The four moves that will ultimately cost Broncos GM George Paton his job

Too many marginal draft picks

Paton has not presented himself as a draft guru, to say the very least. This is an area that every GM needs to hit on more often than not.

In 2021, he was able to land Patrick Surtain with the No. 9 overall pick. He also found Quinn Meinerz, Baron Browning, Javonte Williams, Caden Sterns and Jonathon Cooper in that class.

Meinerz and Cooper have been productive players. Williams has had injury issues and Browning has yet to play at all in 2023 due to an injury. Caden Sterns is out for the season with an injury. None of those players should be considered a bad pick, but they certainly haven't been great.

Surtain is considered by many to be the best cornerback in pro football. That is debateable, and still many Broncos fans grilled Paton for not drafting Justin Fields with that pick. For me, he is never getting off the hook for not drafting Micah Parsons, who was the best player in that entire draft, no matter what Surtain ever does.

The 2022 draft was just bad. Paton took Nik Bonitto, who is all the rage right now after finally having a good game, Greg Dulcich, who has been hurt for much of his career and Eyioma Uwazurike, who is suspended indefinitely for violating the league's gambling policy.

He also drafted Damarri Mathis and Delarrin Turner-Yell, two players who have absolutely struggled in their second year in the league.

Paton only had five picks to work with in the most recent draft, but that was due to some poor roster management as well (more on that later).

Marvin Mims appears to be a great pick but the jury is certainly still out on every other player drafted this past spring: Drew Sanders, Riley Moss, JL Skinner and Alex Forsyth.

It could have been worse, but the drafting by Paton could have, and needed to be, much better.