The Broncos have me confused, like I’m Michael Bluth meeting Anne for the very first time.
They just demolished the Dallas Cowboys in a de facto prime time spot.
They did it on the back of a dominating defensive performance where they rendered the Dallas death star no better than one of the SpaceX rockets that explodes all the time.
The Cowboys had their worst success rate game of the season offensivelyand quarterback Dak Prescott had his worst game for the season by both EPA/play and total EPA.
But it wasn’t just the defence. Offensively, the Broncos put on a clinic. They scored six offensive touchdowns including four thrown by Bo Nix.
For the season, the Broncos are 6-2 and on top of the AFC West.
So why am I confused?
Other than this game against the Cowboys, who makes everyone look like Tom Brady, Bo Nix has been making mayoneggs.
Even with his dominating performance against the Cowboys, which, again, is like having a dominating performance in a being normal competition against Elon Musk, Nix has just not played well.
Almost every shred of offensive production from the Broncos has come from the fertile mind of Sean Payton.
Payton’s offence has Nix third in the league in expected completion and 23rd in air yards. The game against the Cowboys’ awful defence was the only where Payton trusted Nix to throw it down the field.
His average depth of target was 11 yards, that’s one of only two times this season his average throw was past the sticks.
Against not the worst defence in the league, Nix is in an offensive ecosystem replete with horizontal passes screens.
They’re not asking him to bite off the toughest throws.
That’s not to say that can’t be good offence, it’s just clear that it’s an offence designed to protect against the quarterback stuffing it up.
But he has stuffed it up.
Even with the offensive equivalent of bowling with the bumpers up, Nix is 24th in completion percentage over expectation and 22nd in plain old completion percentage among the 28 quarterbacks who have taken at least 200 snaps.
He is just hovering at the edge of what is acceptable in a system that puts next to nothing on him.
That’s not to say that he can’t make tough throws.
He can and does on occasion, especially his dime to Pat Bryant to close the first half, but he’s going to leave points on the field.
Does it matter?
The Broncos have an elite defence.
It’s not just their defenestration of the Cowboys, this Broncos unit has been exceptional all season long especially against the pass.
They are the fourth best defence in the league in EPA/play and top the league in success rate.
Their opponents are successful on 37.4% of dropbacks, which about 4.3% better than second best.
That’s about the difference between the Chargers, who are second best at defensive dropback success rate, and the Commanders who are 14th.
A big part of that is the pass rush, the Broncos have eight more sacks than the Rams who are second and are second in the league in pressures, led by the elite duo of Nik Bonitto and Jonathon Cooper.
But it’s also the secondary, obviously Pat Surtain is a special player, but against the Cowboys receiver duo the Broncos showed their enviable depth in the back end.
Clearly, the plan was to go full Belichick with the Cowboys receiver duo of George Pickens and CeeDee Lamb.
It means to play a lot of man coverage and have your best corner on the second-best receiver and then double your second-best receiver with safety help on every snap.
That meant Surtain on Pickens and Moss on Lamb with help from Hufanga but especially Brandon Jones over the top.
It worked early, with Surtain breaking up a pass intended for Pickens in the end zone. However, Surtain got injured on the play and couldn’t play for the rest of the game.
It didn’t matter. Kris Abrams-Draine got in the game and not much changed. The Cowboys still struggled to move the ball and, while the receivers had fairly good counting stats, they never threatened to dominate the game and never made a huge play.
That’s depth and coaching.
Can you win if your team has “hovering at the edge of acceptable” quarterback play if other things are elite?
Last year says you can, but this Broncos team is not as talented all over the field as last year’s Eagles.
Every other year since 2013 says, loudly, you’re better off having the quarterback.
Even if the Broncos are the AFC’s top seed, as they very well might be, you just can’t trust the quarterback.