General manager John Elway couldn’t help himself from calling out quarterback Brock Osweiler while reflecting on his past five years with the Denver Broncos.
John Elway has done a tremendous job with the Denver Broncos. Since taking over player personnel decisions in 2011, the Hall of Fame quarterback has a record of 58-22 with two Super Bowl appearances and one Super Bowl win.
The team has never been worse than 8-8 with him at the helm, and since that initial .500 season, the Broncos have had back-to-back 13-win seasons followed by back-to-back 12-win seasons.
It seems like there’s nothing Elway can’t do. Nothing, that is, except stopping himself from calling out former quarterback Brock Osweiler.
Osweiler was drafted in the second round of the 2012 NFL Draft as the heir to future Hall of Fame passer Peyton Manning. In 2015 Osweiler was pressed into action as Manning struggled through injuries.
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After playing rather well, Osweiler was named the starter despite Manning being healthy. Then when the team struggled just a little, Manning was inserted and Osweiler rode the bench until the team was done with their Super Bowl run.
Manning looked like a shell of himself during the championship run. The Broncos won because their defense was unstoppable, and the Denver offense was in full-blown game management mode.
Naturally Osweiler was ticked after losing his shot at being a Super Bowl-winning quarterback, and he left in the offseason. Anyone paying attention could have understood why Osweiler was upset and ended up bolting for the Houston Texans. Well, anyone except Elway, who still can’t understand why the Texans were able to lure Osweiler away.
"“I can understand that he didn’t want to sit down and have Peyton come back in that San Diego game, but it wasn’t the fact that Brock was playing bad,” Elway said via Nicki Jhabvala of the Denver Post. “We needed a change of something. So I was a little surprised just how he seemed to be a little bent out of shape about that. But he had an opportunity to make a tremendous amount of money in Houston, and for us, it just didn’t fit.”"
If anyone doesn’t understand why Brock was “bent out of shape,” they are either ignoring the facts or simply lying. Osweiler led come-from-behind victories over the New England Patriots and Cincinnati Bengals during his seven starts. Both of those teams were playoff teams. Overall the team was 5-2 with Manning on the sideline.
In Week 17, the Broncos were struggling to move the ball. There were dropped passes by receivers and a lack of running holes for the backs. Head coach Gary Kubiak decided what the team needed was a change at quarterback and in came Manning.
From then on, the team just kept handing the ball off as Manning struggled to throw more than five yards down field. Even as they were on the cusp of hoisting the Lombardi Trophy, the team still didn’t trust Manning.
Up by six and with time winding down, the Broncos offense had the ball and was looking to ice the game against the Carolina Panthers. Instead of allowing Manning to even attempt one pass, the team ran the ball straight into the strength of the Panthers defense and unsurprisingly had a three-and-out.
That series showed that Manning was in the game because of his name, not his play. The Broncos trusted the defense more than Manning, and that defense did their job and secured the title.
So after that, Osweiler decided it was best for him to leave. If Denver kept him in the Week 17 game, he would have made more than $20 million per year with no issues. Instead, he received an average of around $17 million from the Texans, and Elway still can’t let it go.
Fortunately for Broncos fans, they found a good replacement in Paxton Lynch, whom they drafted in the first round this offseason. It’s time for Elway to focus on that and let the issue with Osweiler go.