Denver Broncos: Early training camp 53-man roster prediction

Denver Broncos early training camp 53-man roster prediction.

Denver Broncos 2020 training camp is officially underway with plenty of players already finding ways to stand out among the nearly-80 player crowd.

Among those standouts, of course, are rookie wide receivers Jerry Jeudy and KJ Hamler, who have both dazzled with their incredible speed, quickness, footwork, and big-play ability.

The NFL roster carousel is going to be fascinating in 2020.

When the NFL and NFLPA struck a new collective bargaining agreement earlier in 2020 (remember that?), the biggest immediate roster changes were an increase from 10 to 12 practice squad players (a figure that would increase to 14 in 2022) as well as the opportunity for teams to have 48 players on the gameday roster instead of just 46.

There was also a new change added to roster rules where players could be brought up off the practice squad a couple of times during the season without being made subject to waivers.

There is also now a possibility of promoting players from the practice squad up to 90 minutes before a game instead of the day before.

With COVID-19 affecting the sports world so substantially, the NFL amended its new roster rules for the 2020 season to give teams even more flexibility, and perhaps some of these rules will be adopted going forward.

Notably, practice squads will now be up to 16 players, and four of those players can be protected each week by every team. Not only are practice squads going up by six players total, but NFL teams have the option of having six players on the practice squad who would normally not qualify because they are vested veterans.

Not that it would ever happen, but the NFL rules would allow for a player like Von Miller, for instance, to be on a practice squad this year. Again, Von Miller would never make it through to be signed to the practice squad, but the point is that up to six vested veterans can now be on the practice squad.

Even more notable than the practice squad rules? There is no limit to the number of players that can be brought up off of injured reserve after three weeks.

From my understanding of the roster rules, there does not appear to be any sort of rule stating that teams will not have to cut at least 17 players from their roster or make 17 roster moves to get down to 53 from their current 80 (or less). That means that anyone the Broncos want to put on the practice squad, they will first have to subject to waivers.

After they have been subjected to waivers the first time, the Broncos can re-sign up to 16 guys to the practice squad, and each week they can protect four of those players from signing with other teams.

With all of that said, roster building could be different in 2020 than it has been in the past.

Even though we are in the early stages of Broncos training camp this year, how might the 53-man roster look initially to open the season?

It could be quite a bit different than this time even just a month ago based on what has gone on in the early portion of camp.