Once the snow melts this week, any head coaching candidate visiting the Broncos’ headquarters will see Dove Valley is not surrounded by scorched earth.
The Broncos finished 12-4 this past season, a year after reaching the Super Bowl. The other two NFL teams in need of a head coach as of Wednesday night — the Chicago Bears and Atlanta Falcons — were a combined 11-21 this season.
The Broncos have a young, talented, cornerstone nucleus of Von Miller, Demaryius Thomas (a free agent who isn’t going anywhere), Chris Harris and C.J. Anderson.
Denver has a fan base so manic and so far-reaching, the Broncos recently were anointed as the new “America’s Team.”
To potential head coaching candidates, the Broncos have much to offer.
Yet, for any outsider looking in, there are two issues general manager John Elway and chief executive officer Joe Ellis must address as they lead the Broncos’ head coaching search committee: ownership and quarterback.
To any new head coach seeking security, ownership and quarterback are to an NFL franchise what Mount Elbert and Pikes Peak are to hills.
First, Broncos ownership. For 30 seasons, the Broncos were led by arguably the NFL’s best owner in Pat Bowlen. But last July, the team announced Bowlen was stepping down to deal with Alzheimer’s disease while the Broncos’ franchise was placed in a trust.
The trust stipulates that one of Bowlen’s seven children eventually will replace him. Until one of the Bowlen children proves he or she is ready to assume command, Ellis is running the team.
“Pat’s presence is missed tremendously,” Ellis said. “We are operating under a blueprint and foundation that he laid out that’s simple to follow and easy to understand. It’s about doing everything the right way and winning championships.”
Indeed, the Broncos have been led by the Ellis-Elway management team since 2011, when Bowlen stepped back from the day-to-day operations, Ellis was promoted to president and Elway was hired to run the football operations department.
Elway and Ellis hired John Fox to head the coaching staff, and together they won four AFC West titles and reached no less than the final eight of the NFL playoffs all four years while posting a combined 46-18 regular-season record.
But Fox is gone, and it appears likely he will wind up coaching the Bears after his interview with the club Wednesday. The Broncos also lost defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio, who accepted a four-year deal Wednesday to become the Oakland Raiders’ new head coach. Broncos offensive coordinator Adam Gase did not get San Francisco’s head coaching job. As he learned Wednesday, he finished second to 49ers defensive line coach Jim Tomsula.
Gase talked Wednesday morning with Elway about the Broncos’ head coaching job, but for now the team wants to look at other candidates.
Detroit Lions defensive coordinator Teryl Austin is likely to be the first to get a formal interview Friday. Others on the Broncos’ candidate list include Baltimore Ravens offensive coordinator Gary Kubiak and quarterbacks coach Rick Dennison, Seattle Seahawks defensive coordinator Dan Quinn and possibly 49ers defensive coordinator Vic Fangio.
As of Wednesday afternoon, the Broncos had notified the Lions of their intent to interview Austin. But interviewing Quinn will take patience. If Quinn’s Seahawks beat the Green Bay Packers in the NFC championship game Sunday, NFL rules would prevent the Broncos from interviewing him until after the Super Bowl.
Teams can conduct second interviews of candidates from Super Bowl participants only during the bye next week. The Broncos didn’t get a first chance to interview Quinn during his initial availability two weeks ago because they didn’t have a coaching opening until Monday afternoon.
Still, the Broncos are confident they can get a new head coach who will take the team, as Elway put it, “to the next level.”
“I think we have a real solid foundation on the football side, and it starts with John Elway,” Ellis said, “because he understands completely what this team means to this city and this region. And he understands what Pat Bowlen wants from his football team. I know Pat can’t be here, and that’s unfair. But what is right is we carry out what he has instructed us to do for so many years. We’re doing that.”
It can be argued that all aspects of an NFL franchise, including ownership and management, are secondary when the quarterback is Peyton Manning. The all-time career leader with 530 touchdowns passing and closing in on Brett Favre for several more of the league’s significant passing records, Manning is deliberating about whether he wants to return next season.
He is two months shy of his 39th birthday, and his performance fell from his usual brilliance through the first seven games of the 2014 season (22 touchdown passes, three interceptions) to pedestrian in the final 10 games (18 touchdowns, 12 interceptions), including a disappointing 24-13 playoff loss Sunday to his former team, the Indianapolis Colts.
“We want him back,” Ellis said of Manning. “But he’ll decide whether he wants to come back or not. He deserves that right. He’s one of the greatest players to ever play the game. He’s entitled to be able to make that decision as he sees fit.”
Mike Klis: mklis@denverpost.com or
