George Paton, the general manager who’d just traded for Waddle hours earlier, was there. So was running back J.K. Dobbins, whose ground game stood to benefit from Waddle’s field-stretching speed. So was newly-minted offensive coordinator Davis Webb, suddenly gifted a precise route-runner in his first year as a play-caller. And so was quarterback Bo Nix, of course, who Waddle got an instant picture of.

“He’s different, in a good way,” Waddle told The Post on Thursday, on his first sitdown with Nix. “He’s in tune. He’s a family man. He loves playing football.

“He loves just being around, and he’s got one of them personalities you just gravitate to.”

The last time the Broncos mortgaged this much of their future on a player also brought a celebratory dinner at a steakhouse. It was Elway’s, for quarterback Russell Wilson in 2022. That outcome ended in disaster. The Broncos no doubt hope Waddle’s outcome will be different, because the situation is. Wilson was tasked with the entire foundation in Denver; Waddle simply needs to be the organization’s final piece of the puzzle, slotting in next to Dobbins and Webb and Nix.

“There was a crystal-clear vision prior to the trade,” head coach Sean Payton reflected Thursday. “As to — ‘All right, this is what we see, this is where he plays, and these are the things we feel like he’s exceptional at, and then let’s apply them into what we’re doing.'”

Three months later, the integration process is coming along smoothly. Payton said Thursday the 27-year-old Waddle “picks things up quick,” and there is no supplement for accelerated learning like accelerated talent. Nix won’t actually throw to Waddle in live situations until later in June, as the quarterback is still rehabbing his broken ankle. He was on the field to watch Thursday, though, as Waddle veered all across formations in 11-on-11 periods, broke off lighting-quick cuts on out routes and torched cornerback Riley Moss so badly on one in-breaker that Moss simply resorted to grabbing him.

After the third day of OTAs wrapped up, safety Talanoa Hufanga gave his initial impressions of Waddle.

“Everything he’s expected to be,” Hufanga said.

Fast and smooth

On Thursday, Waddle smiled and shrugged off a reporter’s question about whether he viewed himself as a “hired gun.” And teammates have not described the sixth-year receiver as some sort of savior, because the Broncos do not need him to be. They need him, simply, to do what he’s good at to upgrade the Denver offense, a process that has already turned plenty of navy-blue helmets.

“He’s a special dude,” veteran receiver Courtland Sutton said Thursday. “There’s a lot of things that he has, his qualities, that are very unique to himself. And I say that in a very specific way, because he has some qualities that only he could do. And it����ap fun to be able to watch it up close and personal, and I think Coach Webb and Coach Payton have done a really good job of trying to figure out the things that he can do well.”

The things Waddle can do well, Sutton smiled, are obvious. At Episcopal High in Bellaire, Texas, former offensive coordinator Kary Kimble dubbed Waddle “Magic.” Defenders saw him, until they didn’t. He was named an All-American returner as a sophomore at Alabama 40-yard-dash, and led all qualified NFL receivers in yards-per-catch (18.1) in his second year with the Dolphins in 2022.

The niche Waddle fits in Denver, though, goes much deeper than surface-level speed. Payton places a premium on smooth deceleration in evaluating wideouts; after Troy Franklin’s shaky first season in Denver, for example, Payton told the young receiver he wanted him to learn how to start “stopping like a Tesla.” The brakes are already innate to Waddle, who Payton praised Thursday for his ability to stop fast.

That single trait adds a complete unpredictability to Waddle’s breaks. The receiver grinned when asked by reporters on that Thursday, joking he couldn’t “give away the sauce.”

Hufanga, though, defined it well enough.

“I think his ability to make every route look the same is pretty important,” Hufanga said. “As a defender, when you can make a 10-yard stop look like a go, a 10-yard dig (route) look like a go, a 10-yard out-route — it����ap just, everything looks the same. And it puts pressure on your backpedal, as a DB.”

The best version of Waddle to date came in 2022, immediately after the Dolphins’ trade for Tyreek Hill but before the eventual decline of the Mike McDaniel-Tua Tagovailoa era in Miami. Hufanga, who faced the Hill-Waddle tandem firsthand while playing for San Francisco back then, noted the duo’s ability to accelerate and decelerate to disguise in-breaking routes as deep routes and vice versa. In Denver, now, Waddle can play off another “elite playmaker” — as he termed it — in Sutton, as the two give Payton and Webb options to interchange through a variety of alignments and route concepts.

“You could start slot to outside, or outside to slot,” Payton said, describing the vision for Waddle. “Just pick.”

The 30-year-old Sutton, of course, is nowhere near as quick as Hill. Few are. Quietly, though, Sutton finished second in the NFL in 2024 and tied for 10th in 2025 in catches on balls thrown more than 20 yards in the air, according to Next Gen Stats. It’s an open secret that Sutton is usually Nix’s go-to look on third downs, which could conversely pen up one-on-one looks for Waddle in high-leverage spots.

On the flip side, opposing secondaries keyed in on Sutton in 2025, often putting a natural cap on Denver’s offense. If Sutton was bracketed, Nix often didn’t have a consistent deep threat last year, and finished 17th in the NFL in completion percentage of throws 20-plus yards downfield.

Enter Waddle.

“I think that he and I being able to manipulate the outside is going to help the run game,” Sutton said Thursday. “And then ultimately, whenever we do get a chance to get these one-on-one looks, I think it����ap going to be interesting to see where that safety does decide to shade.”

Low maintenance, high potential

The arrival of one star, of course, will naturally dim the light of those around him. On Thursday night, Sutton received the heartiest cheers and took the heartiest swings at UCHealth’s annual “Healthy Swings” home-run-derby at Coors Field; as he accepted a winner’s trophy, a fellow teammate off to the side cracked a joke labeling Sutton as “Mr. Bronco.” The eight-year veteran made a Pro Bowl in 2025 on the back of two straight 1,000-yard seasons, and Denver wouldn’t have made the Waddle trade if there was any risk that either receiver would lose sleep over lost targets.

Sutton, though, has established himself as one of the lowest-maintenance receivers in the NFL. Waddle, meanwhile, never publicly complained about diminished targets through two sub-1,000-yard seasons in Miami in 2024 and 2025.

“I think last year, we saw what it would take for a selfless offense to be able to get to where we want to get to,” Sutton said “It����ap not the — I don’t think we have any individual personalities that are saying, ‘Hey, I need this. I need that.’ I think we got a bunch of guys that are willing to put their pride aside and say, ‘Hey, look, what do I need to do for this team to be successful?’”

Payton often refers to locker-room favorites as “force multipliers.” Dobbins is one. So is boisterous defensive tackle Malcolm Roach, for instance. Waddle does not project in the same vein; former coaches describe him as quiet, and he doesn’t carry himself with any particular gravitas when speaking at a public podium.

That personality, though, is a fit in itself. And Waddle has already begun force-multiplying with his first routes down in Dove Valley.

“I just think he takes us — unlocks another dimension for us, especially with RPOs and stuff like that,” Roach told The Post Thursday night, at Coors. “I think the best is yet for him to come, and the best is yet for us to come.

“So I think it����ap going to be a good marriage.”

Only 11 quarterbacks have thrown for more touchdowns. Only 13 QBs have averaged a better yards per pass attempt in their careers. Only 14 other players have completed more passes. Only 15 other signal-callers have thrown for more yards.

He tossed 353 TDs over his career. His touchdown-to-pick ratio was 3.1-to-1. He averaged 29 passing scores, nine interceptions, and 10 wins per season. He’s the only QB in NFL annals to amass both 40,000 passing yards and 5,000 rushing yards in the same career. He was 121-80-1 as a starter. He won a Super Bowl and was a horrible goal-line call away from winning a second.

If you take the name off the back of the jersey, and just look at the stats, that’s a Hall-of-Fame career, isn’t it? Those are the kind of career numbers you’d hope Bo Nix would aspire to. 

Alas, that resume comes with a name. And a reputation. And a pile of pure cheeseball high enough to climb Mount Elbert.

The subject of Russell Wilson — his career, his legacy — is, no shock, a bit of a mixed bag within the Grading The Week offices. But when we were forced to reckon with No. 3 one more time after he announced a few days ago his was transitioning from the NFL to an analyst job at CBS Sports, the football wonks decided on the following:

Despite a miserable two seasons in Denver that were the beginning of the end of a good career, it was, on the whole, a very good career. A Hall-of-Fame career. The GTW crew is cool with Russ getting his ticket punched to Canton one day. Just don’t force us to have to listen to his induction speech. Please.

Russell Wilson in Canton — B

When the Broncos sold the farm to acquire Wilson from Seattle in 2022, the idea was that, at age 33, Big Russ had enough juice left from a pretty glorious Seahawks decade to author the kind of dreamy coda Peyton Manning authored at Dove Valley a decade earlier.

Instead, what unfolded was a chain of nightmares. Wilson was a step or two slower than the guy who won rings with the Legion of Boom, and that step or two proved immense for a guy who loved to hang onto the ball too long. With Wilson’s quick-twitch fading, the sack count piled up. He never saw a throw in the middle of the field he liked, largely because he never looked in the middle of the field to begin with. Pairing that with a first-time, pleasant, but in-over-his-head head coach in Nathaniel Hackett turned into dark comedy, with fans at Empower Field having to count the play clock down, out loud, back at Russ to get him to get the ball snapped in time.

The pre-snap operations were far cleaner with Sean Payton in charge, but Wilson’s decision-making and sack-taking drove his notoriously fickle coach up a wall. Payton and Wilson were too set in their ways to co-exist. The Broncos chose to eat $85 million in dead-cap penalties just to flush Wilson out of their system — but cold turkey, in hindsight, proved to be the perfect dish. Without Russ crashing so quickly, so spectacularly, the Broncos wouldn’t have had to turn to Nix, nor revamp the locker room with so many young players all at once.

Denver launched Wilson’s NFL death spiral, but don’t let that entirely discount the 10 seasons that preceded it — Seattle Russ was 104-53-1 as a starter in the Northwest, made it to nine Pro Bowls, and led the Seahawks on eight playoff runs. Only eight other QBs have ever led more game-winning drives over a career than Wilson’s 40, which is the same career comeback number as John Elway’s. The more you forget about what Russ did in orange and blue, the better. For everybody.

Russell Wilson on TV — D

That said, the GTW kids would be pleasantly surprised if the notoriously pleasant, bland, inoffensive Russ is anything but terrible television.

Oh, he’ll look good. Dang good. He’ll be cool as heck. But one of the central tenets of an analyst position is sharing an actual, from-the-heart opinion, the occasional hot take. For DangeRuss, that might be too hot to handle.

A team won’t hesitate to cut a player. Cold, calculated decisions are made on the daily.

NFL players, likewise, aren’t interested in charity when it comes to their employer.

Clubs try to pay players as little as they can. Players try to earn as much as possible.

That����ap the way the business works 99% of the time.

That����ap also what made the news earlier this month that the Broncos had given Pat Surtain II a $5 million raise — and added a 2027 escalator worth another $5 million if Surtain makes the Pro Bowl or an All-Pro team this fall — interesting.

It was a smart move by the Broncos, even if it wasn’t done out of pure grace.

Surtain knew he was underpaid after a boom in the cornerback market since he signed an extension in September 2024. So did Broncos officials. There was really no reason to play hardball with a guy the club is likely hoping plays another 7-10 years on the Front Range and retires a Bronco and a future Hall of Famer.

Surtain is 26 years old. He’s going to be due for a monster extension in the next 12-24 months anyway. Why risk souring the relationship now, just as the roster around Surtain has blossomed into a Super Bowl contender?

It looks from here like good employee management on the front office’s part to bump Surtain up this year — and likely next year, too, as long as he’s mostly healthy this fall. A four-year, $96 million extension signed in 2024 essentially becomes four years and $106 million, setting Surtain up to cash in again before too long.

There’s another key to the raise, though, and it����ap a very simple one.

The Broncos did it because they could. They started the week more than $25 million under the salary cap, and even after giving Surtain a raise, they can easily absorb another contract if they wanted to add a veteran this summer, add at the trade deadline this fall — or both.

“He’s obviously someone that we feel like is elite and at the top of his position,” head coach Sean Payton said Thursday, explaining why Surtain got a raise without a new deal. “Part of that is the salary cap and how that fluctuates and moves, especially in the last three years.”

As it pertains to Denver, specifically, the Broncos have worn $85 million in dead cap for Russell Wilson alone over the past two seasons. Now they head into 2026 with among the cleanest books in football. They have newfound flexibility and are putting it to use.

There is still plenty of roster maneuvering, cap management and future planning to do, however.

First, Denver will likely want to get back to rolling over a fair chunk of cap space year to year. They’d made a practice of it under George Paton until cutting Wilson. The past two years, they’ve rolled over less than $1 million. Before that, Paton was consistently rolling between $5-10 million over per year.

The Broncos’ use of option bonuses as a contract tool likely plays into their approach this offseason, too.

Option bonuses give a club flexibility on how it accounts for a player’s pay. Remember, base salary counts against the cap in the current year, whereas bonus money can be prorated over up to five seasons. Teams regularly convert base salary to bonus to lower a player’s current-year cap number and push cap charges down the road. Option bonuses basically let teams decide how to handle those decisions as they go.

Under Paton and vice president of player administration Rich Hurtado, the Broncos have used option bonuses with more frequency as they’ve locked up more than 10 core players on major extensions in the past two years.

Teams like option bonuses in part because, the way the CBA is written, the default assumption is that each option will be exercised and the money will be accounted for as a bonus. So teams get the flexibility of the proration built in until the option date, then can decide whether to actually use it.

That����ap a bit of a mouthful, so an example might be cleaner: Broncos receiver Courtland Sutton has a $12 million option bonus this year due Sept. 1. The money is guaranteed, so he’s getting paid no matter what Denver does.

Currently, that $12 million is accounted for as $2.4 million on the cap for this year and each of the next four. Add the $2.4 million to Sutton’s $4.735 million base salary, $6.075 million of prorated signing bonus and $765,000 in per-game roster bonuses, and you get his 2026 cap number of $13.975 million.

On Sept. 1, Denver can leave that just the way it is. But the team could also rescind the option bonus in total or in part. The Broncos’ options usually allow them to choose between prorating all, half or a smaller portion (around a third) of the bonus amount. So, if Denver rescinded the entire bonus, Sutton’s base salary would jump from $4.375 million to $16.375 million. His cap number would balloon from $13.975 to $23.575 million this year, but the Broncos wouldn’t have $9.6 million in future-year prorated bonus money on their books.

The Broncos did this in part with Garett Bolles last year, prorating out $6 million of his option bonus but rescinding some of it and bumping his base salary to $10.235 million and his cap number to $13 million.

Bolles, like Sutton, has an option bonus due Sept. 1 this fall. His is $16.935 million.

So, put it this way: Bolles and Sutton could eventually count a combined $22.43 million against Denver’s cap in 2026. But they could also count $45.58 million. Or somewhere in between.

It just depends on whether the Broncos want the cap room now or want to increase their flexibility in future years. Some teams, like Philadelphia, use option bonuses aggressively and basically always exercise them. Kick the money down the road. As long as the cap keeps going up each year, a dollar on the cap is cheaper in the future than it is this year. It����ap a bet that there’s not another surprise downturn like the COVID-impacted years coming around the corner.

There’s an argument to be made that if a team can choose between counting money on the cap this year or in the future, it should choose the future every time. The pandemic happened, though. It����ap not impossible for the cap to drop or stagnate. Payton in New Orleans was part of a group that spent years walking the tightrope and prorating aggressively. It mostly worked until the pandemic. Now it����ap taken years and years of roster slashing and money burning in a straitjacket to unwind the mess.

The Broncos are aggressive but have demonstrated a somewhat lower-than-maximum risk tolerance.

The older a player is, the more likely Denver will at least consider rescinding an option bonus and taking more of the money on the current year cap.

Sources also indicate that internally, the Broncos generally treat option bonuses as if they’re going to rescind them. So, they don’t necessarily look at Sutton as a player with a $13.975 cap hit this year. They look at him as a player with a $23.575 million cap hit that they can choose to lower by exercising the option on Sept. 1.

The CBA assumes the flexibility and the league credits Denver with around $21 million in cap space after Surtain’s raise. But the Broncos enter the summer likely working under their own internal assumption that they have less room than that.

Now that the team’s built a stable of players with option bonuses in their deals, it can treat them essentially like puzzle pieces. Exercise a couple here, rescind a portion there. Manipulate cap space and associated risk on a per-player, per-year, per-option basis.

It����ap complicated, it����ap interesting, and it����ap the way the front office has decided to attack a future that could, as soon as next summer, include a mega-contract for quarterback Bo Nix.

Every team’s calculus changes once it pays a quarterback. But from this far away, it����ap impossible to say exactly what that might look like, how fast the cap will grow, how players at other positions will age and what position might go from strength to weakness or vice versa.

As such, the Broncos are trying to set themselves up with as much flexibility as possible.

It means you can pay a star player what he’s worth in the present and maybe, just maybe, keep an extra quality player or two down the line.

He is no longer calling plays. It is like asking Paul McCartney to only play bass for the Beatles. For 15 years, no one was better at piling up points than Payton.

In his previous life in New Orleans, Payton always had the answers as the voice in Drew Brees’ head. But that was 1,300 miles away.

And $18 million ago. That is his annual salary.

With an organization’s hopes in his grip, with his Hall of Fame bid hanging in the balance, Payton was brought here to make decisions like this.

He wasn’t hired to deliver a winning record, even if one was desperately needed after a seven-year drought, or capture an AFC West title, or post a playoff victory.

It was never about that.

It has always been about this: winning a Super Bowl.

That is why he makes more money than any coach in Broncos history. He is a legendary culture builder. And no NFL boss pushes the right buttons as an underdog like Payton.

But to achieve a championship — “Go The Distance,” aka GTD, the new offseason slogan — he was brought in to make tough choices, including about himself.

Want to throttle up the offense? Promote The Mad Scientist.

Thursday offered the media’s first chance to see Davis Webb — “The Mad Scientist,” Courtland Sutton said — calling plays.

It is June. There are no pads. And Bo Nix is still recovering from a check-up procedure on his ankle after an offseason of the Broncos putting their foot in their mouth about his health.

But watching Webb speak into the walkie-talkie, seeing Evan Engram look reborn and Jaylen Waddle turn routes into blurs, there was an obvious conclusion to draw: this should work.

It is time for a new chapter. For Payton to transition into a CEO position.

This is how he can achieve the ultimate goal. At Thursday’s practice, Payton showed a willingness to fade into the background, watching from a distance, glancing at his play sheet and providing pointers to receivers.

Webb was steering the wheel. And he looked comfortable in the cockpit.

“It����ap a combination of things that he has learned from coach Payton and things that he has liked and seen from his own experience of playing and coaching in this league. I know he is ready. There is not a thought behind it,” Sutton said. “I know that he is ready and being able to listen to the way he coaches and the way he is teaching the terminology to us on the field and in the classroom has been amazing.”

Webb, 31, has the hardest job outside of Rockies pitching coach. Working for Payton is a challenge, and now he is taking over one of the coach’s favorite things to do.

Regardless of how Payton relinquished the role — cajoling, self-reflection, kicking and screaming — it was the right decision. Payton can provide a 10,000-foot view, blending his experience with Webb’s innovation.

During the open viewing session, the Broncos ran a lot of three-wide. Sutton and Waddle showed why they will be a problem — good luck to defensive coordinators deciding where to slide coverage — and Engram lost linebackers easier than Ozempic does weight.

Maybe Payton and Webb were just showing off for the cameras.

But the way the players talk about Webb is inspiring confidence. Nix has been all in since he met him. Garett Bolles calls him “scary smart,” saying on the “Up and Adams” podcast a few weeks ago that he is not “afraid to put everything on the line and let it rip.”

Think of Payton as Robin Williams and Webb as Will Hunting.

All those screams from Nix to the sidelines, all those punts (third most in the league), don’t lie.

Payton can still dial up gash plays, but the mechanics of communicating them to Nix have become problematic.

Into this equation comes Webb. He is an obvious solution. And not just for the reasons mentioned above.

Everyone knows Webb has a high football IQ. He has been keeping notebooks of plays since high school, which he later converted to PDF files. He is cerebral.

But that is not what has me convinced that Webb can pull this off.

It is Webb, the person, the player. Webb brings a swagger, an edge, a presence, a thick skin. He walks into the room at 6-foot-5, 220-ish pounds and fills the space. He is a former quarterback in every way.

Even if his ideas get squashed, he is not afraid to speak up to Payton. Just like Nix. Friction is a defining quality in any productive relationship with Payton.

And the good part, when it comes to squeezing every ounce of juice out of this offense? Webb bet on himself.

Talking to industry folks over the last several months, it is clear that Webb nearly landed head-coaching jobs with the Raiders and Bills. If he wanted to play the iron off the tee box, Webb could have stayed in his role as the Broncos quarterbacks coach.

He did not need to call plays to land a head coaching job next offseason.

Like backup quarterbacks, assistant coaches benefit from the great unknown.

And yet, Webb muscled his way into a promotion with his performance the past two seasons, his first as a coach since retiring from the NFL.

Payton wasn’t giving up his play-calling for just anyone. Webb was in the building, and with his interview list long, it drove home what Payton already knew.

Now was the time, like it or not, to hand off the play-calling.

It would be naive to suggest Webb won’t struggle, hit rough patches. He has not developed the scar tissue to overcome a second-and-25 after a failed reverse, or a fourth-down stop when the defense makes it look like Webb was tipping his pitches.

But that is what makes this so fascinating. Will Payton show patience after the third three-and-out? He must, or this is all so much cotton candy, empty calories.

Webb must microwave his development. And he needs Payton’s help.

The coach can provide institutional knowledge, in-game advice, and Webb can see the defense through a current quarterback’s eyes.

Time is ticking faster than the play clock on this experiment. If it goes well, Webb will be a head coach in February.

There is a lot to like here, particularly if you want an offense that features a modern twist.

The Broncos have a duo that can make this team better.

Webb is ready. And if this goes as planned, a Super Bowl berth will cement Payton’s Hall of Fame legacy.

He tossed a ball lightly to receivers running routes.

He moved around the Broncos’ OTA practice Thursday engaged in what was happening around him.

He just wasn’t participating in the actual practice.

The Broncos third-year quarterback instead watched, talked with new quarterbacks coach Logan Kilgore, chatted with receivers about routes and plays they’d just run, pointed out where the ball was about to be delivered and did it all wearing white tennis shoes, a ball cap and hoodie.

Head coach Sean Payton says Nix will be swapping that apparel for a uniform and helmet soon.

“You don’t see pre-practice, but he’s been throwing,” Payton said. “I do think in our third week, (for minicamp), I think you’ll see more of a role.”

Denver wrapped up its first of two OTA weeks and had reporters in attendance for the first time. The club will have a second week of OTAs Tuesday through Thursday next week and then a three-day, mandatory minicamp June 16-18.

Somewhere in that final week Nix is expected to be back on the field in a more formal, practicing capacity. Whether he practices all three days or does every drill remains to be seen.

Still, Nix doesn’t like standing around doing nothing. Payton in January said he’d find Nix roaming the Broncos’ facility on a scooter after his first of two ankle surgeries.

“You have to know him,” Payton said. “He’s fidgety to begin with.”

Nix, then, will be happy to be back on the football field in a non-observing capacity in the coming weeks, even if it����ap only for a day or two before the team breaks for the summer. He got a taste through his initial rehab after a late-January surgery to repair a fractured ankle, but then had another operation in late April.

Now, he’s getting closer to being back on the field.

“Bo is definitely a competitor. He loves talking ball,” said wide receiver Jaylen Waddle, Nix’s new top target. “He loves just being around the guys. I think he’s going to be a great leader. I can see the traits from him, just day-to-day and everything. If he sees something, he’s going to tell me about it. We just kind of pick each other’s brains and get on the same page the best we can.”

There’s plenty to do for the Broncos, who came within a game of the Super Bowl last year — and may well have made it without Nix’s ankle breaking in overtime against Buffalo. On the list for Nix: Building a rapport with Waddle.

Waddle on Thursday said Nix had been instrumental in helping him feel comfortable in Denver right off the bat. He doesn’t think it’ll take long for the football part to click once Nix is back on the field.

“Bo’s a tremendous player; he’s a playmaker,” Waddle said. “He makes a lot of plays. When you’ve got a guy like that slinging the ball, I don’t think it����ap going to take that much time.”

The Broncos opted not to sign a quarterback for these OTA weeks despite Nix’s absence, so both Jarrett Stidham and Sam Ehlinger are getting a ton of work.

Stidham is going into his fourth season with Payton in Denver, while Ehlinger is trying to make a jump in his second year.

“I think considerably,” Payton said when asked about Ehlinger improving in his command of Denver’s offense. “Just today there were a handful of plays that, maybe a year ago at this time (he doesn’t make), just from a terminology standpoint or rhythm. You can see it. It����ap encouraging.”

Sean Payton wants no part of them this summer.

The Broncos head coach on Thursday said his team will not practice against any of its three preseason opponents in August.

Instead, the Broncos will travel to Atlanta and host Green Bay and Minnesota without seeing any additional work against those teams.

Payton said the decision to skip what����ap become a training camp staple around the NFL in recent years stems from Denver’s long postseason run in January.

The Broncos were the last team to start their voluntary offseason program by two weeks when they began lifting and running May 4. They cut out a week of OTAs, too.

All of that, Payton said, means Denver needs a relatively uninterrupted training camp.

“When you do have a joint practice, you miss maybe two days of installation,” he explained. “So this year we know we have the preseason games, but we’re not going to have a joint practice.”

Payton is among the coaches who still plays his starters in preseason games. Many around the league now prefer to let their top guys get work in the more controlled joint practice environment, then play only backups in preseason games.

Payton, though, said he doesn’t pay attention to other teams’ workloads or care when, for example, Green Bay played all of its starters during joint practice work but then held out its top players for a preseason game in Denver two summers ago.

“When we have a joint practice, we pay attention to the reps that we get and the reps they get in the game the next couple days,” he said. “We’ll do the same if we’re not. Obviously we haven’t had a joint practice every preseason week. So we’ll manage their snap counts.”

Doesn’t he think that joint practices are good for evaluating players?

“So are the games,” Payton said. “We play them in the games.”

Jonah Elliss is (mostly) an outside linebacker after all

The Jonah Elliss inside linebacker experiment did not go very far.

Or, at least, it hasn’t so far.

Elliss spent Thursday’s practice working with the Broncos outside linebackers and Payton indicated that����ap mostly where he’ll stay.

“That����ap where his home will be initially,” Payton said. “There may be some packages where he’s inside and we have some flex. But he’s doing too well outside.”

Payton earlier this year said Elliss would get time playing inside and teammates including Nik Bonitto and Alex Singleton talked about believing Elliss could make the transition smoothly.

Instead, he’ll mostly be an outside linebacker along with Bonitto, Jonathon Cooper, Dondrea Tillman, Que Robinson, Drew Sanders and others.

Broncos will attempt to ‘Go the Distance’

Safety Talanoa Hufanga stepped to the podium Thursday to speak with reporters after practice. He did so wearing a cutoff navy t-shirt that “G.T.D.” in white block lettering.

What does that mean?

“It����ap our strength staff, they come up with a slogan during the offseason,” Hufanga said. “This year it����ap ‘Go the Distance.’ Just being able to finish. We didn’t go the distance last year, so we’ve got to make sure we get that this time.”

Hufanga took his share of responsibility for Denver coming up short last year, saying he needed to do better taking the football away. The safety played high-level football in his first year for the Broncos, but he dropped several potential interceptions, too.

“I got back on the JUGS (machine),” Hufanga said. “The reason I couldn’t get on the JUGS last year — and this is an excuse, I’ll be honest — was I was coming off my wrist surgery. A lot of it was just coming off of wearing a club during the game. That was really uncomfortable and really hard to learn again. My hand-eye coordination was really not great. But that is an excuse. I own up to it and I have to be better.”

Hufanga said he had plenty of chances that were anything but difficult.

“I don’t know I dropped all of them because some of them were gimmes,” he said. “I’m being real with you, man, they dropped right in my lap and I didn’t come out with them.”

It remains the defining characteristic of the Broncos. It is why on Tuesday they gave their best player Pat Surtain II a $5 million raise before his new $96 million contract even kicked in.

He outperformed his deal, ownership recognized it, and rather than risk creating a rift or causing a holdout — something Surtain said he was not considering — the Broncos paid him closer to his worth.

Over the past two years, the Broncos have awarded nearly a half-billion dollars in contract extensions.

For this, they have earned praise and, um, threatened to undermine expectations. They change their cast of characters less than “Friends.”

Trust began defining the Broncos’ roster after co-owners Greg Penner and Carrie Walton Penner fired Nathaniel Hackett and hired Sean Payton.

What began this week with OTAs can end only in one place for this season to be a success: at SoFi Stadium in Super Bowl LXI on Feb. 14, 2027.

That would sure beat a box of overpriced chocolates.

Another ring is the expectation they put on themselves.

This is what happens after back-to-back playoff berths and a division title. And yet the Broncos followed an AFC Championship Game loss with an offseason of crickets chirping.

They took one big swing, acquiring receiver Jaylen Waddle.

The Patriots added A.J. Brown, Romeo Doubs and Alijah Vera-Tucker.

The Bills signed a battery of veterans, including old friend Bradley Chubb. The Ravens brought new coach Jesse Minter aboard, edge rusher Trey Hendrickson and multiple depth pieces.

And the Rams went full arms race to dominate the Walton Christmas Day dinner conversation by trading for reigning Defensive Player of the Year Myles Garrett and two-time All-Pro cornerback Trent McDuffie.

Did the Broncos really do enough?

“I think we’ve got a great team all around,” Surtain said when I asked him that question. “So it����ap more than enough, honestly.”

It goes back to trust.

The Broncos view Team Retention as a solution. I have questions. At tight end in the passing game. At running back in the training room. At how they plan to maximize the return on investment with Jahdae Barron.

Can the Broncos take the next step without upgrading at certain positions? Denver tripled down on loyalty, keeping Alex Singleton, Justin Strnad, J.K. Dobbins, Adam Trautman, well, really everyone but John Franklin-Myers and P.J. Locke.

How is this going to work? The Broncos went so far on the field and made such improvement that anything less than a Super Bowl will be a disappointment.

But shouldn’t they have done more?

“We believe in each other. Love challenges,” cornerback Riley Moss said. “There are no complainers.”

Payton made clear when he arrived that he wanted players who loved football, were tough and lived to compete.

“And he’s done that. Now, we’ve had a year of winning where we got close,” linebacker Alex Singleton said last week. “Instead of trying to fix something that isn’t broken with new pieces. ….”

They kept the band together. There is a reason Mötley Crüe is still touring, right?

Continuity has only strengthened camaraderie and chemistry. No one has said it out loud yet, but we will hear it soon enough.

It is the Broncos vs. Everybody.

Now more than ever.

No one likes these players more than this GM, this coach, and, well, these players.

But is their confidence misguided? ESPN’s offseason power rankings placed the Broncos 15th behind six teams in the AFC alone. Their over-under for wins is 9.5

If the Broncos pull this off, they will cement their standing as one of the best teams in franchise history. If not, their static free agency will taint them as a collection of high-character guys who couldn’t finish the job without more outside help.

It was a huge risk by staying internal, save for Waddle.

So, again, how do the Broncos continue the climb against opponents who appear to be more all in?

It goes back to players like Surtain. To trust. “To a locker room with the same mentality and work ethic,” Moss said.

These types of statements roll eyes. But I have seen it work, most notably with the 2007 Rockies. Players who grew up in the minors, stayed together, were bonded by friendship and did the unthinkable because of the power of playing for each other.

That same kind of dynamic is at work here. The premise is simple, if not fraught with danger. That standing pat will allow them to move forward. Even Surtain.

“We haven’t seen his best yet,” said Pat Surtain, the star cornerback’s father, and former NFL stalwart, who attended PS2’s foundation Topgolf event that raised money to provide resources for students in financially disadvantaged communities. “We haven’t.”

Really? How so?

“What would happen if he is targeted more and gets like six interceptions?” the elder Surtain said.

Or is healthy. Surtain missed three games last season, the longest absence of his football career at any level, with a partially torn pectoral muscle. It was a remarkably fast recovery.

“It should have been season-ending,” Pops said. “But he came back.”

This is why the Broncos gave him a raise before he was due. Surtain is all in for the team.

Bo Nix is the face of the franchise. But Surtain is the best player, a future Hall of Famer. He knows what a title looks like, having won a national championship at Alabama in 2020.

Waddle was his teammate. That is where the confidence comes from when he believes the Broncos did enough.

Waddle will help Nix. And force teams to use more man coverage on Courtland Sutton.

Based on conversations with multiple players over the last month, they also believe Davis Webb will make the offense more explosive. It must be to survive an opening six-game gauntlet that smacks of cruel and unusual punishment.

“In order to reach the top you have to play the best and our schedule definitely says that,” Surtain said. “I am looking forward to it. That is the exciting part of the game. You have to prove yourself every year.”

No matter what happens in the opening two months, the Broncos will be good and remain a contender. But for this to work, they have to improve after an offseason where they were complacent.

“I am telling you,” Surtain said with a smile, “this is a special group.”

In other words, trust him.

Denver started the first of two weeks of organized team activities on Tuesday. The team is on the field three days this week and three days next week for voluntary work, then has its mandatory minicamp slated for June 16-18.

The next three weeks, then, are the only time Sean Payton’s team will be on the grass in any formal capacity until training camp begins at the end of July.

It����ap football without pads. It����ap more than three full months before the regular season begins. There is a lot of time left in the offseason and the rush to blow small developments or highlights out of proportion this time of year runs rampant across the league.

Nonetheless, these three weeks do mark important waypoints on the Broncos’ path toward training camp and, ultimately, a “Monday Night Football” opener Sept. 14 at Kansas City.

So, here are four storylines that could realistically be moved forward over the coming weeks.

Is Bo Nix nearing the end of his rehabilitation?

It’s the story that will be a story until it����ap not. And even then, questions about the third-year quarterback’s ankle will linger until he puts another long stretch of healthy play together this fall.

Payton indicated last month that he expected Nix to be around for OTAs, but also that he was more confident Nix would be actually involved in some capacity later this month during the minicamp.

“If it were up to him, it’d be earlier,” Payton said May 9. “But we’re going to be smart.”

Nix fractured his ankle in January late in a postseason win against Buffalo and had surgery shortly after. Payton and others originally indicated that Nix would be full speed at the start of Denver’s offseason program, which started in early May, but a second procedure on the ankle in late April pushed that timeline back.

“You’ll see him (in June),” Payton said. “I’m sure you’ll see him in, probably minicamp maybe, but he’ll be full speed throwing everything in July before we even get back here (for training camp).”

The Broncos have expressed confidence in Nix’s rehab both after the initial surgery and after the second. The coming weeks will give a bit more clarity on where the 26-year-old is in that process.

Who will win playing time in the Broncos’ revamped wide receiver room?

Aside from Nix, the single biggest item of interest when reporters are allowed into OTA practice Thursday will be seeing Jaylen Waddle on the field for Denver for the first time.

The star wide receiver, acquired in March from Miami, will likely have to wait a bit longer to start building rapport with his starting quarterback, but his impact is sure to be felt right away in the receiver room.

Not only does he make a dynamic pairing atop the room with Courtland Sutton, but his arrival and sure-to-be-heavy workload have an impact on the rest of the room.

Exact roles and playing time will be up for grabs through the summer, but that competition is already on.

The list of contenders is long but starts with Troy Franklin, Pat Bryant and Marvin Mims Jr. The Broncos have used all three in different ways over the years and each has his strong suits. Franklin can fly and his production jumped last fall from 28 catches, 265 yards and a pair of touchdowns as a 2024 rookie to 65, 729 and six, respectively. Bryant is tough over the middle and in traffic, has run-after-catch ability and is the group’s best blocker. Mims is explosive and has shown he can play any of the spots or out of the backfield in addition to being a terrific returner.

Maybe by September it����ap as simple as rotating those three guys in with Waddle and Sutton depending on game situation. Maybe somebody grabs control of the No. 3 spot. It’ll be one of the best summer battles on the roster.

Can Jonah Elliss make the ILB transition stick?

There’s no substitute for actually playing full speed and, eventually, tackling, so this will be an ongoing process. The staff has confidence, though, that Elliss can play in the middle of the field and he can begin to show signs of that — or plant the seed for question marks — depending on how the next few weeks go.

One player who’s confident Elliss can make the move smoothly: Veteran inside linebacker Alex Singleton, who will be part of the group trying to help get the 2024 third-round pick up to speed.

“It����ap fun. Anytime a guy can learn more, all the better,” Singleton said Friday of welcoming Elliss into the inside linebacker room. “I actually played inside backer with his brother (Christian), too, so I know, kind of, the mindset he’s going to have about it.

Several players this offseason have noted Elliss’ overall talent and concluded that he needs to be on the field some way, somehow. If him moving inside helps create playing time for young edge rushers like Que Robinson, all the better.

The first steps: Learning the responsibilities and communications in the middle of the field. That’ll be Elliss’ challenge this summer before attempting to show he can play regularly inside during training camp.

Is Jahdae Barron headed for a similar role in Year 2?

The personnel in Denver’s loaded secondary has not changed. Pat Surtain II is the premier cornerback in football and has a new, $5 million raise, too. Riley Moss and nickel Ja’Quan McMillian are both valued players and are both entering contract years, too.

So, where does that leave Barron, Denver’s 2025 first-round pick? He played a modest 30% of defensive snaps as a rookie — and less than that outside of the stretch Surtain missed due to injury.

Will he again compete with McMillian for the nickel job in camp? Will he compete for a starting job outside against Moss and Kris Abrams-Draine? Is he perhaps the third option behind starters Talanoa Hufanga and Brandon Jones at safety after P.J. Locke’s departure this spring? All of the above?

Barron’s time is likely coming with McMillian and Moss both in line for big paydays after the 2026 season, but what does the shorter-term future have in store for him?

Count to 10. Deep breath. Exhale. Slowly. Put the pitchforks down and ask yourself this question:

Who could the Avalanche get to coach their team — right now — who would be better — again, right this very second — than Jared Bednar?

David Carle? Best coach in the time zone. I was in that camp a year ago, my friend.  The driver of DU’s hockey dynasty is allegedly not ready to walk through that door.

Jay Woodcroft? Can he draw up a defense? No thanks.

Craig Berube? Too much Maple Leaf. Pass.

Kris Knoblauch? Nah.

Bruce Cassidy? Sure, but there’s a catch: He’s technically off the market. The Golden Knights, classy to the last, refuse to let their former coach out of a contract that runs through 2027 — even though they’d relieved him of his duties with eight games to go in the regular season.

After Carle or Cassidy, whom the Vegas brass have locked up in in dungeon near Circus Circus, the pickings look awfully slim.

Which, we’ll grant you, isn’t the sexiest reason to run it back with Bednar. But we’ll give you another rationale: Joe Sakic is inheriting something of a hot mess, at least as championship-level teams go.

Sakic built the best house on the NHL’s block four years ago. But when he handed the keys over to Chris MacFarland, the maintenance costs went through the roof. Which, by the way, now leaks when it rains.

When MacFarland left the Avs’ general manager post to run the Nashville Predators on Tuesday, he left a pile of bills on the kitchen table and the basement unfinished. Colorado has roughly $3 million of cap space available for ’26-27 and only 17 players under contract. The Avalanche don’t have a first-round pick until 2029.

MacFarland took a Kyle Schwarber approach to roster management — C-Mac swung hard and swung from his heels, but the misses could be heard for miles. Trading Mikko Rantanen was supposed to ease the cap strain for ’26-27 and ’27-28, but the Avs landed back on that track anyway thanks to the Martin Necas contract. Swapping out Rantanen and Bo Byram didn’t age well. Neither did hanging onto Samuel Girard for as long as they did.

Cale Makar is expected to undergo surgery that will almost surely delay the start of his ’26-27 season. Also, he’s eligible for a contract extension on July 1 that could almost double his current cap number of $9 million. Necas is making $11.5 million a year through 2034 to be a playoff ghost. Brock Nelson, your 2C, is making $7.5 million a year to play defense.

Captain Gabe Landeskog turns 34 in November; Scott Wedgewood turns 34 in August. Devon Toews turns 33 next February. Valeri Nichushkin will be 32 in March. Nazem Kadri will be 36 in the fall. Nelson and Josh Manson will turn 35 in October.

, the Avs are on a track to use 56.1% of their expected ’26-27 cap space on players 31 years of age or older. That’s a lot of old dogs to try and teach new tricks.

Bednar isn’t nearly as divisive a winner as Sean Payton, but he’s getting closer by the summer. Like Sunshine Sean, Bedsy offers a high floor, good-to-brilliant regular seasons, and inevitable playoff heartbreak brought on by a combination of stubbornness and the inability to adapt on the fly. Every time that second title looks close, something happens that snatches the dream away.

A decade of Bednar has produced one Stanley Cup title, two conference final appearances and four second-round exits. For a team whose core has at least two future Hall-of-Famers in Nathan MacKinnon and Makar, and featured a third in Rantanen for most of Bednar’s era, that feels like a slightly underwhelming return on the trophy front. Very good suddenly feels very stale.

Fun fact: Seven of the last nine Western Conference championship coaches got to the Stanley Cup Final within their first 12 months on the job — including John Tortorella in Vegas, who’d only landed the gig in April.

Counter: Six of the last nine Eastern Conference-winning coaches were on their jobs six years or longer when they reached the Cup Final.

The last eight Cup championship-winning coaches did so with about four seasons with their current team already under their belts, on average. A quick-strike hire might get you there, but they usually don’t get over the line — the Final coach with the most tenure with a franchise has won three of the last five Cups and five of the last eight.

Bedsy also hasn’t lost the locker room, for whatever that’s worth. MacKinnon trusts him, which is no mean feat. Logan O’Connor has told me in multiple chats over multiple seasons that players appreciate Jared’s steady, calm voice during a nine-month grind.

“His work ethic and his preparation is something that there is zero complacency in what he does day-to-day,” O’Connor, the former Pios star, said last spring. “How (Bednar) operates, the meetings he runs, the message he delivers, what he expects from players, having good relationships with players — I think he creates a clear picture of how he wants us to play.

“And that goes from first line to fourth line, individuals to power play to penalty kill. I think you know exactly the expectations that he has for you. And then it’s on us to go out there and execute those expectations. I think he just has the utmost respect from us players. And it’s no surprise that he’s had as great of a run as he has, given the volatility in the (coaching) market. And we all love playing for him.”

For Sakic and the Kroenkes, the question of Bednar, whose current contract extension expires at the end of next season, is largely this:

Do you prefer something safe and predictable — 50-plus wins in the regular season, followed by a second-round postseason exit — or the crap shoot of a new coaching hire?

Do you want to be hockey’s version of the ’90s Atlanta Braves? Or do you want to roll the dice? After being shamed on The Strip, we’re about to find out if Super Joe’s still in a gambling mood.

“On the outside looking in, I would have him on a (reps) restriction,” Warren Moon, the Hall-of-Fame quarterback, told me over the phone Monday when I asked about Bo Nix, the Broncos’ QB1.

“I think (the Broncos) should put him on some type of pitch count, like you would put a quarterback on a pitch count if he had problems with his shoulder.

“You put him in, limit his (reps), and you see how he’s handling it in practice. It’s something they’re going to have to monitor as they go along and see how much (this month) he can take and how much he shouldn’t take.”

The Broncos open Organized Team Activities this week, ramping up to a mandatory mini-camp June 16-18. Nix, who’s coming off January ankle surgery, followed by another procedure in April, is expected to do more watching than throwing this month.

Which, to Moon’s ears, isn’t just safe. It’s smart. The former great who played six seasons in Canada before a 17-year NFL career with the Oilers, Vikings, Seahawks and Chiefs once tried to rush back from a bum right ankle himself. Fall of 1996.

“The quick movements that you have to make in the pocket, you just aren’t able to make as quickly,” Moon recalled. “I tried to practice with it as much as I could. They tried to give it time to heal … I probably should have given it a lot more time.”

Moon had sprained his right ankle against Detroit in Week 1, then sat out a week. In hindsight, he told me, it should’ve been longer. Warren fought like holy heck to play through the pain. Even though he couldn’t plant. Couldn’t cut. Couldn’t move. If you’re Warren Moon, you can fake it as an NFL signal-caller on one good leg. Until the pocket collapses.

“When I got that ankle sprain, it made me feel like I was The Mummy, like I was Frankenstein’s monster,” the 69-year-old chuckled. “I couldn’t move at all. I just didn’t have the mobility, just didn’t have the lightness on my feet to do the things that I was comfortable doing.”

Moon sat out Week 2, then made six straight starts before the ankle got dinged again during a home loss to Chicago on Oct. 28. With one working ankle, Warren tossed six scores with seven picks, completing 56.6% of his throws. In ’94 and ’95 with the Vikings, Moon had averaged seven tilts per season of at least 275 passing yards. After the ankle mess, he managed just two such games for Minnesota in ’96 over eight appearances — a freak injury that, in hindsight,

“When you were trying to move in the pocket to avoid somebody, I just didn’t have the same quick-twitch ability as I did when my ankle was healthy,” Moon offered.

“And then when you look at someone like Bo Nix, someone who relies on his mobility — if it’s not completely healed, it’s going to definitely hamper his mobility. Which is one of his strengths.”

Moon is a Nix fan, by the way. Says he even reminds him of somebody Warren used to run into during those business trips to Denver those many moons ago.

“(Nix) has a little bit of John Elway in him, in the way he moves,” Moon said. “His arm’s probably not as strong as John’s. John was one of those guys who could bring his team back at the end of a game. That’s one of the things Bo has done a good job of …

“Then there’s the movement, of course, (Nix) being able to move around and make plays with his legs. He would be similar that way, in those aspects of his game.”

Like Elway, those aspects are hard to replicate — and even harder to replace, as Steady Stiddy reminded us against the Patriots in the AFC Championship.

“(The Broncos) do a lot of things because of Bo’s mobility,” Moon said of Nix. “They do a lot of rollouts, a lot of bootlegs, a lot of play-action to take advantage of his throwing ability on the run. And you want to make sure he’s able to do things where Sean Payton can still run the type of offense (that) he still wants to run. I’m sure that’s something they’ll be looking at at (during) the OTAs.”

When it comes to ankle recoveries, Moon added, it’s also about looking at the long view. Any rep Nix can manage on the field during June is found money. The points on the calendar that matter more are the start of training camp in late July and sometime around the second preseason game against the Packers on Aug. 21. Anything before that is gravy.

“The main thing is that (Nix) is there physically, as the leader of the football team,” Moon continued. “That he’s going to be in the meetings, for the (instruction) that he needs to digest, that the team sees that he’s doing things.

“The fact that he’s there (at OTAs), that’s huge. It’s not an Aaron Rodgers deal where you don’t know if he’s going to show up or not, where the team is wondering, ‘Is he going to be our leader?’ They know, ‘Hey, our QB1 is here.’ (The Broncos) seeing that he’s doing what he can on the field, that confidence bleeds over to the rest of the football team, too.”

Want Bo in the flow?

Low and slow is the way to go.

“I really like what they’ve done in a short period of time. The future looks great for them,” Moon stressed. “And the kid from Miami (Jaylen Waddle) they got in the offseason — I know Sean is going to come up with a lot of ideas as to how to use him. They’re going to be right there in the thick of things at the end of the regular season. Just like they were last year.”