Denver Broncos: Failure to build on success is most frustrating part of season

With five games remaining in the 2021 season, the Denver Broncos sit at 6-6 on the year. Their path to the playoffs is looking bleaker and bleaker.

It has been a difficult season to gauge for many teams in the league as results have been up and down all over the board. The Broncos have been no exception.

In some instances, the Broncos have looked like one of the worst teams in the NFL. So how were they able to so easily dispatch the Dallas Cowboys and Los Angeles Chargers, two teams that would be in the playoffs if the season ended today?

It has been incredibly difficult to watch this team play this season.

The Broncos had the hopes of the entire fanbase up as high as they have been in years ahead of Sunday night’s game against the Kansas City Chiefs but completely laid an egg in a 22-9 loss.

That was coming off of an impressive win over the Chargers in which they shut down one of the league’s better offenses.

Prior to that, the Broncos came home after a dominant win over the Cowboys only to be blown out by the Philadelphia Eagles. Had the team followed up on the success of those two wins in the games that followed, it would be sitting at 8-4 right now and we would be having a much different conversation than we are.

Currently, the talk around the team is back to replacing key parts in the organization, starting with the head coach and the quarterback. That’s for good reason, as both Vic Fangio and Teddy Bridgewater are huge reasons why the team has not followed up on its success.

Fangio has buried his chances of ever being a good head coach, largely due to his stubborn ways. He just won’t make the changes that best suit his team and he’s going to go down with the ship that quite likely misses the playoffs for a sixth straight year.

Here is a look at how Bridgewater has performed in the four games discussed above.

In wins over Dallas and Los Angeles: 30-of-46 passing (65.2 percent), 378 yards, 2 TDs

In losses to Philadelphia and Kansas City: 44-of-76 passing (57.8 percent), 483 yards, 1 TD, 2 INTs

Of course, Fangio and Bridgewater are not the only reason the team came out so flat against the Eagles and Chiefs, but it certainly starts there. Much of the fault in the Kansas City game can be placed right at the feet of Bridgewater, who was absolutely terrible in that game.

The Broncos now find themselves toward the bottom of the heap of several playoff hopefuls in the AFC and if we’re here to be honest, they’re playing at a much lower level than many of those teams.

The Broncos are going to have to find a way to win four of their final five games to get to 10-7 and have a shot at getting in. A 9-8 record likely is not going to cut it due to tiebreakers.

The Broncos started the season 3-0 by beating up on three of the league’s worst teams. They then lost four games in a row before having a chance to turn their season around with back-to-back wins over the Washington Football Team and Cowboys.

Those losses to the Eagles and Chiefs stick out like sore thumbs right now and if the team does in fact miss the playoffs once again, should be the two games the team looks back on and shakes its collective head.