The Denver Broncos made the playoffs last year and ended a long playoff drought. They've ended their brutal streaks against the Chiefs and Raiders. They have made their way from being one of the biggest jokes in the league to being arguably a top-10 overall roster in short order under head coach Sean Payton.
Payton has a way of doing things that is not everybody's favorite brand, but he's an all-time great NFL head coach. He knows how to run a winning operation, and part of that is a but more cutthroat than some folks would really like. But if you want to be great, you have to set the bar high for everyone, especially the veteran players on your roster.
The Broncos just added veteran running back JK Dobbins to their roster, a decision that has apparently been brewing for the better part of the last three months. This team does not take veteran additions lightly, and Payton shed some important light on that with a strong message for any veteran players the team is bringing in.
Sean Payton sends strong message to veteran additions at Broncos minicamp
"One thing about the NFL locker room: It hasn’t changed, and it never will. Come on in if you can help us win—we want you here. If you can’t—all right, we probably want you to leave. I’m talking from a player’s perspective.”
- Sean Payton (via Broncos PR)
Those words carry a lot of weight from Sean Payton because obviously, the veteran players coming in are going to be held to a rigid standard. And that's how it should be. You can see and hear the makeup of the veterans the Broncos have brought in with every interview they give. The competitive fire is there. The charisma is there. These guys are all team captain types with a great combination of talent and humility.
And ultimately, those are the traits that make people great in just about any industry, right? You have to be gifted, you have to work hard, but you also have to have that humility like you've never truly "arrived". When guys get that way, you can sense it and it comes across in the way they play on Sundays.
This offseason has been a huge one for the current era of the franchise. The Broncos have added some risky players in free agency with their injury histories, but adding the likes of Talanoa Hufanga, Dre Greenlaw, Evan Engram, and JK Dobbins among others have been pretty much exactly what this team needed from a roster need standpoint but also a locker room fit standpoint.
You want guys who can hit the ground running on and off the field, and it feels like this team has done a tremendous job of identifying players who can do exactly that.