Denver Broncos: Predicting roster cuts ahead of Saturday deadline

Denver Broncos training camp (Photo by Justin Edmonds/Getty Images)
Denver Broncos training camp (Photo by Justin Edmonds/Getty Images)
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Denver Broncos, Broncos roster
Denver Broncos training camp (Photo by Justin Edmonds/Getty Images)

Predicting Denver Broncos roster cuts ahead of Saturday’s deadline.

The COVID-19 pandemic already forced the Denver Broncos and every other NFL team to cut to a roster maximum of just 80 players before on-field activities started in July.

Now, it’s time for the Denver Broncos and all 31 other teams to make difficult decisions about which players to cut or move off of their 80-player roster as they whittle it down to just 53 before the start of the 2020 regular season.

By Saturday afternoon, the Denver Broncos will have a 53-man roster, but by Sunday afternoon, they will also have up to 16 guys added back to their practice squad. It’s not out of the realm of possibility given the current climate of everything that the majority of NFL teams will prefer to have their own guys return to the practice squad when the time comes, meaning we could see 69 of these 80 players (or more) stay with the Broncos one way or another.

More likely, there will be roster movement in the form of trades, waiver claims, and possibly even some veteran free agent moves we don’t know of just yet.

I put together a list of players currently on the Broncos’ roster I think other teams will want to trade for, and if the choice for John Elway is to either cut or trade these guys, hopefully the Broncos can get something in return instead.

This time of year, there are always some surprise trades and we’ve recently seen one major domino fall with Yannick Ngakoue heading to the Minnesota Vikings. There are also some big-name veterans still available in free agency like Jadeveon Clowney, and potentially Riley Reiff very soon.

The Denver Broncos have assembled a roster which, among the 80 players currently in uniform, looks to have more than 53 guys who will be on active NFL rosters come time for the start of the regular season, so cuts will be difficult this year.

We’re going to try and predict that with just days remaining before Elway, Vic Fangio, and the Denver Broncos brain trust have to get together to make moves.

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