With their victory over the Chargers on Sunday afternoon, the Broncos locked up the top seed in the AFC and will have the elusive first-round bye next week. The Broncos will be the only AFC playoff team not to play next week, and will not know their first playoff opponent until the end of next week. Denver will truly enjoy this next week off and will use it to get healthier.
The Broncos picked up an incredibly boring 19-3 victory over the Chargers on Sunday, and seemed to be using an incredibly limited Playbook. The Broncos took no shots down the field, were mostly relying on the running game and short screens, and seemed incredibly content with an ugly win. To their credit, the wind was indeed incredibly ugly.
Not only did the Broncos' victory clinch the top seed in the conference for them, but it also finalized the Chargers’ playoff position. With their loss, the Chargers were shooed into the final playoff spot in the AFC. The Chargers will travel next week to New England to face the Patriots and have guaranteed that they’ll be on the road for every game they play.
The Broncos clearly limited their game plan and play book on Sunday against the Chargers
If the Chargers were able to knock off the Patriots and an upset next week, they will immediately head right back to Denver to face the Broncos. As a refresher on NFL playoff formatting, a victory by the seventh seed during Wild Card Weekend guarantees that they’ll head to face the top seed in the conference. In this scenario, it would set up a third matchup between the Broncos and the Chargers this year.
With that in mind, it was very clear that the Broncos did not want to run a single meaningful play on Sunday. Denver's offense was ugly, featured mostly secondary pieces, and took not a single risk the entire game. Ultimately, this could have been a stroke of genius by the Broncos' coaching staff. Denver coasted to an ugly win against Chargers backups and didn't put a single play of importance on tape for whoever they host in the Divisional Round of the playoffs.
The Broncos were able to cross off all remaining major objectives on their to-do list for the season, and did so in a simple victory. Denver clinched the top seed in the AFC and will have month-old tape as the best resource for their Divisional Round opponent to work with. Sean Payton has more tricks up his sleeve than any other coach in football, and might have pulled off one more to cap off his historic regular season.