What the Denver Broncos’ Bye Week Looks Like

Broncos head coach John Fox during the second half against the Washington Redskins at Sports Authority Field at Mile High. The Broncos won 45-21. (Chris Humphreys-USA TODAY Sports)

It’s hard to believe, but we’re midway through the NFL season. Time flies when you’re having fun, huh?

The Denver Broncos (7-1) have their bye at the perfect point in the season. This week is a light week for the team with two non-padded practices on Tuesday and Wednesday. Then the team (coaching staff included) will have Thursday through Sunday off, which is mandated by the league during a team’s bye week. The Broncos will resume their normal activities on Monday.

The coaching staff made nice indentations in their chairs on Monday as they watched enough film to make even Woody Allen’s head turn. They used the day to self-scout for areas that need to be cleaned up.

“We’re cleaning up the game,” John Fox said. “We also had to clean up our Oakland game, which was on a short week when we played them. We hadn’t graded that. So we cleaned all of that up. The rest of the day, the coaching staff will go over self-scout things, areas to improve—we’ll do some film study.”

The team will turn the page back to their training camp days, and go Broncos vs. Broncos during the two practices this week rather than running plays against or as an opponent.

The key for the Broncos is to get the banged up guys healthy. Starting tight end Julius Thomas is nursing a sprained ankle. Safety Duke Ihenacho also injured his ankle against the Redskins so he’ll be held out this week.

Champ Bailey won’t go with his foot injury. Orlando Franklin will get some more time to recover from his ankle injury despite playing on Sunday. Some of the older guys like Peyton Manning and Wes Welker likely won’t see many reps this week if at all.

The Broncos need to use this time wisely to heal, rest, and stay out of trouble. The team is at San Diego right after the bye, then they play the undefeated Chiefs twice in three weeks, and a trip to New England in between it all.

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