Denver Broncos’ Stock Report takes nosedive after Bills loss
Denver Broncos stock report takes nosedive after Bills loss.
Just six days after the best game of Drew Lock’s career and the best offensive performance put together by offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur, the Denver Broncos came out with one of their worst outings in recent memory.
The Broncos suffered an embarrassing 48-19 loss to the Buffalo Bills, officially eliminating the Broncos from playoff contention and clinching the AFC East title for the Bills, who were in control all game long, and simply tortured the Broncos in a nightmarish second half that never felt like it would end.
With such a poor performance from all three phases in the offense, defense, and special teams, it would be difficult to put together our typical stock report. Instead, we will be highlighting (or lowlighting, depending on how you look at it) key moments or performances from the game.
Although the offense looked about as stagnant as it has all season, Melvin Gordon and Noah Fant were the top performers of the day. Gordon accounted for two touchdowns and Fant one, the only touchdowns the Denver Broncos had in the game. Gordon finished the game with 61 rushing yards, and Fant 68 receiving yards, a big chunk of his total yardage coming from a huge reception early on in the game.
Just a week after silencing much of the doubt in Broncos Country, Drew Lock gave the skeptics fuel once again after finishing the game with 132 yards and just 1 TD. While Lock did not throw an interception, he was strip-sacked and threw at least two passes that most certainly should have been picked off. His decision making is still very much in question, and the target is once again on his back to end the regular season on a positive note going into the 2021 season.
With the strip-sack of Drew Lock today, the Denver Broncos are the only team with a giveaway in each of the regular season games this season. There is not much more that can be said about this humiliating statistic.
Today was definitely not the defense’s best outing, allowing Josh Allen to march all over them all day. Allen finished the day with 359 pass yards, 2 TD’s, and 33 rush yards. Allen was essentially given no pressure all day and picked about the secondary all game long.
The Broncos allowed not one, but two receivers over 100 yards in Stefon Diggs and Cole Beasley, who finished with 147 and 112 receiving yards respectively. Although not going for 100 rushing yards on the day, Devin Singletary also had a solid outing, with 68 rush yards and 1 TD.
In place of Brandon McManus (on COVID Reserve), the Broncos signed kicker Taylor Russolino to start in his place for the week. It went about as well as one imagined.
Russolino was 1/3 on extra points and missed his only field goal attempt of 51 yards. It is important to keep in mind that this was Russolino’s first professional game at 31 years old. Of course, McManus was sorely missed, but in the grand scheme of things, Russolino’s performance was the least of the Broncos’ problems.
Arguably the most disappointing performance on Saturday was by that of rookie cornerback Michael Ojemudia, who was ejected following throwing a punch at wide receiver Gabriel Davis. Of course, rookies make mistakes, but this was inexcusable.
Ojemudia was very undisciplined at this moment, especially considering how thin the Broncos already were at the cornerback position. Michael Ojemudia will have to learn from this experience.