3 free agency do-overs for the Denver Broncos in the 2023 offseason
Let's live in hindsight a bit and take a different path than the team did in the 2023 free agency period. Here are three free agency "do-overs" for the Denver Broncos. I have found it hard to find much that the team has done wrong this offseason. The Broncos have truly put themselves in a strong position for 2023 and beyond.
Things got rolling with the Sean Payton hire, which was fabulous and 100% the right decision to make. They then proceeded to spend hundreds of millions of dollars in free agency, boosting some of the most urgent roster holes.
After investing a ton of resources in free agency, the Broncos attacked the 2023 NFL Draft, putting the finishing touches on what is now one of the better roster/coach combinations in all of the NFL. Right now, Denver looks like a legitimate playoff team, and I recently argued a step further in saying that the team might be closer to a Super Bowl than we think.
However, could we change a few of the free agency signings that the team made in 2023? Let's live in hindsight a bit and cover three free agency do-overs.
3 free agency do-overs for the Denver Broncos in the 2023 offseason
Denver Broncos should have signed Carson Wentz instead of Jarrett Stidham
Signing Jarrett Stidham to a two year, $10 million contract was a mistake, and I don't care how highly Sean Payton thinks of him. The right move here should have been to sign Carson Wentz to a contract to be the backup to Russell Wilson.
Jarrett Stidham has thrown six touchdown passes and seven interceptions over his career, which began in 2019. He was injured in 2021 and ended up as the third string QB with the New England Patriots, so he didn't even appear in a game that year. He's had one notable start over his career which came in 2022 against the San Francisco 49ers, but that's it. Stidham is a low-end backup in the NFL and I think the better option would have been to sign Carson Wentz.
Since Wentz' disastrous 2020 season, he's played for the Indianapolis Colts and Washington Commanders. He did bounce back quite a bit in 2021 with the Colts, but they shockingly dumped him for Matt Ryan. Wentz obviously has a much more exhaustive career in the NFL than Stidham and has played at an elite level.
The Pro Bowler and Super Bowl champion is 46-45-1 as a starter in the NFL with 151 touchdowns and 66 interceptions. He's been an effective QB and would have been the perfect reclamation project for Sean Payton and clearly has a much higher ceiling than Stidham.
His higher ceiling would be enough to have this do-over. In case that Russell Wilson would implode, there might not be a better backup QB option than Wentz, especially if he had gotten the chance to work with Sean Payton.