs and everything else going on in July. So there's a lot more to talk about. It's a lot more experience. I'm excited for that. Then, of course, we're starting off with the 4th of July, which might just be the best holiday out there. So let's start off with the 4th of July and let's roll. From there, we already know it's football season. Hell yeah, man. I love it. Sean John, what's up, buddy? Good to see you in the comments here, man. So one of the big topics of conversation every year during training camp are position battles. And I think it's time we lock in. It's time we start looking at this. We know who's on the team, at least for training camp and preseason. And we know the team has brought back the majority of last year's team. So there's not going to be a lot of talk in the realm of position battles like we might have seen in previous years, but there's still going to be a few. So, Spotty, what are some of the ones that you're looking for initially? Let's start off with — because we normally bring this up, and for the second year in a row, we don't even have to have a conversation about it — those position battles are NOT a quarterback battle. For the second year in a row, we're comfortably set in our starting quarterback spot, and for the foreseeable future. That in itself shows you how complete a team you can potentially have. If you're talking year in, year out about it, who's going to take this — really the only QB battle we have right now is between Sam Ehlinger and Jarrett Stidham for who's going to be backup. I don't think Jarrett's going to be usurped in that specific spot, mostly because he's been with the team for so long. Sean has a lot of confidence in him, even though Denver Broncos fans may not have any confidence in him after that Patriots game — but it's fine, it's fine. The conversations are probably going to be less about who wins the position battles and more about the depth chart specifically. The one that I have top of mind that I want to talk about is the wide receiver room. Me and my pops, we were sitting over Father's Day chatting about it, because we know the top two guys, right? Waddle's going to have a spot, Courtland's going to have a spot — there's no argument there. But who's three? Are we going to move Troy Franklin into three? Personally — and as everybody knows from our talks last year — I'm a big fan of Pat Bryant in that three spot. The guy that comes out of the slot, he's a big possession guy. We have those other two guys. We have Court, who's going to get down the field, he's going to get the 10 yards, he's going to get the physical catches. We know Waddle's going to get all of those zigzag routes — he's going to be the guy that keeps it down there. But we need somebody where, hey man, it's third and six and they've got two guys covering both our top guys — who are we getting? I really look at Pat Bryant for that. And from there, I'm still trying to figure out what we're even going to do about Marvin Mims. Bro, there's a lot to break down in this wide receiver room. There's just too much talent. And to me, that signals — if we're going to start talking about surprise cuts or surprise trades at the end of training camp and preseason, this is probably the most likely room you're going to see it come out from. Personally, I think you're going to wait and see how they look in camp, obviously. But to me, it's going to take a lot for somebody to take that away from Pat Bryant. And the one reason I say that is he had one drop all of last year. For two years now in a row, we've been complaining ad nauseam about the freaking drop problem this team has had. Last year was not any better, right? So to me, I'm going to prioritize a guy who I know is consistent in being able to make the catches, hold on to them, and not drop them. I think Troy Franklin is still coming along. I think he's that good depth, that number four guy that maybe you can put in there sometimes, right? I just — well, I don't think he's screwed up to the point of deserving to be cut. I just don't see anything from him last year to say that he's improved so much that he deserves that number three spot. But then with Marvin Mims, and that guy we signed from the UFL — Burton or whoever. I think Butler. Butler, yeah. That could be a situation where they're signifying — wouldn't be surprised if Marvin Mims just requests a trade, that he's seen the same writing on the wall that you have, that I have — dude, where do you fit in on this offense? And he's more than just a return guy. That's what he's thinking. It's hard. I foresee potentially a Devaughn Vele kind of situation. There is a Broncos wide receiver that fans love that probably is going to get traded away. And if you really think about it — Devaughn Vele, we got a fourth-round pick out of a seventh-round guy. He had a great year for the Saints, still cheer for him. But that situation might arise again, because at this point there's too much. We're looking at Court, Waddle, Pat, Franklin, Mims, Lil'Jordan Humphrey still on the team, and Hakeem Butler, who we just signed. I think Butler's more or less going to take a little of Lil'Jordan Humphrey's position, because they're both a pretty big size, but the thing is Lil'Jordan is a little younger than Butler. So I just named off seven guys, and I doubt we're going to carry seven guys in the wide receiver room. No, and I think Butler is an interesting case study, because he's kind of following in the footsteps of Tillman a little bit. I think the Broncos have had some success with Tillman coming out of the UFL, and they see what Butler has done. And for anybody who doesn't know — I mean, I had to look him up, right? I don't follow the UFL. Well, this guy was the UFL's Offensive Player of the Year two out of the last three years. And he was drafted in the fourth round by the Cardinals, which is not a bad spot for a wide receiver to be drafted. It's a terrible team to go to. You what? It's a terrible team to go to. Right, exactly. It's kind of like being drafted by the Jets or by the Raiders. Or the Browns. You're like, oh, you made it. Did you? Did you? Do well so you can get a trade and go somewhere else. Yeah. But I'm kind of seeing this as Butler's return to the NFL. I think he's been trying — whatever happened out there in Arizona, like whatever caused him to go to the Canadian Football League and then to the UFL, I don't know. But this is his return back to the NFL. And I think he sees this as an opportunity to be like, man, if I can take advantage of this and solidify a spot on not just any team, but the Denver Broncos as they're on this upswing — this is the time for him to get in on it. So I think you could definitely see a huge battle between Lil'Jordan Humphrey and Butler there, because I think they both have a lot to play for, but consistency is going to be key. I'm telling you, any drops are just going to be under a magnifying glass, at least from my standpoint. I mean, I think from Sean Payton's standpoint too — he's an efficiency guy. That's exactly what he's looking for. Yeah. Well, what's the point of going out and getting your quarterback — who turns out to be just as good, if not better, than advertised — and building an offensive line around him and going to get these weapons for him, just for you to go out there and drop the ball when he gets it into your hands? Right, right. Which is something that we complain about. Jarrett wants to talk about that too, right? Catchable balls and all of that. But hey, let's just call a spade a spade. If the ball is considered catchable and you drop it, then that's on you. Here's the thing. They use whatever metrics they use to determine if it's catchable the same way for all 32 teams. And if we're ranked at the bottom of that list — I don't care how they do it — we're still at the bottom of that list. And that's bad, right? It's not like, well, we're just going to judge them a little harder than others. Right. Which kind of brings me to the next thing I just wanted to touch on, and it's less important than the wide receiver room — but the tight end room. It's just been underwhelming for... Five, six, seven years? I'm trying — when was Julius Thomas catching passes? I'm trying to think of another tight end after Orange Julius that really — I mean, Greg Dulcich showed some — Greg Dulcich is having a great time in Miami, by the way. Good for him. So what that makes me think about now is — now it's about hierarchy. We know that Evan Engram is going to be the one. I don't think there's anybody who's going to step in and take the one spot from Evan Engram. I think that would take a Herculean-type effort for that to happen. But after that, right — we brought back everybody else, but we also signed two rookies, and we have Caleb Lohner, who's going to be in his second year. So who's going to be the odd man out? Is it Troutman, which I doubt? Is it going to be Kroll? Sorry, Adam. Sorry, Adam. Someone's got to be the odd man out, because we're not going to carry — I mean, we've got Evan Engram, Troutman, Kroll, Jolly. I forget the name of the kid we got later in there. And Caleb Lohner. That's six tight ends right there. That's just — no chance we carry that many, and we already consider Prentice a tight end/fullback. So how things are going to go right there — it's not about what's going to make — it's not going to be about Evan Engram. It's not about the top, it's about what we're getting from the rest of these guys. Because they really need to show up, or honestly, they can all kick rocks and we can throw in the rookies. Right, exactly, dude. You're right — I didn't think about it, but looking at the depth, the roster here, I did not realize we had six tight ends until you put it in that number. Like, holy crap, we do. And part of it is I forget about Caleb Lohner, as much as I'm fangirling over him — just because I want to be right about him, you know I'm right. Well, I just want another late-round-pick guy. Like what we do so well with undrafted and late-round-pick guys. I want another one of those guys to step up. Because that's the real difference on a team. It's not really the first-round draft picks. It's not really the second-round draft picks. It's really getting snaps — meaningful snaps — from your third, fourth, fifth, and free-agent guys. Yeah. Agreed. No, I would say, guys, go over to broncosandbourbon.com. Look at the roster and the depth chart we have there and get an idea, because, like I said — you look at how many tight ends we actually have, and you're like, holy crap. Who's going to make this cut? Engram, Jolly — and then who knows? Is it Atkins? Is it Troutman? Where does this Bentley guy fit in? There you go. That's the guy we got later in the draft. Is Lohner just going to stay on practice squad? There are at least some possibilities here, right? I don't see any stars outside of Engram, right? But Jolly could very well turn into that. And I would like him to — even say you start the season with Evan Engram at the helm there, but by week six, seven, eight, if he's still at zero or one touchdowns, I say you put in Jolly and have him be the number one. And see if you can get him going — because then, if you can get him going, there's no need to re-sign Evan Engram. But you just look back: one touchdown all of last year. I think I even made this joke with you last time we talked about this — yeah, well, he had one more touchdown than I did. One more touchdown than you did. It was a nice touchdown. It was against the Eagles, and it looked like he was going to go down, and he kind of carried himself three or four yards. Yeah, he had that last push. It was nice. It was. It was nice. It was memorable, and it came at an important time. But that was it. So look, you've got to get something more from your tight end. And this is where the Davis Webb factor starts really coming into play. Right. Between how much Bo's really going to be utilizing his legs, between the Evan Engram–Bo Nix connection — are those things going to improve? Are they going to get better? And that's a whole nother episode, right? But that Davis Webb thing could really benefit the team in general. That's just crazy. I mean, we have an embarrassment of riches on the offense at this point, right? It's not like there's a bunch of guys outside of Court and Waddle where you're pointing to them like, oh my gosh, oh my gosh. We're not the Rams, right? We're not the Los Angeles Rams when it comes to offense. But I'm telling you what, man — with everything that we have, especially in the running back room, which I'm probably the most excited about — I don't even want to get into it, because we know who's going to be number one there, but it's really about how much Jonah Coleman's going to play. But Bo's got somebody to throw to. We've got running backs that can catch. We've got wide receivers that are getting downfield. And we've got tight ends that should catch. If anything, the addition of everything we've done already should open more up for the Evan Engrams of the world. Or, shoot — Troutman somehow gets out there. Atkins gets out there. They're good for at least one or two touchdowns a year. Maybe. Maybe. Hey, two touchdowns — that'd be more than what Evan Engram got last year. I mean, that's true. Hey, one touchdown's better than a lot of them did last year. Exactly, dude. That room's going to be very interesting to watch as well. And I wouldn't be surprised if you see maybe some sort of trade out of it — nothing for any serious amount of draft capital, but a sixth maybe, somewhere in there, some late-round draft picks — because this is a good problem to have: making a team better. Yeah. Well, look, when you bring back the majority of your team — and again, for the majority of it, I think it was because they honestly didn't want to, outside of a couple of people where it was like, well, we didn't actually find anyone else. So we don't want to have a lot of discussions about position battles. Right. Because it means the team is mostly set. Yeah. The guys know each other. They understand the system. There's continuity — all these things that we've been lacking during those dark ages. So, man, it's going to be interesting. And it's kind of sad for those rookies — anything, if you got drafted later than the third round and you're going to the Broncos. Yeah. It might still work out for them, though. You'll eventually get on. Yeah, I mean, just look at Savion Jones. I guess we haven't really seen it yet, but JFM is gone. That's a big spot. That's a big spot. And if Savion Jones is who they drafted him to be, he's going to get his chance. And he's got three years to prove that he's worth a long-term contract. And if he doesn't do that — I mean, there's another rookie, Tyler-on-Adam, who is right behind him. Yeah, I mean, so that's probably the only other battle to pay attention to. What do you think — what would need to happen for Tyler-on-Adam to kind of get more looks or more of a chance outside of what we'll see in preseason games? To me, I think Savion Jones has done enough to show that he's ready for the role. And I've never seen anything to indicate any red flags or anything with him. It's hard. I mean, JFM was talking up Savion Jones all last year. And when you have the guy who's trying to take your spot, and you have the balls to talk him up like that — like JFM did — I personally, if I had someone who's trying to take my job, I wouldn't be talking them up to the media and the coaching staff, right? So the only reason you do something like that is if the guy's got the chops. I think Savion Jones is going to have to come out of shape or not paying attention in his meetings for him to give up that position. I think he's really earned it. But from what I hear — and of course this is in no shells, we're talking about seven-on-sevens — Tyler-on-Adam was playing really well during minicamp. And I love to hear that. I love when a defensive lineman is making noise during minicamp. That's something you're never hearing of. Usually what it means is the offense was bad, or something was bad on that side. Like, if you're hearing about defensive players in seven-on-sevens, it sounds like it's a good pick — and he signed his contract yesterday. So that's the last person the Broncos needed to lock up on the rookie deals. Yep. Love it. But look, guys, we're going to break these down a whole lot more as we get into the weeks getting closer to training camp here. Obviously, all of us are dying for real Broncos news to start coming out. But the good news is we're just less than a month away for that to start happening, when the rookies report and the veterans report a week after that at the end of July. So get ready for it, guys. I know we're trying to get by and get to the worst part of the offseason, but we're almost there. So one thing I do want to talk to you about lastly here, before we do closing thoughts — the announcement of Sean Payton getting a five-year contract extension, man. I looked back and realized, talking about numbers, that there are some surprising stats here. The Broncos have not extended a head coach's contract in 14 years. John Fox was the last one to get a contract extension. That was more of a restructure. And we saw that work out. It's been 14 years since we've had a head coach long enough to extend them. I feel like there are some things to pay attention to in that. Like, Kubiak is like, I'm not coming back. Right. Yeah. And that makes sense. There are a couple of things like that with health issues. Now, like Vance, and Nathaniel Hackett, and honestly I can't even remember — Fangio. Yeah, it's hard to think about everybody that was the head coach during that time frame. Kubiak, Fangio — but there's a couple of one-and-two-and-dones in there. Yep. For sure. So, yeah. So what do you think — Sean Payton being around. One of those things, I don't know if he wins a Super Bowl, he could just call it there before the five years even is up. Here's the thing — the best-case scenario, and this is maybe not a popular opinion for a lot of people: we go to the Super Bowl this year, Sean hangs them up, and then you go to your Davis Webb — especially if the offense is doing what it's supposed to do. Because, I mean, selfishly, if we're supposed to have this wunderkind offensive coordinator, we're going to lose him after this. If this year works out the way it's supposed to with him as offensive coordinator, he's not going to be on the team next year. Really? Hmm. See, I see the logic behind that. My only thought is — the reason he's not really a head coach right now — I mean, we know officially he wasn't offered anything, but he even kind of alluded to it in his press conference last week, saying he's so happy to be under Sean Payton. And that was a big reason for him staying. And I'm wondering if the Broncos are like, look — you stay here in Denver, we're going to take care of you. You've seen what the ownership has done the last three years or whatever. We take care of our people. And Sean isn't going to be a head coach forever. We're going to need a head coach before too long, and we're looking for continuity. You stay here, it works out, you've got a head coaching job right here. I don't know. That's kind of how I see it. When has that happened? When has that — look, Eric — it could happen, I'm disappointed by all of it. Like, Eric being in Kansas City, everybody was saying, hey, Andy Reid's got to retire eventually. He's still the coach. Doug Pederson — he's bumped around a couple of places. Oh, man. I mean, from what we've seen with other ownership outside of the Broncos, they're not willing to give coaches long periods of time. So there are six to eight head coaching positions and jobs that are going to open up next year, and the year after that, and the year after that. The Cardinals are probably like this stat you just gave — I'm curious, the last time the Cardinals gave a head coach an extension, right? Yeah. Everybody's looking for a new coach. That's my only thought about that when it comes to Webb. It shows you the vision that the Walton-Penner Group has for the Denver Broncos. They brought continuity on the team. They brought continuity to the GM job. They brought continuity to the coaching job. It's just the way that they see things. I mean, take a look at the most successful sports franchises — specifically in the NFL. And what do they have in common? The Ravens for the last 15 to 20 years, the Steelers for the last 15 to 20 years, the Patriots era with Bill Belichick — it's not flipping coaches and flipping offensive coordinators every other month or every other year. It's showing that, hey, people want to come here, we're going to keep you, and we're going to keep you happy. So, yes. I mean, Sean definitely deserves an extension. As everybody knows how I feel about us trading a draft pick specifically to get him — I'm not saying he hasn't done a good job, I'm just saying — we haven't won a Super Bowl yet. I mean, every other coach that was traded for won a Super Bowl. Just saying. Yeah, and that's the last thing he has to do. He's shown he can get a quarterback. He's shown it wasn't just the Drew Brees thing — kind of like Tom Brady really made Belichick look good. And I think we saw that after Brady left. Not to say Belichick didn't, you know — but I think there was a lot of Tom Brady in that too. But Sean Payton has shown he can draft a new guy, build up a team from scratch in record time — when you talk about how just terrible the community was within the locker room and everything like that. But anyway, it's just fun to know that we've got some continuity. And things are just looking good for the Broncos right now. So do you want to go back here — a couple of comments from Sean: who are the starting linebackers going to be? I'm going to say, again, looking at broncosandbourbon.com right here, it's probably the same ones you saw last year. So, Jonathon Cooper and — we're just going to wait to see how that plays out. But you've got Singleton, Strnad, Bonitto. I mean, Spotty, you see anything different? No, it's — they paid Strnad to stay, they paid Singleton to stay, Murdoch is raw, Dorian York is raw. We haven't really brought anybody else in for that. There's a chance we might bring in some more veteran guys just to shore it up and be a little more confident there, but pretty much everybody — I mean, damn near everybody we saw on defense last year, that's probably exactly what we're going to see. It'll be nice to have Brandon Jones back. It'll be nice to have — I mean, we know what Hufanga's going to do. Riley — we brought McMillian back. I think the only difference we'll see is that we're going to see Jahdae Barron a little more than we did last year, which is what we need, considering that we're going to lose either Riley Moss or Ja'Quan McMillian or both, depending on how things go. That's probably the best thing — the defensive continuity is the greatest thing you could potentially have. This is going to be the third year in a row that this defense is damn near the same. And that's a defense that had 50-some sacks one year and the next year they had 60-some. Yeah. Not a bad group to bring back. I would completely agree with that, man. Not at all. Okay, guys, we're going to do some closing thoughts here in a second. So stick around. Don't go away quite yet. First off, our website, Broncos and Bourbon, is up. And if you haven't signed up yet — I'm sorry, you missed the free sign-up period, which was all of last year. It now costs money to sign up on the site, but don't worry — it's okay, it's easy. It's a one-dollar lifetime, one-time payment that gets you free access to the entire website and all of its features forever. You never have to worry about it again. So don't worry if you missed out on the free session — go over there, just drop us a buck, that's fine, and then you get free access to everything. The price is going to go up to $5 at the beginning of the season. And if we start getting a lot of traffic, we'll even go to an annual subscription as well, instead of a one-time lifetime payment. So head on over there to broncosandbourbon.com right now. Great place for all the articles we publish throughout the year, our videos, our podcasts, a whole fan section for you to interact with daily topics. And we'll have a pick'em challenge throughout the season with weekly and season-ending prizes for whoever does best. And us guys here at the Bourbon, Broncos, and No BS show are going to be participating as well. Play against us and see how you do with your pick'ems and everything. So, yeah, head on over to broncosandbourbon.com, guys. Check that out. We are live every Tuesday night at 7 p.m. Mountain Time. So head on over here. We get through the rest of the offseason together. And once training camp starts — I know that's not everybody's thing, but it's pretty fun when you look at it in a different light than you do the regular season. So we will be here through all of it. Good news, bad news, whatever it is — you can count on us. So head on over and make sure you're following us on all of our different social medias: Facebook, YouTube, Instagram. Spotty, I'm not going to lie — I was bored the other night, and I was like, I'm going to do it, I'm going to look it up, I wonder if this is still a thing. And I was this close to creating us an actual good old MySpace page. That's still a thing? It is now a dating website. Oh. So Bourbon, Broncos, and No BS almost had a MySpace dating website page, but — we'll just leave that one off the list for now. But pretty much everywhere — arguing, sounds like a drunken arguing, just Jarrett and some John and some David and Spotty. I just — yikes. Well, wherever you're following social media stuff, we're probably there. Make sure you look us up and follow us, guys. The season's going to be here before you know it, and this is the time to get in on everything while things are a little slow, a little quiet. So like I said, head on over, sign up on the website so you can take care of that. It also gets you the coupon codes for all the merch we push out and everything like that. So it'll pay for itself in no time. Okay, let's do some closing thoughts before we head on out here and get through yet another week of no football, but one week closer nonetheless. Spotty, one — thank you very much for joining me again, as always. But here we are, a month away from training camp. How are you feeling? What are you thinking? And, you know, lots of things to consider after we've seen what happened this offseason. One of the things I'm thinking about is that I'm looking forward to seeing these young talents that we've been fostering over the last couple years. We know a lot of them are going to get some extra playing time — some because guys left, some because some dudes are stupid on our team. I'm excited to see the Q Robinsons, the Savion Joneses. I want to see more of Jahdae Barron. I'm really excited to see Jonah Coleman — we already know that as a rookie. This team has done an incredible job of adding more guys and retaining the ones we've had before. Then it just seems we find one or two extra gems for the whole entire group. We know what we have in every other player, but what we don't know is those young guys, and how they contribute to the team this year is what's really going to be the difference maker. We already know what Surtain and Bonitto and Bo and Courtland and Waddle can do — they're going to continue to do what they do day in and day out — but truly, to set yourself apart, you need the next man to step up. And that's those young guys for us. So over the next couple of months, they're probably going to be the ones that we really see a lot more of in training camp, a lot more of in those preseason games. Let's just get to it, honestly — let's fast-forward a little bit to August. But I'm excited to see how the Broncos look, and of course, if we see any semblance of what they can be, we already know that this Super Bowl window is going to be even bigger for us. Yes, sir. I love it, man. There's a lot of positivity going on around this team right now, guys. And I think it's very warranted. It'll be interesting to see what the narrative around the Broncos will be from the rest of the NFL this year. Last year was all about us being frauds. Well, you can only claim that for so long before you're like, what are you talking about, dude? So what's it going to be this year? We'll see. But Bo's feeling — sounding — pretty confident about his ankle. We've got a head coach for the next five years at least signed, this big up-and-comer for our offensive coordinator, the defensive coordinator is still there in place and he's been doing fantastic since that one little particular game down in Florida a few years ago. Things are just looking really good, man. And you should have every reason to get excited, because this is going to be one hell of a ride. If you thought last year was good, I think this year is going to be even better. Maybe with a few less heart attacks. We can hope. We can hope. Oh, my. Showing up to work hungover on Mondays because I was anxiety drinking is never good. Yeah. No, I don't think you're alone in that. Yeah. Cool beans. Okay, guys. Well, with that being said, we're going to head on out. Make sure you visit the website, broncosandbourbon.com. Get in your wallet — it's cheap, and lifetime access for one payment. And we'll see you back here next Tuesday at 7 p.m. Mountain Time for another episode of Bourbon, Broncos, and No BS. But I don't know, Spotty — I've got nothing left to say other than end this show as we always do, with a very strong Go Broncos! Go Broncos! Take care, guys. We will see you next week. We'll be right back.