It's only two weeks into the 2024 NFL Season, but Sean Payton's offense for the Denver Broncos has been as predictable and bland as ever. Yes, Denver does not have the personnel to be running some of the plays that Payton wants, and frankly, there needs to be a bigger conversation about GM George Paton and the poor job he's done.
The hiring of Nathaniel Hackett and trading of Russell Wilson has set this franchise back years. The draft capital that went out the door for the Wilson trade and needing to trade for Sean Payton has greatly impacted both sides of the ball, but has hit the offense quite hard.
Denver does not have a single dynamic play-maker on offense, and two of Paton's draft picks in Javonte Williams and Greg Dulcich also look like massive whiffs, so that just adds insult to injury. Well, our own Jordan Lopez outlined just how predictable the offense has been:
Doesn’t get more predictable than this:
— Jordan Lopez (@JordanTLopez) September 16, 2024
According to Next Gen Stats, the Broncos were Under Center 10 times against the Steelers
They ran the ball 9 of those 10 plays (90%)
For the season thus far, 32 plays Under Center and 25 of them were runs
This is just not OK. Where is the play-action? Why haven't the Broncos run it? Play-action passing is one of the most efficient forms of throwing the football in history and is a great aid for rookie quarterbacks. Here's a good example of how play-action passing game open up an offense:
🚨🚨🚨Play-Action Screens get LB's running to "Run Action"
— ChalkTalk-XO Clinics (@xoclinics) July 22, 2018
Eliminate defenders with action!
🔥🔥🔥 pic.twitter.com/GDlaIwBey2
This isn't from under center, but you get the idea. Play-action typically seeks to get the defense to "bite" a bit on what they think is a run play, which then helps the wide receivers get open more. When a team is under center, there is just no reason for them to be running play-action as little as the Denver Broncos are through two games.
The defense will start to figure out what Denver is doing and sell-out on the run. This then stops the run and in turn makes the passing offense less efficient. Now yes, it does not help that the Broncos can't run the ball, but running the ball from under center 25/32 times is just bad play-calling, period.
If the Denver Broncos hope to develop Bo Nix into a franchise quarterback, the entire offense needs to play better, and will need to use play-action more. Guess what? The New Orleans Saints are averaging 45.5 points per game through two games, have the best offense in the NFL, and greatly increased their play-action usage from 2023 to 2024.
It's almost as if PA works...
Someone should tell Sean Payton this.