The Denver Broncos’ decision to hire Sean Payton as the team’s next head coach was understandably met with some pushback. Not everybody in Broncos Country was on board with the move, and the move has also been met with some criticism nationally, believe it or not.
Although it should be noted, the move by the Broncos to hire Sean Payton has been pretty overwhelmingly positively received by the vast majority. But, isn’t it usually the negative voices that ring the loudest?
There might be some valid concerns about whether or not trading for and hiring Sean Payton as your team’s next head coach is a good idea, but I have yet to hear anything that has caused me to worry about it. I have heard plenty of lame arguments against Payton and his overall body of work as an NFL head coach as reasons why people think the move was a bad one for the Broncos.
Let’s look at the four worst that have repeatedly popped up.
4 lame reasons to call the Sean Payton hire by the Broncos a bad one
1. Sean Payton has “only won one Super Bowl” as a head coach
Let’s start off with the most ridiculous argument of the entire list. People have really been criticizing Sean Payton for “only” winning one Super Bowl as an NFL head coach. There are nine head coaches in the NFL today — active coaches — who have won the Super Bowl:
- Bill Belichick
- Sean McVay
- Andy Reid
- Doug Pederson
- Mike Tomlin
- Mike McCarthy
- John Harbaugh
- Pete Carroll
- Sean Payton
Nine active coaches, out of 32. Now, when you look historically, Sean Payton is one of less than 40 coaches in the history of the game to win a title. It’s all about perspective though. You look back at Payton’s time with the Saints, and people see the early Super Bowl title, and just forget about everything else.
How Payton and the Saints went to the playoffs every year from 2017-2020 and had horrendous bad luck in how all four of those appearances ended:
- 2017: Minneapolis Miracle
- 2018: No pass interference call in NFC championship vs. Rams
- 2019: No offensive PI called in OT vs. Kyle Rudolph in playoffs
- 2020: Up by 10 in 4th quarter vs. Bucs before Jared Cook’s fumble
What gets ignored when people say “only one Super Bowl win” regarding Sean Payton is more than just the historical difficulty of winning the Super Bowl, they are ignoring the tremendous success Payton has had as he’s adjusted to the different defensive trends and evolutions around the entire NFL.
2. The Denver Broncos paid way too much (picks, cash) for Sean Payton
Alright, let’s talk about this, because I’m as guilty as anyone of preferring alternatives (Jim Harbaugh, specifically) considering the draft compensation going to the New Orleans Saints in any deal for Sean Payton. It’s fair to not want to trade draft picks for a coach, because you don’t get to see the coach celebrating in the end zone after a touchdown, nor do you get to see them do a sack dance.
You don’t get to buy their jersey, and folks want to be able to look at the tangible differences a draft pick can make on the field and dream about it, discuss it, etc.
I get it, because I love the NFL Draft as much as anyone. With that being said, draft picks are negligible by comparison to having a great head coach and quarterback. The Broncos have certainly paid the price in the last calendar year to fill those two spots, haven’t they?
All in all, the Broncos have traded:
- 2022 1st-round pick
- 2023 1st-round pick
- 2023 1st-round pick (from Dolphins)
- 2022 2nd-round pick
- 2023 2nd-round pick
- 2024 2nd-round pick
- 2022 5th-round pick
- DL Shelby Harris
- QB Drew Lock
- TE Noah Fant
And they have received:
- QB Russell Wilson
- HC Sean Payton
- 2024 3rd-round pick
- 2022 4th-round pick
Now, is that a hefty price to pay? Absolutely. But scoffing at the cost of acquiring valuable assets is the practice of losing teams. Things need to start playing out on the field, of course. The Broncos were bad in 2022, Russell Wilson’s first year with the team, and they are banking on Payton helping turn the ship around.
They have every reason to believe he can.
This guy is top 25 all time when it comes to winning percentage as a head coach. He had a top-10 offense in 12 of his 15 years with the Saints. It was a regular occurrence for the Saints to be among the league’s top five offenses. This is not somebody who rode the coattails of Drew Brees, either. Payton helped make Brees and Brees helped Payton’s offense hum.
It’s funny how quickly and easily people forget that the Chargers — for years — plotted moving on from Brees. He wasn’t good enough for them. They didn’t believe in him as the future. They drafted Philip Rivers and sat him for three seasons before trading Brees to the Saints. Brees was a cast-off, an injury risk, and people act like Sean Payton was Adam Gase inheriting Peyton Manning.
The cost to acquire these two valuable assets for the team was high. People will criticize it until there is proof on the field that it can actually work. That’s fair, but complaining about the cost to get these guys is ridiculous, especially when you’re complaining about the cost financially. Speaking specifically to the cost of signing Payton to a likely-record NFL head coach contract, who cares?
It’s not your money.
It’s not your money, and the draft picks? Well, the option of having a great head coach versus having the 29th pick in the Draft? That’s a trade you make every day of the week.
3. Sean Payton is the same as Mike McCarthy
Let’s start — and perhaps end quickly — the argument of whether Sean Payton is the same as Mike McCarthy by asking a question: Who would you rather have as your team’s head coach?
From the sounds of things, a lot of people that were jumping into my mentions on Twitter made it sound like the Cowboys would much rather have Payton than McCarthy and that Jerry Jones should jump at that opportunity. But now the argument is that Sean Payton is no different than McCarthy?
What’s the sentiment behind this one, anyway? The sentiment is that both of these veteran coaches are “has-beens”. They won Super Bowls over a decade ago and were dragged there by star quarterbacks in the first place. As time has gone along, their effectiveness has diminished and they’ve become annual pretenders in the postseason.
Again I will ask — which of these two coaches would you rather have right now?
And I don’t mean that as a slight to Mike McCarthy, at least as little of a slight as it can possibly seem. To diminish what McCarthy has been able to do as a head coach would be foolish as well. He’s won a lot of games, and a lot of big games at that.
I guess if the worst thing this comparison means is that your team falls short in the playoffs, then I guess at least the team is making the playoffs.
For the record, I would much rather have Payton than McCarthy and I think most people would.
4. He quit on his team, and Bountygate
To be clear, I’m not advocating targeting players or condoning that kind of behind-the-scenes stuff for anyone. I did find a segment of Pro Football Talk interesting as they were discussing the Sean Payton hire and all things regarding Payton’s history, his fit with the Broncos, and more.
In this clip, PFT’s Mike Florio talks about the fact that, at the time of “Bountygate”, the NFL was coming under a ton of fire from former players who were suing the league for the concussions they suffered while playing, and that the whole “Bountygate” thing was completely overblown as a way for the league to draw attention away from itself and paint itself in a better light given the lawsuits that were coming in.
It’s at least interesting to consider and you can hear more from Florio in that clip up above. It’s worth listening to the whole segment, because they also discuss the notion that Payton is just a clone of Mike McCarthy.
The other idea here is that Sean Payton quit on the Saints, which may have validity to Saints fans but has no relevance in Denver. Payton spent 16 years with the Saints. How many of us have spent 16 years with one organization?
Furthermore, how does Payton allegedly “quitting” on the Saints affect the Broncos at present? Should we expect him to quit on the organization after 16 years? This issue simply has no relevance right now given the circumstances that were going on with the Saints at the time.
It’s interesting that people think the QB position has anything to do with Payton quitting when the team was on Russell Wilson’s preferred trade destinations list for the 2022 offseason. Could Payton not have stuck around and traded for Wilson? The team was allegedly in “salary cap hell” and managed to go from $70+ million in the red to $30+ million in the green.
Things aren’t great with the Saints at present moment, and perhaps Payton saw that writing on the wall, but it’s hard to blame him for wanting a year off after the 16 years he spent with that franchise.
7 players that could follow Sean Payton to the Denver Broncos
There are plenty of players around the NFL that could help the Denver Broncos and follow Sean Payton to the Mile High City in 2023.
Essentially, this particular gripe with Payton has no relevance regarding his present situation with the Denver Broncos.