Blowing out one’s knee in this particular profession, as Broncos running backs coach Lou Ayeni once marveled, can be a death sentence. So can an Achilles tear. So can a Lisfranc break. Someone out there, J.K. Dobbins joked Friday, has a voodoo doll of his beaming 5-foot-10 self.
They have poked it. Prodded. Slashed. Torn his left side to shreds, over the course of six NFL seasons.
And yet the 27-year-old Dobbins is as alive as he’s ever been, and as alive as anyone in the vicinity of Dove Valley.
“Itap over,” Dobbins beamed Friday. “Like, whoever has my doll … they’re done. Like, itap just done. You know what I’m saying? So, itap gon’ be — you’ll see.
“I’ll pinky-promise all of you,” Dobbins continued, speaking directly to reporters. “If it happens, I’ll buy you a drink, or whatever you need.”
Remember this day, Dobbins told reporters Friday, after the first full day of Broncos camp. July 31, 2026. This was the day of the Great Dobbins Pinky Promise, in which Denver’s 27-year-old starting running back shook his fist directly at the football gods. Between that blown knee in Baltimore in 2021, and that torn Achilles in 2023, and that broken foot last year in Denver, Dobbins — one of the NFL’s most productive running backs on a per-touch basis when healthy — has never played a full 17-game season and has never really come close since 2020.
But Dobbins “double pinky-promised” Broncos head coach Sean Payton and GM George Paton, as he put it, that he could stay healthy. They believed him enough to re-sign him in March’s free agency, for a not-insignificant $8 million guaranteed. And in one of the most vibrant 10 minutes in front of a press-conference podium in recent Broncos history, Dobbins promised the public, too, that he will play a full slate in 2026.
“I know a lot of people always say, ‘Oh, he’s good for the first 10 weeks.’ Like, I’ll be in the top three (in rushing) for the first 10 weeks, right? And they’ll be like, ‘Dude, he does this every time,'” Dobbins said. “Well, this year, forget a top three. I’ll keep saying it. People think I’m crazy — but I’m going to be No. 1. And I’m going to keep it there for the whole year, 17 games.”
This is Sisyphus, trying to push this particular rock up this particular hill now for the seventh time. Dobbins, who never missed a game of collegiate football and still stands as the second all-time leading rusher in Ohio State history, knows better than anyone that injury variance is completely unpredictable for running backs.
So how exactly, Dobbins was asked Friday, could he possibly ensure that he would play a full season?
“So, like, when I was younger, I could do the splits, right?” Dobbins began.
Stay with him, now.
“I think I lost a little bit of that flexibility,” Dobbins continued. “I just wasn’t paying attention to it as much. So now I’m back to that, and back to my college ways. And I did all the little things, and I’m doing all the little things thatap going to keep me, like – even if itap some fluky stuff thatap about to happen, I’m going to be like Elasti-Boy, or Elastigirl, or something like that.
“I’ll be over there, bounce back up from it,” Dobbins continued at the podium, miming his body going slack like an inflatable balloon man at a car dealership. “Like, if I get hip-drop tackled, I can tuck my head to the back of my foot and I’ll get back up.”
Here is J.K. Dobbins with a physical demonstration of how he simply will not get hurt again if he gets hip-drop tackled
“I can touch my head to the back of my foot!”
— Luca Evans (@bylucaevans)
That hip-drop tackle in Week 10 last season, catching Dobbins’ left foot underneath him, wiped out a career season. At that point, Dobbinsranked sixth in the NFL in rushing yards per game (77.2) and was a fulcrum for Denver’s offense whenever it needed stability. On numerous weekends, the Broncos would struggle with their offense in the first halves before Payton simply decided to hand the ball to Dobbins; the running back finished with 56 carries for 229 yards (4.1 YPC) before halftime and 97 carries for 543 yards (5.6 YPC) after halftime.
A Lisfranc injury ended his 2025 season, even as Dobbins was set to play in a Super Bowl if Denver advanced that far. In comparison to previous lower-body injuries, though? Rehabbing the broken foot was “like a little rest,” Dobbins scoffed Friday.
And Broncos inside linebacker Alex Singleton, speaking on Dobbins, pointed out one could look at the other side of the “injury-prone” label — the fact that Dobbins continues to suffer devastation to his legs and has somehow returned stronger.
“I mean, first, is the Lord Jesus Christ,” Dobbins said Friday, when asked about his mentality on bouncing back. “He blessed me with some type of stuff inside of me that – I can’t stop. Like, I just can’t stop. I can’t lose, right? And then, itap just, I don’t want to let myself down either.”
Thatstuff was enough to convince Payton and general manager George Paton entering free agency that Dobbins’ broken foot was a “fluky,” as the running back himself put it. If this were a different man with the same statistics and circumstances but a different attitude, it’s entirely likely Dobbins would be gone.
Instead, he’s back, minted again as Denver’s clear RB1. And effusive as ever.
“There’s a lot to him,” Payton said. “And when you’re evaluating the type of injury he had, how it happened, what he brings to the team — we had strong opinions, George and I and the rest of the group, about re-signing him.”
Thatstuff,too, poured out in waves at the podium Friday, for a running back that Singleton deadpanned “doesn’t stop talking.” Dobbins dipped into religion, and multiculturalism, and Southern storms, all in the 10-minute context of his sheer force of will to repair his body. He continued taking questions when a Broncos PR representative tried to cut them off at a standard time. He referenced voodoo. He told a reporter he’d buy her a blue dress — she was wearing a red dress — if he was wrong about his injury luck.
“When I got to the Ravens, I got the nickname, ‘Spanish El Toro, right?’ Thatap a bull. Thatap a type of animal. And I feel like the horse is kinda like the bull. Here in America, the horse is probably like the bull in Spanish, right?” Dobbins said, while describing himself as a lifetime Bronco.
“Like, it symbolizes strength, like, beauty, or whatever. I’m not saying that I’m beautiful, right? But I’m just saying, like, the animal — it just symbolizes strength.”
Can Dobbins speak his own luck into existence? Will the football heavens listen? Will the owner of his doll listen?
He certainly believes so.
“Just, keep going,” Dobbins said. “Thatap what I’ma always do. Until I can’t. Like, until I just physically can’t. But I think I’m blessed to where I could just go until I’m like, 40.”
