# Denver Broncos 2026 Outlook: The Field Has Stopped Doubting the Broncos, Which Is New

*Published 2026-09-03 — MissedTakes*

Denver went 14-3 in 2025 and made the playoffs, per [the site's team page](/nfl/teams/broncos) — the best record in a decade-long stretch that includes 10-7 in 2024 and five straight losing seasons before that. Sean Payton is the head coach, George Paton the general manager.

That 2025 season is the backdrop for everything the field is saying now, because the field got it badly wrong. Our packet's collective-miss table has the Broncos as one of the biggest whiffs of 2025: six graded win-total calls, and the field came in **five wins under** what Denver actually did. [Nick Wright](/pundits/nick-wright) said in August 2025 that "the Denver Broncos are not winning ten games," and separately that 7-10 was likelier than 10-7. Both graded 0. [Brady Quinn](/pundits/brady-quinn) had them at 7-10: also 0.

The site holds 27 Broncos win-total calls, eight of them graded, at an average accuracy of **22.5**. It holds 23 division-winner calls, 15 graded, at **100**. That gap is the story of Denver punditry in one line: everyone eventually got the division right and almost nobody got the size of the season right.

![Broncos punditry, graded, by claim type](/posts/visuals/cd5cfb01-c105-4f06-8b6c-11fa0bd3aa44.png)

## Quarterbacks

Bo Nix is the starter and nobody on the site disputes it. The interesting split is on direction. [Geoff Schwartz](/pundits/geoff-schwartz), asked on Aug. 27 whether Nix steps forward or back in year three, [chose "step back"](/opinions/6a87d70d-574b-4958-b19e-1e7d1edc2ca3), arguing Nix is a finished product who doesn't push the ball downfield. [Rachel Nichols](/pundits/rachel-nichols) went the other way on Sept. 2: ["Is he a top 15 quarterback in the league, Rachel? I think he is."](/opinions/4263b330-84e6-4436-b7ce-e0e8b1f61b24) [Derek Brown](/pundits/derek-brown) is the boldest — ["We're going to see the best year of his career. Bet the long shot odds for him at MVP."](/opinions/d6e49275-e4cf-4d86-917d-1d29252c1d0a) [Pat Fitzmaurice](/pundits/pat-fitzmaurice) is the most restrained: ["a relatively safe floor but might have a limited ceiling. Consider him a low-end QB1 or high-end QB2."](/opinions/19624197-916b-4bba-9ef3-90033d4a59ce)

The graded Nix file is small — six calls — but instructive. [Chris Brockman](/pundits/chris-brockman) predicted 4,500 yards and 35 touchdowns in June 2025; the yardage call graded 74.71 (actual 3,931), the touchdown call 42.86 (actual 25), and his companion "MVP finalist" call graded 0. [John Middlekauff](/pundits/john-middlekauff) pegged Nix as a top-15 quarterback by passing yards and got 41.67 for it — Nix finished eighth, so the miss was in being too cautious. [Mike Harmon](/pundits/mike-harmon)'s late-season sleeper call on Nix hit 100: QB7 finish, QB7 bar.

The backup job is the least contested thing in Denver. Multiple writers have Jarrett Stidham holding QB2 over Sam Ehlinger — Chad Jensen called it "a fourth straight season of Stidham as QB2 behind Bo Nix" and elsewhere described it as the "non-competition" for the job; Bob Morris wrote that "Stidham has a firm lead." Jensen also expects Ehlinger to be cut and hit the waiver wire. Note the site's warning label here: depth-chart calls carry a **93.3** average accuracy across the five graded Broncos examples but a skill delta of just **1.0** — being right that the starter starts beats nothing.

So: no genuine QB competition, per the field. Just disagreement about the ceiling.

## The receiver room

This is the loudest room on the roster — 115 Broncos WR takes, the most of any position — and it is organized around one trade. Jaylen Waddle is now the No. 1, per Jared Dubin: "Waddle has the potential to explode as the No. 1 receiver in Sean Payton's offense." Derek Brown [plants a flag](/opinions/28a6e7f1-25e5-4bad-a7f3-e8c7d3ca934b): "You can easily draft him as a WR2 for your teams this season that has WR1 upside." Douglas Clawson goes furthest — "at least 130 grabs this year." Kurt Blakeway has 1,100-plus yards and nine touchdowns.

The flip side is Courtland Sutton, who has become a consensus fade. FantasyPros: "primed to be one of this year's biggest fantasy busts as his target share collapses in a suddenly crowded Denver Broncos offense." Mike Fanelli says "the trade crushed Courtland Sutton's fantasy value." [Nathan Jahnke](/pundits/nathan-jahnke) calls him "a frustrating, touchdown-dependent play." [Andrew Erickson](/pundits/andrew-erickson) lists both Sutton and Jerry Jeudy as busts and Pat Bryant as a sleeper. Erickson's bust calls grade well — 88.89 accuracy over 11 graded — and his sleeper calls do not: 44.67 over 37.

That matters because this room is where Denver punditry has historically gone to die. The 17 graded Broncos WR takes average **48.9 accuracy with a skill delta of -31.1** — the worst of any Denver position group on the site. The reason is Marvin Mims Jr. Four separate pundits — [Rich Eisen](/opinions/f94f8499-af74-4a8d-a688-fd08cd52bb3c), [Jake Ciely](/opinions/6b5a40bc-e349-48a1-ad37-18ee448ebe75), Erickson and [Joe Pisapia](/opinions/cc48dc34-a7bd-4ef5-a626-fa92222ec60b) — made him a 2025 sleeper. He finished WR70 against a WR52 bar. All four graded 0 with a -200 skill delta. Mims is now, per Jahnke, possibly "fourth on the depth chart." Read the Waddle enthusiasm with that in mind.

## The running backs

J.K. Dobbins leads the room — Richard Janvrin: "He'll get the bulk of the work over RJ Harvey and Jonah Coleman" — but almost all the noise is about the fourth-round rookie behind him. Jonah Coleman is close to a unanimous sleeper: Derek Brown ("a wonderful late-round dart"), Mike Fanelli ("my favorite sleeper running back candidate and someone I want to draft in every league"), Nic Bodiford ("built to handle a three-down workload"), Erickson, Chad Workman, and FantasyPros' expert consensus, which ranks him the No. 1 running back sleeper in the field. [Walt](/pundits/walt) notes "growing speculation that Coleman — not R.J. Harvey — would take over for J.K. Dobbins in the event of an injury."

Brown's own record splits the difference: 52.25 accuracy on 41 graded sleeper calls, against 96.67 on depth-chart calls. The Broncos RB file overall is the healthiest on the roster — 12 graded takes, **69.1** accuracy, **+55.6** skill. Erickson has Dobbins as a bust; FantasyPros' consensus has Harvey 15 spots below his draft cost.

No fullback takes on file.

## Tight ends

Twenty-five takes, four graded, and the graded four average **39.4** accuracy with a **-23.0** skill delta — most of them old mock-draft picks rather than anything about the current room. The live claims are modest. Evan Engram and Adam Trautman are set as the top two (Morris; Jensen calls the fight for the two spots behind them a battle that "rages on"). Jensen expects Engram to clear 100 targets under new coordinator Davis Webb; Fanelli expects a repeat of last year's TE29, 6.4 points per game; [Walt](/opinions/2514bfdd-c8d1-4282-8b1a-1ef7f0b79f30) projects 54 catches, 520 yards, two touchdowns. That is a genuine three-way disagreement about the same player, and all of it is still pending.

## The offensive line

Thin, and thin in a specific way. The site holds 11 offensive-tackle takes and two on guards. The two graded tackle calls both concern Garett Bolles as a first-team All-Pro — [JP Acosta](/opinions/660e3494-2b0b-415e-beb7-9e3bf3464e30) and Pushing the Pile both said yes, he did not make it, and both graded **0** with a -100 skill delta. That is the whole graded Denver O-line record: two calls, both wrong, both about an award.

The pending material is camp bookkeeping. Jensen and Zack Kelberman both had Calvin Throckmorton working as first-team center with Luke Wattenberg and Alex Forsyth unavailable. Jensen on rookie Kage Casey: "Casey is primed to succeed him as the starting left guard." Nobody on this site has published a checkable claim about how this line will actually block.

## The defensive line

Eight edge takes, 11 interior, and four of the eight graded DE calls are mock-draft picks on players who went undrafted or elsewhere — average accuracy on the DE group is **11.5**. There is no graded record here worth leaning on.

What there is: agreement that Zach Allen, D.J. Jones and Malcolm Roach are the starting trio, and a real disagreement about who replaces John Franklin-Myers. Erick Trickel says Eyioma Uwazurike "could be poised for the JFM job, at least on early downs." D.J. Jones himself says "I believe Malcolm Roach is going to take that JFM role and run with it." Two writers — Cody Rourke and Sayre Bedinger — expect Allen to make the biggest climb of any Bronco on next year's Locked On Top 100, Rourke pegging him between 25 and 35.

## The secondary

Eighteen cornerback takes, 27 safety takes, five graded between them, and the graded ones are mostly awards. The one that landed: [Richard Sherman](/pundits/richard-sherman) called Pat Surtain II Defensive Player of the Year for 2024 and got **100**, with a +100 skill delta against a naive pick of Myles Garrett. The one that didn't: Acosta's first-team All-Pro call on Surtain for 2025 graded 0.

The live question is Jahdae Barron versus Riley Moss on the outside. [Gregg Rosenthal](/pundits/gregg-rosenthal): "there has to be a world where he's just a better player than Riley Moss... Baron just takes that job no matter what they're saying publicly." [Rob Rang](/opinions/9433cd9f-2cf7-44f6-9a69-cc08eadf6d22): "I think Barron could beat out Moss on the outside this year." Jensen disagrees flatly: "Moss's job isn't in doubt. He's the No. 2 cornerback." Rosenthal's depth-chart accuracy is 92.81 over 26 graded, with a skill delta of -2.22 — high hit rate, no edge over the obvious answer, which is exactly what a contested job like this tests.

At safety the field is unanimous on Talanoa Hufanga and Brandon Jones as starters, with Taylor Rapp's return — Payton himself said there's "a better than good chance" — muddying the No. 3 job behind them.

## Special teams

Effectively nothing. The site holds exactly one kicker take and one punter take, both from the same Cody Roark 53-man projection, and both amount to "Wil Lutz and Jeremy Crawshaw are on the roster." No long-snapper takes, no return-game calls beyond Mims's depth-chart standing. Nobody has said anything checkable about Denver's special teams, and we are not going to pretend otherwise.

## The rookie class

Ground truth from the 2026 draft: DT Tyler Onyedim (3-66, Texas A&M), RB Jonah Coleman (4-108, Washington), OT Kage Casey (4-111, Boise State), TE Justin Joly (5-152, NC State), S Miles Scott (7-246, Illinois), TE Dallen Bentley (7-256, Utah), LB Red Murdock (7-257, Buffalo).

Punditry has attached itself almost entirely to Coleman (covered above) and to whether the late picks stick. Jensen after the preseason opener on Murdock: "He's making this roster." Kelberman notes Murdock sits behind "locked-in veteran starters" Alex Singleton and Justin Strnad. Jahnke expects Joly to make the roster "as a fifth-round pick" while noting he didn't enter the preseason game until late in the second quarter. Rourke on Scott: "I have a really strong feeling right now that Myles Scott will edge out Tyson Anderson for a spot." Casey draws the boldest projection — Jensen's starting-left-guard succession call. Onyedim gets one mention, as a likely roster body. Nothing on Bentley beyond roster projections. PFF's Broncos preview, per Gordon McGuinness, "expects limited rookie contributions."

## The overall outlook

The site's 2026 win-total consensus table is empty for this season — nothing has resolved yet, so there is no field average to quote. What we have is the raw calls, and they cluster tightly.

- Hayden Winks: 12 wins
- Mark Schlereth: "I'd be surprised that they didn't win twelve"
- [Nate Tice](/opinions/a9392488-fa13-4f06-8219-696793fbcdc0): 11
- Moe Moton: 11-6, and a division title
- Nick Wright: 11-6, repeatedly
- Rourke and Bedinger, in July: 13-4
- Warren Sharp's model: 9.7

Every over-lean on file went the same way. [Simon Hunter](/opinions/8ce03bc2-d538-49d6-ab30-850ffa0074d3) in March: "one of my bigger, bigger bets I've made this offseason... another team to get to eleven twelve wins." [Chad Millman](/opinions/124f73ac-c525-4ec7-ac63-df74ecafd537): over 9.5. Gregg Rosenthal, twice, including [Sept. 2](/opinions/38be380a-c141-440c-89b8-d40b89173db0): "an 11-win wildcard team or a 10-win wildcard team." Rosenthal's win-total record is 48.5 accuracy over 18 graded with a +8.04 skill delta — modest, but positive, which is more than Wright can say at 43.63 and **-10.42** over 50.

On the division, the pattern from 2025 repeats. [Daniel Jeremiah](/pundits/daniel-jeremiah) in March: Denver "will be the unquestioned favorite in this division." [Greg Jennings](/opinions/c7291c60-8966-4e8f-af4f-7168ca0d2100), [TJ Jefferson](/opinions/e9bbe3e1-456d-469a-95f2-cbc942938399), Ephraim Salaam, [Willie Colon](/opinions/9945d859-647a-437c-97d3-1d9dbdd4a844), [Pat Gustavson](/opinions/4988d6e6-42e7-4b29-abbe-87fe59169a4e) and Acosta all have Denver repeating. But the two most recent calls on file break the other way: Wright now has Kansas City reclaiming the West with Denver second, and Brockman has the Chargers first with Denver "neck and neck." Both still have Denver in the playoffs — as does everyone else who has weighed in.

Worth flagging on the division picks: last year's graded Broncos division calls all scored 100, but the skill credit ranged from 156 to 200 because the naive answer was Kansas City. This year the naive answer is Denver, so picking them again earns very little. Note also that Wright's career division-winner record is 12.5 accuracy over 14 graded — the worst line on an otherwise respectable ledger.

Conference calls are where the field is furthest out on a limb: Diante Lee ("Right now, they're my pick to win the AFC"), Acosta ("this team should not only win the AFC, but they could win the Super Bowl"), Brockman ("the team to beat in the AFC for 2026") and Eisen. The site's 11 Broncos conference-champion calls, seven graded, average **50** accuracy — every one of them the half-credit awarded for a team that reached the conference final and lost. That is exactly what happened in January, when Wright, Sherman, [Cynthia Frelund](/pundits/cynthia-frelund), [Colin Cowherd](/pundits/colin-cowherd) and [Jamie Erdahl](/pundits/jamie-erdahl) all had Denver in the Super Bowl and Denver lost the AFC Championship game.

The honest summary: this is now a consensus team, and consensus is where skill scores go to zero. The field spent 2025 five wins too low on Denver and has spent 2026 correcting hard in the other direction. The graded record says nobody in this file has yet demonstrated an ability to call the size of a Broncos season.