The Denver Broncos season is finished, and it’s time to explore what moves John Elway and company can make at the most important position, quarterback.
Since Peyton Manning retired, the Denver Broncos have been forced to turn to a plethora of quarterbacks, none of whom left the faithful Broncos fan base very inspired.
The first two years post-Manning saw Gary Kubiak and Vance Joseph try to win with the likes of Trevor Siemian, Paxton Lynch, and Brock Osweiler. Tired of waiting for Paxton Lynch to make any sort of leap, Denver spent the entire 2018 offseason address the most important position in the NFL.
Unfortunately, a year later, I can safely say the position is still a gigantic concern. Now, I’ll admit I was skeptically optimistic about Case Keenum. I was impressed with how he performed in Minnesota, and I felt like he was entering a good situation with Bill Musgrave as his offensive coordinator and a revamped offensive line.
Now with the season over, John Elway will be attempting to answer the exact same question he’s been working on since taking on the General Manager role, who is the long-term answer at quarterback?
Here are five options the Denver Broncos can explore at the quarterback position.
Case Keenum
Not everything that went wrong this season can be blamed on the veteran signal caller, but he does deserve some of the blame.
Take the first Kansas City Chiefs matchup where Keenum missed a wide-open Demaryius Thomas for a game-winning touchdown. Who knows how impactful that could have been to Denver’s season, just that one simple play?
There was also his penchant for taking drive-killing sacks (again, not all his fault), and his tendency to throw poorly-timed interceptions like in Sunday’s game when he threw an interception in the end zone against the Los Angeles Chargers.
That being said, there are some positives to what Case did this season and why he could improve next year. For example, there was the three-game winning streak where Keenum played mistake-free ball (three touchdowns and 550 yards) and had Denver vying for a playoff position with four games remaining. He also had a fantastic repertoire with Emmanuel Sanders (71 receptions, 868 yards and four touchdowns in 12 games), who was clearly missed the last quarter of the season when Denver lost four straight.
Lastly, with the firing of Vance Joseph, it’s important to realize there will likely be a new offensive coordinator in addition to a new head coach. What was most frustrating about Keenum’s performance this season was that it felt like he wasn’t being put in a position to succeed from the beginning.
Bill Musgrave ignored what made Keenum successful the previous year (short, up-tempo passing game) and instead had the offense attempting to move with more intricate, long-developing play calls.
Keeping Keenum is the most likely route at this point. He has one year left of his two-year contract, and his dead money would be $10 million if let go, and John Elway does a good job of monitoring and controlling the Denver Broncos dead money situation.
Moreover, bringing a new coach could bring a change in the offensive attack, and finally, this would be a long-term approach that has Denver looking towards the 2020 NFL Draft where there is expected to be quite a few high-quality quarterback prospects.
Matt Stafford
First, it’s important to note that getting past his monstrous cap hit to the Lions if he were traded is an extremely difficult task. His five-year, $135 million contract comes with a $30 million hit against Detroit if he were to be traded. So again, this is unlikely.
That being said, Matt Stafford will be turning 31 and entering his 11th season as the starter of the Detroit Lions, and to date, he’s done nothing overly significant. The Lions have yet to win a playoff game since he took over back in 2009, and what’s more concerning is that he had a significant regression this past season which was just one part of the reason the Lions are picking eighth in the draft with a 6-10 record.
This year was Stafford’s worst yardage total, second lowest touchdown total, and second worst QBR in the last eight seasons.
Stafford, however, would represent an improvement over Case Keenum, and he fits the ideal quarterback mold that John Elway looks for. In fact, his game is very similar to John Elway’s too.
Moreover, I am willing to chalk this season up to the fact that the offense, in general, wasn’t clicking and Detroit was more than okay shipping off Golden Tate midseason after losing Eric Ebron in free agency. At halfback, there’s the often injured Kerryon Johnson and ageless wonder LeGarrette Blount so again, nothing to write home about.
It would likely take a 1st and a 4th, and the cap piece would be a fun puzzle, but this would signal to Denver Broncos fans everywhere that Elway thinks this team is just a quarterback away.
Teddy Bridgewater
Teddy Bridgewater is an interesting option here for a couple of reasons. First, if he were to come to Denver it would be like a little Minnesota Vikings reunion circa 2017. Second, the Denver Broncos had their chance at Bridgewater in the 2018 offseason but chose to not pursue him quite possibly because of his injury concerns or it could have been because they weren’t looking for a quarterback like Teddy.
If the injuries were the concern, he’s proved that is a thing of the past this past preseason when suiting up for the New York Jets. To me, it appeared the old Teddy was back.
His lone start in New Orleans, however, wasn’t exactly awe-inspiring. Granted, the Saints were sitting a lot of their players, but Bridgewater finished the game 14 for 22 for 118 yards and one touchdown in the Saints 33-14 loss to Carolina.
Denver pursuing Teddy would essentially signal that they feel he could be the franchise player with the Denver Broncos that Minnesota thought they were getting when they selected him in the end of the first round. It would, to be honest, to be a pretty low risk, high reward pick up if the cap numbers can get right.
With a few teams in need of a quarterback this offseason and very limited supply, Bridgewater could be a hot commodity.
Veteran retread (Joe Flacco, Tyrod Taylor, Ryan Fitzpatrick)
Although these are more viable options than the two above, this is probably my least favorite route that the Denver Broncos could be heading and that’s essentially to do the exact same thing they did last year with Case Keenum. They would be spending money on quarterbacks that have low ceilings and small margins for error.
Starting with Joe Flacco, this guy is quickly on his way out in Baltimore with Lamar Jackson running the show. What’s surprising to me is how long Flacco stuck in the starter’s role to begin with. He essentially turned a fantastic 2013 postseason (remember, the one where he beat the Denver Broncos?), and an average 2014 season which saw him post his best QBR of his career (68.2) into a lifelong career with Baltimore.
Flacco isn’t very good and wouldn’t be worth the high cost of employment especially when we already have one below average veteran running the show.
Then there’s Tyrod Taylor, which very well could be something that piques John Elway’s interest. Denver wanted to bring Taylor in as a backup to Manning a ways back, and they also were in talks with Buffalo about trading for him. Neither plan worked and Taylor is about to be a free agent.
While Taylor’s talent warrants consideration here, it’s valuable to remember just how porous Cleveland’s offense was under Taylor vs Baker Mayfield. Bringing Taylor in would basically be a more talented, less effective game manager than Case Keenum.
Ryan Fitzpatrick would be an interesting choice because it was rumored Denver was interested in him as well. Despite his age (36), he showed this past season that he can still sling the ball around quite a bit. To be honest, it would be a little more exciting having Fitzpatrick at the helm than Case, but that would be moving in the wrong direction and signal that Denver is just waiting to pick their franchise guy in 2020.
Draft a 2019 Quarterback
While it’s likely the Denver Broncos use a 2019 NFL Draft pick on a quarterback at some point, I’m speaking specifically here about them using it in the first round on a guy like Dwayne Haskins (who has yet to declare), or Daniel Jones (who has declared), or Drew Lock.
As it stands today, Denver’s in an interesting situation. They again possess a high draft pick (10th overall), and their quarterback position remains a mystery, but there isn’t exactly the abundance of quarterback talent that entered last year’s draft class. Sure, there are some interesting prospects, but as it stands right now I highly doubt Haskins, Jones, or Lock will have a higher draft grade than any of the first four quarterbacks taken in the 2018 draft.
Another interesting component of this is that many of the teams at the top already have their quarterback of the future so Denver would really only need to worry about the New York Giants and Jacksonville Jaguars at this point (Giants sit at 6th and Jaguars sit at 7th). While it’s very early in the draft process and there are a lot of things could change, quarterbacks are always valued high in the draft so even with Denver at 10, they would need to consider moving up to get their quarterback of the future.
As we have seen this past year though, the cost of moving up can be worth it if you can get your franchise guy, but will John Elway be willing to swing for the fences again in what could very well be one of his last attempts at hand-picking Denver’s franchise guy?
Only time will tell, but one thing is for certain, there is going to be a lot of discussion about the future of the Denver Bronco’s quarterback position this offseason. Again.