A Different Twist On The Broncos Run Defense

With all this talk about billboards, Kyle Orton, and injuries, one would think that practice this week has been a bit distracting. Well, get that idea out of your head.

The Broncos are as focused as ever, and on defense, their focus is narrowed to stopping the run.

The Bengals have a great power back in Cedric Benson who racked up 121 yards on 25 carries plus one touchdown last week. Rewind even further back to 2010, and the Broncos are dealing with a back that ranked 13th in rushing yards, sandwiched in between Darren McFadden and LeSean McCoy, respectively.

For the Broncos who ranked 31st in run defense last year, and stayed in that same position after week one, the team knows where its attention should be.

“When you give up that many yards rushing, especially when you play a team that’s a good running team, that’s what their plan is going to be.” defensive coordinator Dennis Allen said.

What is the Broncos plan, defensively then? Without getting too specific Allen said,

“We’ve got to shut down the run. We’ve got to see if we can’t get out to a lead. Then we can put our pass rush on them a little bit.”

The Broncos may have given up 190 yards on the ground to the Oakland Raiders, but Allen has a different perspective on it than just attributing those large numbers on the ground to an awful defense.

“It’s just consistency. When you look at the game the other night, we played the run real well in a lot of situations and then there’s a few times where we let the ball get outside, and we missed a few tackles,” Allen said. “The next thing you know, the guy’s got a bunch of yards.”

The Bengals know where the Broncos’ weakness is and they will try to exploit that from the start. Why have a rookie QB heaving balls downfield when the Broncos rush defense is exposed at the moment.

A hand will be played and all cards are known. It will be a battle of the coaches initially.

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