Broncos Country has been through some hard times in recent years, but as history shows, the Denver Broncos have been an extremely successful organization. That is what makes the recent string of failures so hard to digest.
The Broncos are 0-2 and the Sean Payton era has not kicked off in the way many thought that it would. With a showdown against the Miami Dolphins hanging over their heads in Week 3, things could get even worse.
Earlier, I pointed out that only one other coach in team history has started their tenure with the team at 0-2, but here, I will look at each of the teams that have started with that record and how those seasons turned out.
You will learn two things: One, the Broncos have had a tremendous record to begin seasons. This is year No. 64 of the Broncos and only the 10th time that a team has started 0-2. When you consider that five of those seasons came during the AFL days, and two were under the watch of Vic Fangio, it's even more impressive.
The second thing you will see is that an 0-2 start is quite difficult to overcome. Not only have none of these nine other Broncos teams made the playoffs, but it's tough for any team to do it. Dating back to 1990, only 11.5 percent of the teams that have started 0-2 (31 of 270) have made it to the postseason.
The AFL days
The AFL version of the Broncos was a really bad team. The Broncos never made it to the playoffs in the old AFL and the team's best finish was a 7-7 record in 1962. The team started 0-2 five times during the AFL era. Here's how they finished in each of those seasons.
1963: 2-11-1
1964: 2-11-1
1965: 4-10
1966: 4-10
1968: 5-9
The Broncos fired two different head coaches during that stretch and never got it right during their AFL days. The team started 0-4 in four straight seasons, something that has never happened since.
However, the Broncos have started 0-2 in three of the last five seasons, another indication of how badly the foundation of this franchise has been cracked.
1994 season was a strange one
As you can see, it would be 26 years before the team stumbled out of the gates at 0-2 again, but the 1994 season was a tough one for a Broncos team that had high hopes.
The team made the playoffs the year before, losing to the Raiders in the Wild Card round.
The 1994 season was the second year for head coach Wade Phillips. After guiding the team to the playoffs the year prior, the thought was that the team could build on that. But a loss to the San Diego Chargers on Sunday Night Football to start the season was a tough one.
In that game, the Broncos jumped out to a 24-6 lead and appeared to be cruising. But a huge second quarter for the Chargers brought them back, capped off by a 99-yard interception return for a touchdown by Stanley Richard.
The Chargers were then able to grab the lead late and Junior Seau made a huge play to seal the win, intercepting this ball thrown by John Elway.
That play seemed to throw the team off kilter as it would lose its next three games to the New York Jets, Raiders and Buffalo Bills. Suddenly, a team that had big plans for the season was 0-4.
But the Broncos battled back that season. After getting their record to 3-6, they won four games in a row by defeating the Seattle Seahawks, Atlanta Falcons, Cincinnati Bengals and Kansas City Chiefs. All of those were close games, but the team was finding a way to win close games and got its record to 7-6, in position for a playoff spot.
But after losing to the Raiders for the second time that season in Week 15, the Broncos were hammered on the road by the San Francisco 49ers, a loss that basically extinguished their postseason hopes. They then dropped the season finale against the New Orleans Saints on Christmas Eve, finishing the season 7-9.
Phillips was fired at the end of that season in favor of the oncoming Mike Shanahan, who would quickly turn things around.
1999 was a year of transition
With Shanahan firmly in place, the Broncos were able to win back-to-back Super Bowls in 1997 and 1998. But following that second title, legendary quarterback John Elway decided to call it a career.
The Broncos thought they might be able to pick up right where they left off with Brian Griese at quarterback, but they had a huge wake-up call coming.
The team lost its season opener to the Miami Dolphins before taking a 16-point loss against the Chiefs. A close loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in Week 3 led into what would essentially be the final stake in the heart of the '99 team.
In Week 4 against the New York Jets, Griese threw an interception and, trying to make the tackle, Terrell Davis tore his ACL and MCL and was forced to miss the rest of the season. He was never the same player after that.
To their credit, much like the 1994 team, the Broncos picked themselves up off the floor and won two games in a row after that. But back-to-back losses to the New England Patriots and Minnesota Vikings put the team in a hole it couldn't get out of.
The Broncos finished the 1999 season at 6-10. Until last season, when the Rams finished 5-12, that was the worst record in terms of winning percentage for a defending champion.
The Vic Fangio era got off to a rough start in 2019
After the disastrous tenure of head coach Vance Joseph, the Broncos turned to Vic Fangio, one of the best defensive coordinators in league history, but a guy who had never been a head coach at any level.
Still, there were high hopes that the Broncos got a good guy. However, things got off to a rocky start when the team lost to the Raiders on Monday Night Football to begin the year. In Week 2, the team lost to the Chicago Bears in a game that featured some questionable calls. Either way, the Broncos sat at 0-2.
Things didn't get much better as the team lost to the Packers and Jaguars to fall to 0-4. Like the teams that started 0-2 in 1994 and 1999, this Broncos team battled back with wins in Weeks 5 and 6. But consecutive losses in Weeks 7 and 8 and then again in Weeks 11 and 12 put them at 3-8, making a playoff run basically impossible.
The team won four of five games to close the year, leaving many fans hopeful that 2020 would be a lot different.
The 2020 Broncos were just as bad
The 2020 season will always be one that carries with it an asterisk of sorts as that was the year of the COVID-19 pandemic. But Fangio had a chance to get things off on the right foot and he was unable to do it.
The Broncos dropped the opener against the Tennessee Titans 16-14 in a game they should never have lost. After a loss in Week 2 against the Pittsburgh Steelers, the team sat at 0-2 again.
Fangio is the only coach other than Payton to start 0-2 in his first year as coach with the Broncos and he is one of three coaches — Jack Faulkner and Mac Speedie from the AFL days being the others — to be on the 0-2 list twice.
The Broncos also lost to the Buccaneers in Week 3 before beating a terrible New York Jets team on Thursday Night Football and then getting a win over the Patriots. But a 43-16 drubbing at the hands of the Chiefs the following week put that Broncos on the road to nowhere for the rest of the year.
The Broncos lost five of six games to close the 2020 season and finished the campaign with a 5-11 record. Fans were calling for the job of Fangio, but the front office chose against that, giving him one more chance to see if he could get the team back to its winning ways.
The 2023 Broncos are up against long odds and undeniable history
Here is a statistic you may not want to read. Broncos teams that have started 0-2 have an overall record of 42-90-2. That is a winning percentage of .320, which is not at all good.
None of those 0-2 teams have made the playoffs and if the Broncos lose to the Dolphins on Sunday and drop to 0-3, that 11.5 percent of teams that have started 0-2 and made the playoffs drops down from that, as only a handful of teams have ever accomplished that feat.
These stats are not a coincidence. These things are rare because it's extremely tough to do. Though it's completely fair to believe that Payton can still turn this around, eventually, one also has to be realistic and realize that this season may fall into the same line that every season since 2015 has fallen into.