SAN DIEGO — Donning a pale-blue suit jacket, his hair freshly slicked back, Brock Osweiler bent his 6-foot-8 frame over a lectern as he looked wide-eyed over a room of reporters. His smile unflinching, he began to parse his latest performance, only his third as a starting NFL quarterback.
He said the right things.
He took blame for his mistakes.
He doled out credit where it was due — to his defense, especially.
BESTS/WORSTS:
“I think this is a credit to this team and how hard everybody works though the week with their preparation,” he said. “Nobody blinked with it being a road game, and our defense really came out and set the tone. … We made a few mistakes, but we’ll watch that on tape and learn from them and get better because of those mistakes. Hats off to the defense and the special teams because they kept us in the game and really had a special performance.”
Osweiler, who minutes earlier had steered Denver to a 17-3 victory over the Chargers to extend its record to 10-2, managed the tempo and direction of the conversation — much as he did the game.
On the Broncos’ first possession, Osweiler quickly and efficiently — in only 3:45 — engineered an eight-play, 76-yard drive that ended with a pass in the middle of the end zone to Demaryius Thomas. With 5:26 left in the second quarter, the Broncos had jumped to a 17-0 lead.
Momentum slowed as the time ticked away, but Osweiler, the interim starter, continued to chop away at the Chargers’ defense, spraying 26 pass attempts to nine different receivers. He completed 16 of them, for 166 yards and the touchdown to Thomas.
To follow a three-week parade that landed him on the cover of Sports Illustrated and made him the new — for now, anyway — face of the Broncos’ offense, Osweiler took the backseat once again Sunday. But this time it was to the defense, a role the Broncos’ quarterback — no matter which one — has played often this season.
Osweiler didn’t star, and he didn’t need to.
So he managed — not perfectly, but well enough.
PHOTOS:
“Obviously, I know the talent and how good our defense is,” he said. “But at the same time, it doesn’t give you comfort, it doesn’t make you relax. What it does is it just makes you — I don’t want to say manage the game, but you have to understand the big picture of the whole deal. As a quarterback and as an offense, you want to score points every drive, and as a quarterback, you want to throw the ball 50 times. But with the defense that we have, maybe that’s not the best formula to win football games.”
The quick start to the first half of Sunday’s game wasn’t mirrored in the second. On the Broncos’ first offensive drive in the third quarter, Osweiler was taken down on a bootleg play for his 12th sack of the season, which, at the time, was only 12 quarters.
On the Broncos’ ensuing drive, on a second-and-10 at San Diego’s 27-yard-line, Osweiler hurled a deep pass intended for Emmanuel Sanders in the left corner of the end zone that was picked off by cornerback Jason Verrett.
“I think he did some young things today,” coach Gary Kubiak said of Osweiler. “I think that’s the way I would describe it, but the thing I really like about him (is that) he learns from his mistakes. He’s very good in conversations with me and he wants the ball in situations. When you talk to him about this or this, he’s always wanting the aggressive approach, so I feel really good, and for him to play on the road two out of three weeks and find a way to get it done with this team, there’s some good progress going on there.”
The Osweiler interception was the Broncos’ only turnover of the game, a blemish to an otherwise balanced performance from the offense that endured two more injuries, to running back C.J. Anderson (ankle) and tight end Vernon Davis (concussion).
The Broncos’ 159 net passing yards were nearly matched by the 134 rushing yards on 39 run plays.
Osweiler guided the offense Kubiak intended from the get-go, all while exuding the confidence and control of a season veteran.
“Have I played perfect? Absolutely not,” Osweiler said. “That’s the one thing over the course of these three football games — I’m learning so much every time I’m out there on the field. I think it’s OK to make mistakes every once in a while as long as it doesn’t hurt your team. But the important thing is learning from those mistakes and making sure they don’t happen again, and that’s what’s been happening on a weekly basis.”
Nicki Jhabvala: njhabvala@denverpost.com or @NickiJhabvala
Osweiler tracker
Broncos quarterback Brock Osweiler completed 16-of-26 passes for 166 yards, one touchdown and one interception Sunday. A breakdown of Osweiler’s day:
| Yardage | Left | Center | Right |
| Up to 10 yards: | 6-of-7 (44 yards) | 3-of-4 (19), touchdown | 1-of-3 (7) |
| 11-20 yards: | 3-of-3 (41) | 1-of-2 (12) | 0-of-1 |
| 21+ yards: | 0-of-3 | 2-of-3 (43) | 0-of-0 |
Top weapons
| Player | Targeted | Catches | Yards | TDs |
| Demaryius Thomas | 6 | 6 | 61 | 1 |
| Vernon Davis | 3 | 2 | 25 | 0 |
| Virgil Green | 1 | 1 | 22 | 0 |
| Emmanuel Sanders | 8 | 3 | 19 | 0 |
| Juwan Thompson | 1 | 1 | 14 | 0 |
| Owen Daniels | 3 | 2 | 13 | 0 |
| C.J. Anderson | 1 | 1 | 12 | 0 |
| Note: Ronnie Hillman and Bennie Fowler combined for three targets and no catches. | ||||
