5 Broncos on the hot seat if Denver falls to 1-5 on Thursday

3. Courtland Sutton, wide receiver

One of the veterans I am anticipating has one foot out the door right now is Courtland Sutton. I would imagine the Broncos will be receiving calls on Sutton in the coming weeks and if the team loses and moves to 1-5, I think Sutton is arguably the most likely offensive player to be getting moved at the NFL trade deadline (Oct. 31).

Sutton has simply not regained the form we saw him take back in 2019 when he looked like a bona fide WR1. He made the Pro Bowl that season with Joe Flacco, Brandon Allen, and Drew Lock throwing the passes. It's not that Sutton is not there physically -- he is, even after tearing his ACL in 2020 -- but we just haven't seen him reclaim that WR1 form where you can feed him the ball all game.

Maybe it's a coaching issue and not a Sutton issue. We might find out if he is, in fact, traded in the coming weeks.

The Broncos added Tre'Quan Smith to the practice squad recently, and I wouldn't be surprised if that was a bit of a precursor to a wide receiver trade. They like what they've got in young receivers like Brandon Johnson and Marvin Mims, but the Broncos could ultimately decide to make wholesale changes at receiver in the very near future, especially as Greg Dulcich hopefully comes back from injury and eats up targets.