Cooper, the Broncos’ outside linebacker, was arrested Thursday night for the second time in about a week. The 28-year-old defender, according to online records, was booked at the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office detention facility on a charge of domestic violence and misdemeanor charges of harassment and violation of a protection order.

The details paint an even scarier picture. Cooper and his girlfriend were arrested last Thursday night and given a court order to stay away from one another. Only records indicate that Cooper’s girlfriend called police this Thursday, a few hours after the Broncos completed organized team activities, to say that the Broncos edge-rusher had shown up at her apartment and knocked on the door for “five to 10 minutes.”

According to an affidavit, Cooper sent her at least 20 messages. Both were under court protection orders that forbid them from interacting, stemming from a June 4 incident in which the woman endured “strangulation with hypoxia and traumatic brain injury,” the affidavit reads.

“I started to cry and he pressed, like, further — (because) he had me held up against the wall — he just pressed further and then dropped me and just started screaming at me that it was my fault and that I, like, caused this, and that I was like, a (expletive),” she told police, according to the affidavit.

Cut him. Now.

This isn’t just about football. It’s about trust. It’s about accountability. It’s about decency. What was becoming a distraction for a franchise riding high during a championship window has taken a more awful, serious turn.

The Broncos have to ask themselves a simple question today: Which cost is greater? I Or the stain on a franchise from a story that gets worse by the day?

For Carrie Walton-Penner and Greg Penner, this shouldn’t even be a discussion.

You move on.

Cooper isn’t just a danger to a team’s image anymore. He’s become a danger to another human being. A second arrest, and every unseemly anecdote that’s emerged since, removes any benefit of the doubt. All Cooper had to do to keep his career on track and his team out of the headlines was … nothing.  He couldn’t.

If the Broncos do nothing in response, then what does that say about them?

“We had a long visit with Coop,” Payton, the Broncos’ coach, said Thursday afternoon as voluntary organized team activities (OTAs) wrapped up with Cooper in attendance, “and now the process plays out.”

And Coop did what he did anyway.

“I haven’t (talked about it with the team), and yeah, my instincts told me not to right away,” Payton continued. “(At) this time next week, we have three days of mini-camp. We’ll have a number of speakers. I think there’ll be a time, though, to talk about it.”

That time is right here. Right now. As a best-case scenario, NFL precedent suggests a hefty suspension for Cooper is coming — most likely for six games, regardless of what the courts decide.

The Post’s Luca Evans reported late Thursday night that officials added felony second-degree strangulation charges to the Broncos defender’s case. The veteran linebacker pleaded not guilty in court last week and was seen practicing this past Thursday at OTAs — the last voluntary team session before mandatory mini-camp begins Tuesday. Cooper is slated for a motions hearing on July 6, and a potential jury trial in late July.

Last year, the NFL suspended Chiefs receiver Rashee Rice six games after the wideout pled guilty to two third-degree felony charges stemming from a road-racing incident in Dallas. In 2024, the league suspended then-Arizona wideout Zay Jones for the first five games of the regular season after Jones was charged with misdemeanor domestic battery in Florida. Those charges were later dropped. The suspension wasn’t.

And when it comes to replacements — no, Von Miller isn’t necessarily the logical answer here, either.

For one, the 58 you knew and loved is Von gone. Miller hasn’t played on more than 37% of his team’s defensive snaps since 2022. Pro Football Focus hasn’t given him a grade better than 85.8 (out of 100) since 2021. PFF says The Vonster missed 20% of the tackles he attempted last fall with Washington.

The popular scouting site’s wonks pegged Miller in 2025 as a 64.4-rated defender. Which, we’ll grant you, is solid for a then-36-year-old edge guy. It’s also a drop of 21.1 points from the 85.5 overall grade Vonster collected as a member of the Buffalo Bills in 2024.

Meanwhile, Broncos linebacker Jonah Elliss is 23. PFF graded him out with a 75.8 score overall during the regular season. Elliss recorded three sacks and 18 hurries on 370 snaps, per the site’s advanced metrics, and … didn’t miss a tackle.

Dondrea Tillman is 28. PFF gave him a 68.5 overall grade, with a run-stopping grade of 72.3, which ranked 19th in the league among edge-rushers. Missed-tackle rate: 15.4%.

Que Robinson is 25. He landed a 65.4 overall PFF grade on just 163 snaps as a rookie last fall. Missed-tackle rate: 16.7%.

It’s easy to put 2 and 2 together and come up with a 58 reunion. Only that’s fuzzy math.

The Broncos don’t just have cheaper, younger options than Miller. They have better ones, already on hand.

Per Spotrac.com, the Broncos, as of Friday morning, at $30.36 million. The site said Vonster was worth a 1-year, $5.8-million deal , which would certainly fit the budget.

But does he fit the building? Payton’s built a culture in Dove Valley around his image, his standard. Von takes up a lot of oxygen in any locker room he joins. But especially the one here, where 58 is already revered.

To general manager George Paton’s credit, the roster is already buffered in case of a long-term Cooper absence. We haven’t even mentioned Drew Sanders yet. And defensive coordinator Vance Joseph slathered Robinson with all kinds of love Thursday when asked about the second-year defender’s upside for 2026.

“After the season, watching the cut-ups (of game tape) … when Que played, he played really well,” Joseph said. “He looked like a guy who could be a future starter for us … so it’s our job to keep improving with Que, and get him more reps.”

If Payton is serious about accountability and trust, a window on the Broncos’ defense is about to open. A Super Bowl flag is on the ground, now, waiting for the next man to pick it up and run to daylight.

Week after week, his digits splayed across his helmet in anguish after passes ticked off his hands and into the grass. Hufanga was a 200-pound whirling dervish from the moment he joined the Broncos’ secondary last year, and earned a second-team All-Pro nod for it. He also left five potential interceptions on the ground of NFL stadiums across the country, and visibly reacted to each as if he’d just been handed his entire season paycheck and accidentally dropped it down a drain.

Going back through DB tape from '25 after Talanoa Hufanga's discussion of dropped interceptions at OTAs last week. Story later.

But man, was Hufanga's self-disappointment evident on a few plays last year. A four-part portrait of four dropped picks:

— Luca Evans (@bylucaevans)

Months later, despite a full 17-game slate that exceeded anyone’s expectations for his first year in Denver, Hufanga’s hands still burn from the unfortunate memories.

“A lot of it (was) left on the board, and a lot of it was me, man,” Hufanga said last Thursday, when asked how the Broncos’ defense can be even better in 2026. “We left a lot out there in terms of interception-wise, and that����ap exactly what we’re preaching this year is taking the ball away. We did well in third downs and sacks and things like that, but when we look at the lack of production, it starts with me.

“I gotta lead that better.”

Missed opportunities for turnovers

True to Hufanga’s words, last season’s Broncos had one of the stranger profiles of any dominant NFL defense in recent memory. In coordinator Vance Joseph’s third season at the helm, Denver led the league in fewest yards allowed per play and tied for fifth in NFL history in team sacks; the club also tied for the fourth-fewest turnovers forced by any defense in the NFL. Despite Joseph’s creativity and aggressiveness on situational blitzes, the Broncos thrived more on situational conservatism: they tied for the league lead in fewest red-zone touchdowns allowed (21) and finished  in opponents’ third-down conversion rate (33.8%).

One needs nothing more than a handful of clips of dropped picks, though, to know Joseph’s unit still has acres of room for growth. And on the Broncos’ first day of OTAs last week, the 53-year-old veteran coordinator delivered a pointed message to his defense.

“Basically saying, ‘It����ap a new year,'” cornerback Pat Surtain II recounted last week. “‘Whatever you did last year doesn’t matter now. It����ap a new slate. Teams are getting better and better.

‘We gotta find a way to get better.’”

Indeed, opposing AFC West offenses have improved, after the Broncos surrendered more than 20 points in just one of six regular-season divisional matchups. The Chargers’ offense will likely see a jolt with new play-caller Mike McDaniel. Patrick Mahomes looks probable to return for Week 1 in Kansas City, with reigning Super Bowl MVP Kenneth Walker III now in tow at running back. The Raiders have their franchise quarterback in Fernando Mendoza as well as veteran Kirk Cousins.

The Broncos’ defense, by contrast, lost starting defensive lineman John Franklin-Myers in free agency — and didn’t add a single external piece beyond a handful of rookies and special-teamer Tycen Anderson. It’s unreasonable to expect Joseph’s defense to put up 68 sacks again in 2026. And such a level of retention necessitates internal defensive progress; that begins with the Broncos’ ability to create turnovers, which Joseph and head coach Sean Payton stressed both internally and externally throughout 2025.

“That’s something,” Payton said after a December win over Kansas City, “that we’ve gotta improve on.”

The secondary’s lack of ball-production, in fact, became the subject of good-natured locker-room needling early in the year — and something slightly more, as weeks went by. The Post watched back tape of every Denver defensive pass breakup in 2025; players dropped a total of eight passes in coverage in the regular season, which would’ve jumped the Broncos’ league ranking in total interceptions from tied for 18th to tied for fifth.

Simple body language was even more telling. Surtain slammed his palms into the turf repeatedly after a fourth-quarter play in Week 7 against the Giants, when he and Ja’Quan McMillian tipped a can-of-corn pick away from each other. Two plays later, in that same game, safeties Hufanga and Brandon Jones ran smack-dab into each other and dropped another easy would-be interception from New York quarterback Jaxson Dart.

“I swear — as much as the lack of production in interceptions right now on the back-end — but we are trying to get the ball,” Hufanga reflected, a day later.

Back for more

He, for one, has a built-in excuse. He missed much of his 2024 season with San Francisco , and told reporters last week he wasn’t able to work his hands on a JUGS machine last offseason. He continued wearing a club on his wrist in 2025, too, and said his hand-eye coordination was “not great.”

“I’m going to be honest … I don’t know how I dropped all of them,” Hufanga smiled last week. “Because some of them, like — I’m being real with you, man, it dropped right in my lap. And I didn’t come out with them.

“And at the end of the day, a lot of my teammates would say, ‘You ain’t living right.’ So we gotta change that.”

This phenomenon extends beyond just picks, too. Despite a record-flirting sack season and excellent production against the run in 2025, the Broncos tied for the second-fewest fumbles recovered of any NFL defense last year.

There is no obvious external upgrade to that turnover margin, unless rookie linebacker Red Murdock manages to roll his NCAA all-time lead in forced fumbles into smashing NFL ball-carriers. Any salvation, then, lies within.

“What, realistically — we lost JFM, which is a guy that I’m gonna probably miss a lot,” Hufanga said. “But we did a really good job of being able to keep everybody intact, defensively at least.

“And so we’re super excited just to get this ball rolling.”

Instead, it went directly to representatives of Special Olympics Colorado — waiting to see if he’d be back in Denver so .

“Or else, I might’ve been having it in some other city,” Singleton said.

He spoke to reporters Friday very much present and accounted for in Denver, on-site at his second annual cornhole event with Special Olympics Colorado. Two months earlier, the Broncos captain received $11 million in guaranteed money on a new contract. The Special Olympics team got the green light. But for a brief period, this was all far from a certainty.

At February’s NFL Combine, Broncos general manager George Paton said point-blank they’d “love” to re-sign Singleton and fellow ILB Justin Strnad, both impending free agents. Words that drift through the haze of NFL contract negotiations, however, rarely equate to actions. Strnad told The Post on Friday that he “wasn’t nervous to go to the market.” Hours into free agency opening March 9, Singleton remained unsigned — and had a skeleton deal lined up with another NFL team in free agency if negotiations with the Broncos fell through, according to a source familiar with the process.

Paton’s word never wavered, though. Denver finalized multi-year deals with multi-year mainstays Strnad and Singleton, cut 2025 signee Dre Greenlaw, and immediately set the precedent for an offseason of unprecedented veteran retention.

Broncos head coach Sean Payton may hate the term “run it back,” as he said at the start of April. But his linebackers, for one, appreciate the sentiment.

“I think it’s everything,” Singleton said Friday. “Coaches say it all the time, like — ‘Ah, if we could just run it back, we could go be better.’ And then they let half the guys go, and sign all these free agents, and you’re just like, ‘Well, were they lying to us? What was the upstairs thinking?’

“But instead,” Singleton continued, “we’re in an organization right now that, what they’ve said is completely true. What Sean has said since Day 1 — he’s going to keep the guys here, they’re going to win football games for us — he’s done that. And now, we’ve had a year of winning where we got close. Instead of trying to fix something that isn’t broken with new pieces, we just kinda put together the band. And we’re going to see what happens.”

The heart of a defense that is the heart of these Broncos, then, is back to try to climb through a Super Bowl window everyone in Denver knows is open. Everyone across the NFL, too, if you ask Singleton.

“We’re not chasing targets anymore,” Singleton said Friday, asked about the team’s self-expectations. “We’re the target, now, I think, in the AFC. So we need to know that.”

Beyond a blockbuster trade for Dolphins receiver Jaylen Waddle, the Broncos placed a rather massive offseason bet on retaining their own pieces to successfully dodge that target. That begins with Singleton and Strnad, two veteran buddies who’ve been handsomely rewarded for their efforts and will now be tasked with rewarding the organization’s faith.

For years, Broncos fans have argued across social-media keyboards that the middle of coordinator Vance Joseph’s defense is, in fact, broken. Joseph himself has acknowledged that opposing offenses have attacked his scheme with tight ends across the past two seasons, and Singleton and Strnad have both had spotty records covering TEs in space. The two, however, also happened to be the two best inside linebackers on the NFL’s No. 3 defense in 2025, and Joseph has attached Singleton to his hip as his on-field defensive play-caller.

The Broncos could’ve easily signed a different linebacker in free agency for a similar cost. They did not. They could’ve drafted an early-to-middle-round linebacker, even as Texas’s Anthony Hill Jr. was ripped away two picks before the team’s second-round selection in April. They did not.

“We feel really good about Alex and Justin,” Broncos assistant general manager Reed Burckhardt said post-draft, on evaluating draft ILBs. “And so, it wasn’t a gotta-have-it.”

Singleton’s floor and ceiling are both obvious: a 32-year-old captain who struggled in coverage situations but put together arguably the best year of his career against the run in 2025 (just a 7.5% missed tackle rate, according to Pro Football Focus). Strnad, though, may have another leap to take entering his first season as a clear starter.

Entering his sixth season as a Bronco, the 29-year-old Strnad has still only started 21 games. He filled in capably for the oft-injured Greenlaw in 2025, and made himself impossible to take off the field in obvious coverage and pass-rushing situations even when Greenlaw was healthy.

Strnad told The Post Friday, at Singleton’s tournament, that it was “awesome” to see the organization “take care” of him after years earning his stripes. And Singleton said he thinks Strnad will take a “huge leap,” now that his role is finally set.

“Because you have that confidence where a team finally gives you what you deserve,” Singleton said. “You have that confidence all offseason. So he’s had that already. There isn’t that question of, ‘Oh, what snaps am I going to play?’”

The organization’s confidence in the locker room’s pre-established culture has even trickled down to offseason scheduling. At Payton’s behest, the Broncos will start Phase Three of its offseason program (organized team activities) later than any other NFL team, on June 2. Singleton, though, said Friday he believes the Broncos are weeks and months — if not years — ahead of “a lot of teams in the league.”

They’ll need to be, to reach Super Bowl heights.

“I don’t think we like, really get too caught up in the, like, whole ‘window’ thing,” Strnad said. “But I definitely think it����ap obvious that it����ap time for us to do what we want to do.”

Von Miller is a Denver icon, a Mile High legend, the engine of the defense, the life of the party, the Mick Jagger of ����apountry.

One problem: The Broncos already have a lead singer.

They’re looking for bass players, keyboardists, percussionists and backup dancers. It’s the Sean & Bo Show now,

“I would love to assist and be a vice president to Bo Nix and Courtland Sutton,” Miller told The Post’s Parker Gabriel a few days earlier at a Von’s Vision function in Commerce City. “I’ve been the guy and also I’ve been the vice president as well.

“I’d love to contribute to us getting back to the glory land, holding up that trophy and confetti falling again. For me, my whole entire life, I’ve helped guys be the best version of themselves and I’d love to do that back here with the Denver Broncos back home.”

Having No. 58 in the fold would be a hit for fans who’ve still got Miller jerseys hanging in their closets and a boon for media looking for a sound bite from one of the best to ever play in orange and blue.

And Von — who racked up nine sacks as a situational pass-rusher in Washington last fall — knows a good thing when he sees it, having faced the Broncos with the Bills and with the Commanders over the last three seasons.

Assuming Nix is healthy (crosses fingers), the Broncos are on the Super Bowl train, and Miller would love nothing more than to close out a Hall-of-Fame career with another ring in his favorite NFL town.

Von Miller playing for Sean Payton — D

Never say never, right? The kids up in the Grading The Week department would love to dust off their replica jerseys and party like it’s 2015 all over again.

“I think there’s no question the type of environment I bring to a locker room,” Miller told Gabriel. “I think there’s no question to the type of environment I bring to a team.”

Yet the bean-counters over the corner office keep reminding us of the same thing whenever the subject of No. 58 returning to the Broncos gets brought up:

Ain’t nowhere for The Vonster to play.

The law firm of (Nik) Bonitto & (Jonathon) Cooper are in their respective primes coming off the edge, combining for 22 sacks a season ago.

Behind them, Dondrea Tillman (four sacks in ’25) has been a revelation who hasn’t slowed down, while second-year rusher Que Robinson recorded a sack in the AFC Championship Game. Drew Sanders is looking for a home, and all Jonah Elliss does is make plays.

Whose snaps would you give to Miller, who’s still spry at age 37 but is creeping in the winter of his playing days?

“Obviously, I wouldn’t start. Obviously, I wouldn’t play special teams,” Miller continued. “But I will say, the type of room that we would have, the outside linebackers with me, Nik Bonitto, we’d be a force. Whatever (the) coach (has) going on, I would just contribute to that. The defense that we’d have. I’d love to bring back those Super Bowl 50 vibes.”

Yeah, but here’s the thing: This defense kind of already has those vibes — just with a different generation under defensive coordinator Vance Joseph. The Broncos also need their second-and third-wave of linebackers to play on special teams, my friend.

Von was the face of the Broncos seven years ago, and a good one. But that face is Payton’s now. That voice is Payton’s now.

Miller will retire a Bronco. But Team GTW wagers it’ll be the same way Justin Simmons just retired as a Bronco — with a ceremony, a 1-day contract, a news conference, some tears and a hearty thanks for services rendered and memories we’ll never let go.

A young Miles Scott, as St. Thomas More football coach Ernest Anderson tells it, was a breath of fresh air in this cloud of hormones.

One night in the 2020 season, Anderson was walking around the halls for bed-checks, knocking on doors for lights-out. Kids, as usual, were fiddling with controllers. Playing “NBA 2K.” Playing “Madden.” Then Anderson cracked open the door to Davis’s room, a transfer who’d come from Illinois for his senior season of high school ball.

Scott was lying in bed, listening to Marvin Gaye to wind down.

“That’s when I knew he was an old soul,” Anderson, formerly Scott’s defensive coordinator, recalled. “And it was really that he was here for one reason.”

Scott, an Illinois receiver-turned-safety drafted in the seventh round this April by the Denver Broncos, has never in his football life been particularly fast. He is well-built. He is strong. He is smart enough that Yale once offered him a scholarship. But his best trait, as former Illinois teammate Kenenna Odeluga said: Scott takes a “pursuit of learning, in everything that interests him, to the highest level.”

He is a talented singer and plays the piano. He is remarkably good with geography. He became fluent in Spanish in college, for reasons unknown. And every game week in his final couple of seasons at Illinois, Scott tracked down Fighting Illini defensive analyst Myers Hendrickson for one-on-one film sessions to study the upcoming opposing quarterback’s tendencies.

Those traits first endeared Scott to Illinois as an unknown walk-on receiver out of St. Thomas More, in 2021. That trait first endeared Scott to the Broncos as an unheralded safety in 2025. Scott is a kid, Odeluga said, who “would give you the skin off his back if he could.” Illinois and Denver both keyed in on him for that same reason.

That is not a coincidence.

“A lot of scouts, all of them ask a lot of the same questions,” said Illinois receivers coach Justin Stepp, describing NFL scouts’ pre-draft process. “And I know, as far as Denver, they ask a lot of the same questions that we ask when we’re out recruiting kids.”

There is a pipeline building from shared philosophy, out a couple of states east. Blue-and-orange to blue-and-orange. Scott is the third Fighting Illini in the past four years, after Alex Palczewski in 2023 and Pat Bryant in 2025, that the Broncos have targeted straight out of Illinois. All are completely different football players. All are the same �쾱�Ի���of football player.

“They might not have been the five-star guys,” Odeluga, who played with all three at Illinois, told The Post. “They’re not the guys that you’ll see … all the hoopla around them. But these are guys that bring their lunch pail to work every day, do what the coaches tell them, do it to the best of their ability, and then are there when the team needs them the most. And those are just — lunch-pail guys.”

Tough, smart, dependable

In five seasons under head coach Bret Bielema, Illinois has advanced from perennial Big Ten loser to Big Ten contender, despite landing just . In Champaign, Bielema hires, recruits, and begins and ends team meetings with the same three-word motto: tough, smart, dependable. These are not exactly novel foundational values. But they happen to be nearly identical to the same principles that Sean Payton brought as New Orleans’ first-year head coach in 2006, and brought to rebuild Denver in 2023, and the same principles that Payton’s mentor, Bill Parcells, operated by

“Bill really helped and still helps Sean with personnel, as far as knowing what he needs at O-line, D-line, different positions around the team as a head coach,” former Saints linebacker Scott Shanle told The Post last year. “There’s no doubt about it — Bill Parcells, you would never be in the Bill Parcells doghouse if you knew what you were doing, you executed, you played hard, and you didn’t get hurt.

“Bill hated hurt players. Sean hates players who are hurt.”

Intangible values have become tangible roots, intertwining across the 1,000 miles from the Rockies to the American Midwest. Palczewski, the first Bielema-era product to land with Payton’s Broncos, is a 6-foot-6 Polish offensive lineman who looks more like a freight handler than a football player at first glance. But he authored the , and became a roster lock in the 2023 preseason after going undrafted.

“Tough, smart,” Payton said of Palczewski, then. “He’s played a lot of football. It����ap not always pretty, but there is this quality of — he gets the job done.”

As the 26-year-old Palczewski has become an indispensable part of Denver’s offensive line and earned himself a two-year extension this offseason, Bielema . Every single time Illinois hosts a potential offensive-line recruit on campus, Bielema pulls up that tweet and shows them Payton’s words about Palczewski.

“Tough, smart, dependable has nothing to do with your ability — it has to do with the way you think and act, right,” Bielema said. “And here’s Sean Payton saying two words that we preach every day.”

Since Palczewski’s arrival, Denver has created a new, direct tie to Illinois with each passing year. In 2024, the Broncos hired Jim Leonhard — who’d been a senior football analyst at Illinois — as their defensive passing-game coordinator. In Denver, Leonhard fed Payton and the Broncos’ offensive staff information on Bryant, an ascending 6-foot-2 receiver and a hand-in-glove fit for Payton’s utilization of wide receivers. Payton eventually credited Leonhard for his insight into Bryant’s makeup, a clutch target and avid blocker who Stepp said would often beat Bielema to Illinois’ building in the mornings.

Roughly a month before the 2025 NFL Draft, members of the Broncos’ staff called Illinois with specific requests of film on Bryant. One, Bielema said, was a cut-up of one-on-one practice reps of Bryant working against current Seahawks All-Pro corner Devon Witherspoon, a former Illinois All-American in 2022. Such tape, Bielema said, showed Bryant was “very successful” against Witherspoon.

The Broncos had another specific request for Illinois with those tapes, Stepp recounted: do �Դdz���tell another team they’d requested that film, for fear of tipping their interest in Bryant.

“I would tell you the Denver Broncos — in my opinion, they know who they are and they know who they want to be,” Bielema told The Denver Post. “And they target players, and do an unbelievable amount of recon to try and make sure that what they’re looking at is the reality of what they’re going to get.”

On Denver’s radar

Enter Scott, the latest Illinois-to-Denver tie — and one that’s quietly been brewing for a while. In 2025, shortly before the Broncos drafted Bryant, the Fighting Illini hired Mike Neu as an offensive assistant. Neu is a longtime Payton associate, having served as a scout for New Orleans in 2006 and later the Saints’ quarterbacks coach from 2014 to 2015. And shortly into Neu’s time in Illinois, he reached out to Payton and asked if he and members of the Fighting Illini’s staff could shadow in Denver’s building during offseason activities.

Payton acquiesced. Bielema, Stepp, Neu, offensive coordinator Barry Lunney Jr. and former defensive coordinator Aaron Henry (now at Notre Dame) spent three days in the 2025 offseason with the Broncos, observing in meeting rooms and watching practices. Stepp was struck, he told The Post, by how similarly Denver structured practice to Illinois. Neu sat in on quarterback meetings, and wound up taking some bunch-formation concepts back to Illinois for quarterback Luke Altmyer’s senior season. Henry spent time picking the brain of Broncos defensive coordinator Vance Joseph and implemented concepts from Denver’s schemes against 12-personnel (two-tight-end) formations into Illinois’ system.

And on that excursion — nearly a year before their seventh-round selection rolled around this draft — Broncos staffers asked Bielema about Scott.

“I knew this was a guy,” Bielema said, “that had been on their radar for a while.”

True to Denver’s attempts to camouflage their interest, Scott told The Post at rookie minicamp that he “didn’t have a clue” the Broncos were interested in him pre-draft until they reached out to host him on a top-30 visit. And in many ways, this journey to Denver is unlikely. Scott walked on at Illinois in 2021 after receiving exactly two collegiate offers at St. Thomas More, and spent two years as a backup receiver. After his second season, Bielema told Scott he’d put him on scholarship if he moved to defensive back.

Scott looked at Bielema like he’d grown three heads. But a scholarship was a scholarship.

Across the next three seasons, Scott started 37 of a possible 38 games at safety for Illinois, intercepted seven passes, and was named captain twice. His journey embodied Bielema’s foundational ideals. So did his personality, a quiet and multitalented individual who captured pin-dropping silence when he spoke.

“If there’s a guy that I would say that I could lean on to give me the pulse of the locker room — offense, defense, or special teams — it was definitely Miles Scott,” Bielema said.

In a true rarity, former Illinois defensive coordinator Henry entrusted Scott as Illinois’s green-dot play-caller from his free-safety slot. And Scott’s on-field transition should be easier, Henry anticipates, because of similarities in Illinois and Denver’s defensive schemes. Both the Broncos and Fighting Illini, Henry explained, run a lot of “bare” formations — a five-man rush with three defenders deep.

“Miles was the catalyst of that,” Henry said. “He was very, very, very intelligent, and knew exactly what I wanted to get done.”

He’s a player, then, that Denver sees fitting its system, and is the latest Fighting Illini who could fit neatly into the Broncos’ locker room, too. Palczewski has become a beloved figure on the offensive line for his versatility (and remarkably colorful mouth). Bryant has become a beloved figure in his receiver room for his fearlessness (and remarkably colorful mouth). The 24-year-old Scott, now, will find his own corner.

“That night on draft day that Denver selected him,” Neu recounted, “I kinda got chills. Just because I know he’ll be such a great fit.”

Yes — the Broncos’ head coach is quick to admit he covets larger receivers.

“It’s not that I don’t like smaller receivers,” Payton said last June, on third-round pick Pat Bryant. “I do. But the bigger receivers that can block and are physical at the line of scrimmage … he showed those traits.”

These Broncos already had so many in their room — Courtland Sutton, Bryant, Troy Franklin — that they traded 6-foot-5 wideout Devaughn Vele to the New Orleans Saints before the start of the 2025 season for draft capital. A year later, though, they’ve brought another batch of undrafted rookies into the fray to compete for a roster spot.

Nebraska’s Dane Key stands 6-foot-2 and a half. TCU’s Joseph Manjack IV is 6-foot-2. Charlotte’s Sean Brown, a complete unknown in the draft process who currently has less than 300 followers on Twitter, measures 6-foot-3. Along with speed receivers Kolbe Katsis and Cam Ross, all will vie for a roster spot in training camp on undrafted free-agent contracts with the Broncos — even as Denver has a wealth of resources in the room following its March trade for Dolphins Pro Bowl receiver Jaylen Waddle.

Regardless of any pre-existing surplus, the Broncos are known among agents across the NFL as a premier destination for undrafted clients. Payton, for a brief time early in his tenure with the New Orleans Saints, would offer scouts cash out of his own pocket for hitting on an undrafted rookie who eventually made the roster. And the organization will take an intriguing crop of 14 undrafted prospects into this weekend’s rookie minicamp, the first time draft picks and tryout players alike will put on pads in Denver.

The Broncos are currently sitting at 93 countable players on the offseason roster, over the offseason limit of 90. They’ll need to cut three names by the start of Friday’s rookie minicamp to meet NFL compliance, and those names could come from this list. For now, here’s a hype meter on each of Denver’s post-draft free-agent rookie class.

The blue-chipper

ILB Taurean York, Texas A&M: The single most productive player Denver signed who didn’t get drafted, York started 39 straight games for the Aggies since his true freshman season and will become the youngest player (at 20 years old) on the Broncos’ current roster. He didn’t get drafted for one key reason: he stands 5-foot-10, and his athleticism — despite running the 40-yard-dash in a solid 4.59 seconds — isn’t explosive enough to overcome size concerns. All that said, though, he has the kind of grit and IQ that Payton and Denver’s entire building loves.

“He doesn’t run a 4.3 … but mentally, that kid plays at a 3.9,” said Scott Stewart, York’s former Temple High coach. “I mean, there is not a scheme out there that he doesn’t understand or won’t understand.”

Two undrafted inside linebackers, Karene Reid and Jordan Turner, became 53-man roster stalwarts by the end of 2025. Don’t be surprised if York’s next.

Athletic upside swings

OT Tyler Miller, Iowa State: The rationale here is pretty simple — tackles with this kind of size don’t just sprout from collegiate fields. Miller stands 6-foot-8-plus, weighs 324, and has above-average arm length at 34.1 inches. Add in a decent 40-yard dash (5.21 seconds) and an explosive broad jump (9 feet, 9 inches) in pre-draft testing, and Miller could easily be the next developmental offensive lineman in the pipeline for coach Zach Strief. He took major strides as a pass-protector in his final season at Iowa State, too

LB/S Dasan McCullough, Nebraska: No clue where he fits on an NFL field, but it could be fun to figure out. In his second season at Oklahoma in 2023, the 6-foot-5 hybrid defender played what the Sooners dubbed the “Cheetah” position — a hybrid linebacker-safety-nickel role tasked with a variety of different assignments against the run and pass. He never quite found a consistent position in college, but showed flashes of potential as both a pass-rusher and dropping back into coverage. Have fun, Vance Joseph.

OL Gavin Ortega, Weber State: Ortega primarily played tackle his last three years at Weber State, and was largely excellent, but will likely shift inside in the NFL due to his height (6-foot-5). His pre-draft testing , and he should have versatility across a variety of different spots on the offensive line, a quality the Broncos love.

WR Cam Ross, Virginia: One of the weirder collegiate careers you’ll see. Ross had 723 yards as a freshman at UConn in 2019, played just five games combined over the next three seasons due to the COVID-19 pandemic and injuries, and has played for three schools in the last three years. He caught 53 passes in his final stop at Virginia in 2025, and his speed — a 4.42-second 40-yard dash — made him a return threat on both punts and kicks. The Broncos want another credible returner next to Marvin Mims Jr., so there’s opportunity there.

The Payton-types

WR Dane Key, Nebraska: In what’ll become a notable under-the-radar storyline in training camp, Key is the younger brother of Broncos safety and All-Pro safety Devon Key. He’s got game in his own right, too, with 2,322 receiving yards and 19 touchdowns across four collegiate seasons. Key showcased strong skills as a blocker and decent hands in college, but will need to carve out a role as a trusty possession receiver and special-teamer to have any shot at cracking Denver’s initial 53-man roster.

WR Joseph Manjack IV, TCU: Look at Manjack’s tape back at Houston in 2023, and there’s something here. He racked up 577 yards and six touchdowns in just 10 games as a sophomore, before his production fell off as a junior and he transferred to TCU for a final season. Manjack’s vertical, speed and agility testing are all solid at his 6-foot-2 height, and he’s got the frame and athleticism to earn a long glance in training camp.

WR Sean Brown, Charlotte: Where’d Brown come from? After two quiet seasons at under-the-radar Charlotte, he racked up 35 and 36 catches in each of his last two seasons, respectively. The size is the draw here, but Brown never had much red-zone production in college.

College production is there, but is the upside?

CB Brent Austin, Cal: Finding a roster spot as a cornerback, with the Broncos’ current roster makeup, is probably the toughest task possible for any undrafted newcomer in training camp. Austin, though, surrendered just a 46% catch rate in 2025 at Cal (according to Pro Football Focus) and has at least 10 passes defensed in each of his last two seasons. He’ll likely project as more of an inside corner at 6-foot-11.

CB Ahmari Harvey, Georgia Tech: Harvey actually profiles quite similarly to Austin, allowing a 44% catch rate in his snaps in 2025 and also standing 5-foot-11. His 1.52-second 10-yard split in pre-draft testing, though, suggests better foot speed. Harvey actually also played with Bo Nix at Auburn as a true freshman in 2021, before transferring to Georgia Tech.

The special-team standouts

WR Kolbe Katsis, Northern Arizona: An FCS product, Katsis has top-of-the-line speed, with a 4.43-second 40-yard-dash and 1.52-second 10-yard-split. He was dominant at NAU in 2025, with 1,016 receiving yards and 10 touchdowns, and ran back a kickoff for a touchdown. That last point is important, as he’ll likely profile more as a returner. Again, there’s an opportunity to impress special-teams coordinator Darren Rizzi there.

S Parker Robertson, Oklahoma State: Robertson worked his way from a reserve role to a starter across five seasons at Oklahoma State, and his program loyalty and steady improvement would likely endear him to Denver’s staff. He had 8.5 tackles for loss and a couple of picks in 2025, and played consistent special-teams snaps the last three seasons. If he shows more upside on kickoff units than secondary depth options like JL Skinner or Reese Taylor, Robertson could grind his way to a roster spot.

CB William Wright, Tennessee: Similar to Robertson, Wright grinded out five seasons at Tennessee — but never actually graduated to a starting role in the secondary. He had more snaps on special teams, in fact, than on defense across his collegiate career. That’s great versatility, but Wright will need to prove he can cover at an NFL level to have any chance at making his mark in training cmap.

LS Luke Basso, Oregon: Yes — a long-snapper deal. The Broncos currently have veteran Mitchell Fraboni under contract, but here’s some competition. Basso played with Nix at Oregon for two years, and was named second-team All-Big Ten by coaches in 2024 and 2025.

In a good way, of course.

Yes, the Texas A&M staff believed they were getting a good player when Onyedim transferred there after four years at Iowa State.

Yes, they were banking on him playing a sizable role on the Aggies’ interior defensive line.

Yes, they thought he had upside moving from the Cyclones’ 3-3-5 defense to their even front.

Still, once A&M hit the field for spring ball, the defensive coaches quickly decided those expectations had been too modest.

“We kind of were like, ‘Oh damn. We got one,’” A&M defensive coordinator Lyle Hemphill told The Post.

One year later, Onyedim is set to start working in front of new coaches again, this time in Denver after the Broncos made him the No. 66 overall pick in last month’s draft.

Hitting the jackpot in the transfer portal

When Onyedim and the rest of Denver’s rookie class begin work Friday at the team’s rookie minicamp, he will do so as a player the Broncos front office fell in love with because of the season he put together at A&M.

The Texas native was a sturdy and quality starter at Iowa State, but never put up huge counting stats in what pro and college coaches and scouts call a unique defense.

Onyedim was asked to control multiple gaps on many snaps, read, react and play from there.

“You’ve got to be a big boy in there to do some of that stuff,” Hemphill acknowledged, noting that ISU helped Onyedim grow into a high-quality player. “That, when it����ap all said and done, is probably the harder skill to develop.”

The Aggies, though, were after something different. When they looked for help in the transfer portal, they did something Denver head coach Sean Payton talks about frequently: They isolated subsets of tape to try to zero in on whether Onyedim fit their specific vision.

“There were times at Iowa State where you knew he was in pass-rush mode or just kind of go mode because of down and distance,” Hemphill said. “We cut those clips out and watched those clips on the side and we were like, ‘Oh, wait, this kid can be something more than this defense allows him to be.’ …

“When you watched him in that light, he became a different player.”

Even with that picture on tape at Iowa State, though, Onyedim surpassed what the Aggies thought they were getting. When he first arrived at the SEC school, Hemphill — promoted to coordinator this offseason after spending 2025 as the team’s associate head coach/defense — and others thought Onyedim would be an early down player who didn’t provide much pass-rush juice.

By the time the season went along, they were instead building what would become the nation’s best third-down defense in part around Onyedim.

“He became the third-down big guy that we kept on the field,” Hemphill said. … “ Next thing you know, we’ve got this really good third-down defense and we can put (him) to the overload side and you can create havoc. I’ll be honest, we went from being OK at that position to being dominant at that position and that allowed our third-down defense to really take off.”

After logging 12 tackles for loss and three sacks over four years and 40 games at Iowa State, Onyedim collected 8.5 TFLs and 2.5 sacks in his lone year at A&M.

The NFL noticed.

When scouts came through practice, they asked about No. 11. Most had him as a Day 3 guy, fifth- or sixth-round, before the season began. By the time Onyedim’s campaign ended, the league — and the Broncos — had a much different view.

“The 3-3 scheme at Iowa State is a little different,” Broncos assistant general manager Reed Burckhardt said after Denver selected Onyedim in the third round. “And then he gets in a different scheme that fits ours a little bit more and — there’s always going to be differences, but we felt more comfortable seeing the evidence that he was playing in a scheme similar to ours. He had a really good year. His skillset is as a three-down player.”

Physically, the Broncos like the way Onyedim plays with his hands. He’s got a frame similar to departed free agent John Franklin-Myers, including arms that are 34-plus inches and an 81-inch wingspan.

The same abilities that impressed A&M are what drew the Broncos’ attention — and eventually marathon film sessions from GM George Paton and head coach Sean Payton.

“The tape was good at Iowa State,” Paton said, “But we really liked it at A&M.”

Onyedim, Hemphill said, played anywhere the Aggies wanted him to up front.

“He can play inside the tackle, he can 3, he can play 2i, he can play shade,” Hemphill said, noting they also had a package against multi-tight end sets where Onyedim played on the edge. “He can play 5 against big personnel groups and be pretty good. I think he’s going to kill a tight end if they try to block him.”

Ready to ‘learn from the best’

That versatility should serve Onyedim well in Denver, not just because the group he’s joining is deep and talented but also because of the way defensive coordinator Vance Joseph and defensive line coach Jamar Cain like to deploy their linemen.

“When you’re talking about a 3-technique, you want a guy that can get on an edge, loop and game,” Burckhardt said. “‘V.J.’ does a ton of that stuff. He fit the total package of what we’re looking for inside with the versatility.”

The day he was drafted, Onyedim said his mindset arriving in Denver and joining a group that includes All-Pro Zach Allen, veterans like D.J. Jones and Malcolm Roach, a close friend in former ISU teammate Eyioma Uwazurike and more was to learn as much as possible.

“Don’t be an arrogant person,” he said. “Just learn. Sit back and learn from the best. That����ap my mindset, just learn from the best and cramming everything so I can be the best player I know I can be.”

Hemphill cited that ability as one of Onyedim’s foremost off-field strengths. The Broncos, Hemphill said, will be able to ask him to play whatever role at whatever time and be confident in it because Onyedim is a quick study.

“He understands what you’re trying to accomplish defensively and it just comes easy to him,” Hemphill said. “We really, truly bounced him all over the d-line and he had no issues with it. I think he’s the type of kid that enjoys that. ‘Challenge me a little bit, I’m good with it.’

“Never bitched, never complained. Really solid. He’s just a grown man.”

Texas A&M’s staff learned that and more quickly last spring.

Now, Onyedim will try to author a repeat performance at the game’s highest level.

Or, at least for the Broncos, the 2026 offseason program kicks off Monday.

This is in many ways the start of the long march toward September and the start of the season, though players and coaches still have a five-week break to look forward to this summer.

Denver head coach Sean Payton decided to start this spring’s program later than usual and later than everybody else in the NFL, citing a Broncos 2025 season that lasted until late January.

Payton is also a longtime believer that running and lifting are more important this time of year than getting on the field for football-related activities.

So, players start the voluntary part of the offseason program Monday, but outside of a rookie minicamp May 8-10, Denver will abstain from on-field work until the first week of June.

“All of May will just be weightlifting,” Payton said earlier this year. “You’ll see us on the field in June. We’ll have two weeks of OTAs and a week of mini camp, but I don’t want them to feel like they were just here.”

Payton has also said in the past that he doesn’t want his players feeling like they’re going to football practice in the spring.

Still, Monday morning will feature the Broncos’ first 2026 team meeting, the first messaging about starting over and building toward a title run this fall. It’ll feel like the start of something in the building.

With that in mind, here are four questions about the coming months in ����apountry.

When will Broncos QB Bo Nix be back in action?

The likely answer now: Not for a while. Nix will likely still be around for Phases 1 and 2 of the offseason program over the next several weeks, but he’ll be rehabbing from the recent clean-up procedure on his surgically repaired right ankle rather than doing the full lifting and running regimen his teammates will be on.

OTAs and minicamp are still a month-plus away, but from here, sources expected Payton and Denver’s medical and training staffs to be cautious with Nix through those weeks. The start of training camp is still nearly three months away. Having Nix back to full go then is the new priority for the staff.

There is still no clear understanding of what the recent procedure entailed for Nix, but sources indicate the cleanup work was going to have to happen at some point — if not now, then likely after the 2026 season. Nix’s rehab from the initial fracture repair in January went well enough that Dr. Norman Waldrop III, Nix and the Broncos decided they had a window to get it done now. It will cost Nix most of the early stages of the offseason program, but in return, he enters the year without the prospect of another procedure hanging out there somewhere on the horizon.

Could Denver add a veteran free agent of note?

It����ap always a possibility.

Denver signed RB J.K. Dobbins in June last year. In 2023, the club signed OLB Frank Clark around the same time.

For a time, the Broncos looked like they could perhaps use a veteran defensive lineman. Then they used their top draft pick, No. 66 overall, on Tyler Onyedim. There’s a long way to go to late August, but right now Denver looks like it could again easily take seven defensive linemen into the season: Zach Allen, D.J. Jones, Malcolm Roach, Eyioma Uwazurike, Onyedim, Sai’Vion Jones and Jordan Jackson.

If there’s a spot to add a Dobbins-esque veteran, what about outside linebacker and what about Cam Jordan? The 37-year-old has a decade of history with Sean Payton, he’s still playing well even after 15 years in the NFL and, while the Broncos are by no means short at outside linebacker, they don’t have huge numbers there after sliding Jonah Elliss inside. Now, Denver’s top line is among the best in the business with Nik Bonitto and Jonathon Cooper. The club is high on Que Robinson and Dondrea Tillman provides quality depth. Denver could always kick Elliss back outside if it needed. But Jordan had 10.5 sacks a year ago and, critically, is hardly a situational pass-rusher. He’s still a force against the run and could be used creatively both on third down and early downs. The Broncos have one of his biggest fans in Payton and also a New Orleans native in Vance Joseph as their defensive coordinator.

Are there any big contract extensions on the table?

Not like last year, where the Broncos had a laundry list of mega deals to do with cornerstone players like Courtland Sutton, Allen and Nik Bonitto.

The biggest decision to make is in the secondary, where nickel Ja’Quan McMillian and corner Riley Moss are each entering contract years and 2025 first-round pick Jahdae Barron is waiting in the wings.

Other starters and key players entering the final years of their contracts include safety Brandon Jones, left guard Ben Powers, receiver Marvin Mims Jr. and tight end Evan Engram.

Overall, there’s far less certainty about who from that group will end up in Denver long term than there was a year ago, when it seemed all but certain that the big three would get deals done eventually.

Denver typically has done offseason extensions closer to training camp (Quinn Meinerz in 2024) or during (all three last year and Pat Surtain II in 2024) rather than in the spring.

What else is on the spring cleaning list at Broncos Park?

A handful of other projects. Now that the NFL draft is in the rearview mirror, an extension for general manager George Paton moves closer to the batter’s box. CEO and owner Greg Penner has made it clear Paton’s wanted long-term and has essentially said a deal is a matter of when, not if. Most front office movement of all kinds comes after the draft and into the summer. On a related note, Paton’s front office is highly regarded and has been raided repeatedly over the past two offseasons, so more movement on that front cannot be ruled out.

Denver also has a major move ahead in June, when the club relocates from its current headquarters to its new building across the practice fields, which is nearing completion.

Safety Justin Simmons, who spent all but one of his active seasons with Denver, announced his retirement Wednesday at the age of 32. He did so as a Bronco, where he spent the better part of a decade building a legacy as a fan favorite on the field and a model in the community.

Simmons’ announcement came 10 years to the day after Denver drafted him.

“My time in Denver literally shaped me into the man that I am,” Simmons said in a retirement announcement video shared by the team. “To the best fans in the world and ����apountry, thank you so much for all your support both for myself and for my family.”

Simmons was selected in the third round of the 2016 draft by the Broncos and played eight years in blue and orange, earning a pair of Pro Bowl nods and making second-team All-Pro four times. He blossomed into one of the best safeties in football, logging 30 interceptions over his eight seasons in Denver.

Simmons was released by the Broncos in the spring of 2024 and spent the ensuing season with the Atlanta Falcons on a one-year deal. A free agent through the 2025 season, Simmons never latched on to a team and has not played in a game since Atlanta’s regular-season finale on Jan. 5, 2025.

Simmons, his wife Taryn and their children still call Denver home and Simmons’ legacy off the field will endure every bit as long and perhaps even more profoundly than his on-field exploits.

Simmons has done extensive work with the Boys & Girls Club in Denver among many other endeavors through the Justin Simmons Foundation.

Simmons occupies a unique place in Broncos history. His numbers and impact are that of a Ring of Fame-type player. His time with the franchise, though, did not feature much winning.

Simmons arrived to the Broncos as the club came off a Super Bowl victory to cap the 2015 season.

Selected by then-general manager John Elway to play for head coach Gary Kubiak, Simmons saw the field as a rookie but Denver finished in third place in the AFC West at 9-7 and missed the postseason. They didn’t make the playoffs in any of the following seven seasons under head coaches Vance Joseph, Vic Fangio, Nathaniel Hackett or Sean Payton, either.

Then Simmons was released but took some solace in latching on with the Falcons, who looked like a contender in the NFC South. Instead Atlanta missed the postseason and the Broncos have made it each of the past two years, following up a 10-7 Wild Card year in 2024 with a 14-3 campaign and subsequent run to the AFC Championship Game last season.

Still, Simmons will be universally revered by ����apountry for who he was as a player and who he is as a man.

It doesn’t always come with a Jaylen Waddle-sized splash or the exhilaration of taking Bo Nix at No. 12 overall in the 2024 draft.

Sometimes, it����ap meat and potatoes.

Sometimes, it����ap patience — or something like it.

Sometimes it����ap waiting 61 picks, trading back four more and then taking a player at what was arguably your deepest position the past two years.

That����ap where the Broncos found themselves Friday night when they used their first pick of the draft at No. 66 on Texas A&M defensive tackle Tyler Onyedim.

Everybody else in the NFL made a selection in the first 56 picks. Denver waited 10 more.

Of course, the Broncos’ big offseason fireworks came more than five weeks ago when they traded their first and third-round picks for Waddle, the explosive wide receiver.

That, combined with their late selections in each round, put them among the teams with the least overall capital in the league.

They committed to waiting it out for No. 62 to roll around. General manager George Paton said last week that Denver had six players it was targeting for its first selection.

That alone took patience.

The Broncos watched all of Thursday night — “that was a boring day,” Paton said — and then saw players at other positions of need come ripping off the board in the middle of the second round. Between picks 43 and 59 alone, four inside linebackers and three tight ends heard their names called.

Then the two picks preceding Denver: Inside linebacker Anthony Hill Jr. to Tennessee, which traded up, and tight end Max Klare to the Los Angeles Rams.

“It’s a typical draft — there’s a run at different positions, which we figured there would be,” Paton said. “It fell like we thought it would. I think I mentioned we had six players and they all started going. Tyler was one of those six, but it fell kind of like we thought it would.”

The Broncos were aware the Rams loved Klare, a source told The Post on Friday, so they either did not like him enough to jump in front of L.A. or thought the Rams would look elsewhere. Tennessee general manager Mike Borgonzi, a former Kansas City executive, explained trading up to No. 60 for Hill by talking about pro scouting and understanding the needs and potential interest of the teams in your part of the draft board.

When Denver’s pick arrived, Paton and head coach Sean Payton decided to move back, trading No. 62 to Buffalo for Nos. 66 and 182.

In Onyedim, they leaned into a roster belief they often espouse.

“He plays a position that’s always hard to find at defensive tackle,” Payton said Friday night. “His strike, his shed, the athlete, makeup, those are traits.”

At 6-4 and 292 pounds, Onyedim played four years at Iowa State and then in 2025 for the Aggies. In Denver, he joins All-Pro Zach Allen, veteran D.J. Jones and a room that also features Malcolm Roach, Eyioma Uwazurike, Jordan Jackson and 2025 third-round pick Sai’Vion Jones.

Roach and Uwazurike each are expected to help fill the gap left by John Franklin-Myers, Denver’s lone high-profile free agency departure, but Sai’Vion Jones and Onyedim are the kinds of pieces the Broncos are betting play key roles at some point in the future.

“We typically like to draft high-trait players,” Paton said earlier this month. “Maybe they lack a little bit of polish and it����ap going to take some development. We’ve done a great job with the coaches in developing these types of players. … Sure, we’d like somebody to come in and start right away, but that����ap not always realistic no matter where they’re picked. It����ap just hard.

“With the way our team is built now, it����ap going to be hard to come in and start Day 1.”

That is true of Onyedim, too. His versatility — he called himself “a true d-lineman” capable of playing every spot — is a virtue and in the Broncos’ mind maximizes the chance he’ll find a home somewhere along the front at some point, whether it����ap in 2026 or beyond.

One source said the club believes Onyedim can play, “across the board.”

They have two players like that, now, that they’ve picked in the third round each of the past two years. They moved up for Jones and back for Onyedim. Each has versatility and traits the Broncos like. Either could be a key for Vance Joseph and defensive line coach Jamar Cain as soon as this fall or either could be insurance while veteran players chew up almost all of the snaps in Denver’s regular rotation.

Either way, the Broncos set themselves up for a draft weekend like this. They may well find flashier help at tight end, running back or linebacker with their now seven slated selections on Saturday. There are starters to be found every year — though clearly at a lower hit rate — in rounds four through seven. Particularly so at the positions that Denver still needs to fortify.

Regardless of what happens over the course of Saturday, Payton, Paton and the players in Denver’s locker room believe the roster is already in a place where it can compete for a Super Bowl.

They made their big splash earlier in the spring. The brass knew it’d be tough to find a player on Day 2 who would step right in and start.

That, Paton said, is particularly true on the defensive line.

“Just going into it, we feel pretty good,” he said a month ago. “We have Sai’Vion and we have our four guys coming back. Our starters and then Eni really came on. Then Sai’vion and Jordan Jackson.”

In the NFL, though, the reality is there is almost no such thing as too much depth on the line of scrimmage.

“We’re looking closely at the grade and at the stack,” Payton said. “We’re never trying to worry about the splash.”