The Denver Broncos beat the Jacksonville Jaguars 23-13 in impressive fashion, but there were some concerns in the victory. We break them down.
Nobody likes a complainer after a victory, so we aren’t going to do that. The Denver Broncos just beat the Jacksonville Jaguars 23-13 in week two of the NFL season to improve to 2-0, and the fan base should absolutely be excited about it.
Wins are hard to come by in the NFL, and they have been especially hard to come by for the Denver Broncos who are now only three victories off of their season total from all of the 2020 season.
Especially considering the fact that the Broncos have lost some really close games in Vic Fangio’s tenure as the team’s head coach, especially some very winnable games early in the season.
It’s critical that the Denver Broncos won these first two games of the 2021 season, and heading back to Denver with a perfect 2-0 record before the home opener against the New York Jets?
Especially as well as Teddy Bridgewater has played, there’s not much to complain about.
But…there are some concerns, and there were some glaring ones in this game against the Jaguars.
Here are the top five concerns coming out of the victory.
Denver Broncos: 5 major concerns in win vs. Jaguars
1. A kickoff return touchdown…seriously?
https://twitter.com/NFL/status/1439679459645214721
Like the Phantom of the Opera, Tom McMahon’s special teams unit strikes again.
It hasn’t mattered if it is preseason or regular season, McMahon’s unit has not been up to snuff. The Denver Broncos have allowed more kickoff return touchdowns since the start of the 2018 season (5) than any other team in the NFL.
Tom McMahon was hired by the Denver Broncos in the 2018 offseason.
Of course, McMahon can’t go out there and make tackles. He can’t go out there and do what the players should be doing, but my goodness, what is going on here?
The Broncos have not been a good special teams unit since McMahon was hired on in 2018 and this game against the Jaguars was further proof that they have issues running deeper than just the personnel.
Why not just kick the ball out of the back of the end zone like every other team in the league?
As rare as kick returns are in general these days, to see a kick return touchdown against the Broncos — the fifth in McMahon’s tenure as special teams coordinator — is disgusting and very concerning.
Denver Broncos: 5 major concerns in win vs. Jaguars
2. 10 penalties
The Denver Broncos finished this game against the Jacksonville Jaguars with 10 penalties for 101 yards.
Imagine giving up 101 yards worth of penalties to a team and winning by 10 points, and the game only being that close because of a kickoff return touchdown.
Although the Denver Broncos should be enjoying this victory, that kind of undisciplined play will have Vic Fangio crawling in his skin while watching film from this game.
You can’t give up 101 yards worth of penalties to teams like the Kansas City Chiefs or Baltimore Ravens or Las Vegas Raiders, or any other potential playoff team on the Denver Broncos’ schedule in the AFC.
Not to continue piling on Tom McMahon, but let’s bring this up as well.
A number of the penalties called on the Denver Broncos in this game came at the expense of the special teams. Multiple false start penalties on the punt team — how does that even happen, by the way?
A penalty on Mike Ford for “taunting” which was terrible, but it still cost the Denver Broncos after a great punt by Sam Martin.
There were some penalties in this game that were bad calls by the officiating crew, notably an early call on Kyle Fuller and others in this game that could be disputed.
Even with that being said, the Denver Broncos have to be better than this next week against the New York Jets.
Denver Broncos: 5 major concerns in win vs. Jaguars
3. Bradley Chubb aggravates ankle injury
The Denver Broncos just cannot get Bradley Chubb healthy it seems.
Chubb missed most of the 2019 season with a knee injury. He came back in 2020 and slowly eased back to full speed before injuring his ankle, landing him on IR to end the 2020 season.
After suffering the ankle injury in 2020, Chubb injured his other ankle in the 2021 preseason and hasn’t been able to get to full strength since.
Hopefully, the team merely kept Chubb out of this game after he made his 2021 debut as a precaution. Obviously, Chubb tweaked the injury a little bit and nobody knows right now what the new extent of his absence will be.
You can’t fault Chubb for wanting to get on the field. This is a very tough player who has played through injuries before, including finishing a game against the Jaguars in 2019 where he had a torn ACL.
Von Miller said “it sucks” to see Bradley Chubb go down.
— Zac Stevens (@ZacStevensDNVR) September 19, 2021
Says if it was anyone else, they probably would have sat out this game.
There’s no denying Chubb’s toughness. However, if he is forced to miss a considerable amount of time from this point forward, it could end up being a huge deal for the Denver Broncos, who would love to be able to see the duo of Chubb and Von Miller out on the field for some extended period of time.
Sadly, to this point, the most we’ve seen Miller and Chubb on the field together was with Vance Joseph as the head coach in Chubb’s rookie season back in 2018.
Denver Broncos: 5 major concerns in win vs. Jaguars
4. Where was the run blocking?
The Denver Broncos averaged 3.65 yards per carry in this game on 26 run plays (13 each) from both Javonte Williams and Melvin Gordon.
Without Melvin Gordon’s big 70-yard burst in week one, the running game has not been very good for the Denver Broncos in the first two weeks of the season from an offensive line perspective.
The New York Giants have two of the league’s top interior defensive linemen in Dexter Lawrence and Leonard Williams, so that game was slightly understandable. The Jacksonville Jaguars seemed like a “get right” game for the Denver Broncos’ offensive line as it relates to running the ball, but the Jaguars really controlled the line of scrimmage there.
If not for Javonte Williams’ ability to create yardage after contact, the numbers here would be absolutely abysmal.
Both Melvin Gordon and Williams created some of their best runs after initial contact came at or near the line of scrimmage.
Imagine what these backs could do with some real running lanes.
Things don’t get much easier in week three against the New York Jets with some really tough players on the defensive line.
Denver Broncos: 5 major concerns in win vs. Jaguars
5. 2-of-11 on 3rd downs
The Broncos converted a pretty respectable number of third downs in their week one victory over the New York Giants, even considering they ended up going for and converting three fourth-down plays.
Against the Jacksonville Jaguars, they simply didn’t convert enough third downs in this game at all.
One of the two third-down conversions came late in the game on a third-and-pretty long when Pat Shurmur decided to hand the ball off to Javonte Williams, who broke free for one of his biggest runs of the game.
The Broncos were able to go for three fourth-down plays against the Giants because they had done a much better job of converting third downs earlier in their drives. In this game, they weren’t moving the ball with the same “ease” as they were in week one.
Considering how well Teddy Bridgewater played in this game, it is a bit shocking to see a very low third-down conversion rate and two of the other primary concerns from this game — run blocking and penalties — heavily contributed to this number overall.
Courtland Sutton looks better than ever, has career day vs. Jaguars
The Broncos defeated the Jaguars, 23-13 in a dominant second-half performance. Courtland Sutton had a career day and looks back and better after his injury.
The Denver Broncos have to be sharper in week three against the Jets when it comes to pre-snap penalties and not getting behind the sticks. This offense can be lethal — is that crazy to say? — when they don’t deliberately shoot themselves in the foot with penalties.