2023 off-season thread

[paul-mac]

Glasgow gone 

[AnAngryAmerican]

3 minutes ago, paul-mac said:

Glasgow gone 

Yep. 

 

[Broncofan]

Honestly, I think those 3 were easy moves to make.   I'd include Jacob Martin & Purcell, and that would create a total of 33M more in space.    The FA DL depth is surprisingly deep, so a guy like Purcell is quite replaceable.   

[paul-mac]

1 minute ago, Broncofan said:

Honestly, I think those 3 were easy moves to make.   I'd include Jacob Martin & Purcell, and that would create a total of 33M more in space.    The FA DL depth is surprisingly deep, so a guy like Purcell is quite replaceable.   

Martin is an easy cut too. Young guys in Browning and Bonitto ready to step up and take his snaps. 

[AnAngryAmerican]

Spotrac now has us at $33m and change in cap space. These moves were necessary. Now let’s hope George/Sean do something. 

https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/denver-broncos/cap/

[Broncofan]

7 minutes ago, paul-mac said:

Martin is an easy cut too. Young guys in Browning and Bonitto ready to step up and take his snaps. 

Yeah I don't think releasing Martin is controversial at all, but  I think Purcell will raise a few eyebrows because he's been a value asset for us, but he's eminently replaceable in a decent FA pool.  With 7.3M+ added to the cap pool, it's a no-brainer IMO.

Edited March 10, 2023 by Broncofan

[broncosfan_101]

On 3/7/2023 at 10:02 PM, Broncofan said:

Looking at the C/G FA class, there aren't a lot of great targets, but a couple of possibilities, realizing that Payton clearly values run-proficiency mixed with pass-blocking (IE won't get pass-only guys as targets).   

At C, Kelce/Hudson are retiring (and at their age, not a real solution for us anyways).   That leaves the likes of Conor McGovern, Garrett Bradbury or Bradley Bozeman / Ethan Pocic (the latter 2 who really struggled this past year - although Pocic played better late in the season).    The issue with all of them - they have pretty clear flaws, and in some cases (McGovern), can't stay healthy either.   The one intriguing guy is Jake Brendel - who only had 1 year of starting under his belt, but frankly offers more upside.    Excellent pass protector, but also good at the run blocking game.   I hope we target him, esp if he's not terribly priced in the high range.

For the G's, Nate Davis probably stands out the most as the most run-dominant G - but being one of the youngest G's, hard to know how he'll fare salary wise.  Isaac Seumalo & Risner are likely to draw the most attention (Seumalo I like, but I think he's going to draw the biggest contract too).   Guys like Ben Powers & Will Hernandez, being far better at pass pro than run, I'd be surprised if they were targeted.

If I were to guess, one RT and one C/G are coming in FA - but likely only 1 high-$ signing, and 1 more in the mid-tier.    Then attack the DL depth as well.

 

 

Bradbury has been SO bad. He was fine this season, but the first 3 years of his career were worse than abysmal. No thanks.

[Broncofan]

1 minute ago, broncosfan_101 said:

Bradbury has been SO bad. He was fine this season, but the first 3 years of his career were worse than abysmal. No thanks.

I hear that.  Like I said, it's either Jake Brendel or get a Rd3 C and let him compete with Cushenberry.    Ben Jones just became available, but a major flag is he only played 5 games.   Brendel is the head-and-shoulders best C choice for us IMO that I see.

[BroncoBruin]

Thinking Pocic will be the #1 target in FA if they’re smart enough to avoid paying big money for an average RT. Played extensively with Russ in Seattle. 

[AKRNA]

7 hours ago, AnAngryAmerican said:

We released Edmonds and Darby. I’d hope Glasgow is let go soon - he’d save us $11m I believe - but with Risner about to depart maybe they want to keep him? I’d retain Risner for $11m before Glasgow at the same price but what do I know, I'm sure the Risner haters will disagree. 

 

Now don't do that. Nobody's a "Risner Hater". He's just not a good LG and doesn't have the skill's to play anywhere else.

Upgrading LG won't be too hard.

 

[1234567]

17 hours ago, AKRNA said:

Now don't do that. Nobody's a "Risner Hater". He's just not a good LG and doesn't have the skill's to play anywhere else.

Upgrading LG won't be too hard.

 

I feel like he never really recovered from that shoulder injury. While he was far from a world beater his rookie season, the eye test showed a LOT of promise with him moving forward. I haven’t seen that player since. 

[AKRNA]

8 hours ago, 1234567 said:

I feel like he never really recovered from that shoulder injury. While he was far from a world beater his rookie season, the eye test showed a LOT of promise with him moving forward. I haven’t seen that player since. 

Maybe. I think it was just getting some film on him. He struggled mightily with power rushers. Bad trait for a LG.

[paul-mac]

Legal tampering opens today and we’ve got some money to spend. For me, the big splashes need to be on the OL. We have too many holes to try and plug every gap on the roster and given the lack of draft picks, we are going to have to cross our fingers and hope that the likes of Eyioma Uwazurike, Damarri Mathis and Jonas Griffith can step in to replace Dre’Mont Jones, Ronald Darby and Alex Singleton respectively.

 

However, I think new additions at Left Guard and Right Tackle are an absolute must. The LG spot could be addressed by bringing back Dalton Risner but history shows that players rarely go back to their original team once they hit the open market.

 

Ideally we’d replace Cushenberry at OC too but if the season started today, our OL would be Garett Bolles at LT, Parker Ferguson (?) at LG, Cushenberry in the middle, Quinn Meinerz at RG and Quinn Bailey at RT, so clearly finding a solution at LG and RT is of utmost importance.

 

We need a vet RB as Javonte Williams may not be ready for week 1. Personally I’d be fine with just bringing back Latavius Murray to a cheap 1 year deal.

 

I’d like to see a vet TE brought in for the young locker room.

 

Backup QB probably will be addressed. Not sure whether we just re-sign Rypien on a cheap deal or get a higher quality backup. 
 

The issue with needing OL is that they’re so scarce that even average guys get paid handsomely on the open market. Paton is going to need to get his wallet out. 

[lomaxgrUK]

On 3/10/2023 at 9:38 PM, paul-mac said:

Martin is an easy cut too. Young guys in Browning and Bonitto ready to step up and take his snaps. 

Not sure I agree with this. If Martin isn't willing to change his detail at all, then I would agree that a cut would be most likely.

But I would be a bit surprised if this happened prior to the draft, because I sure as hell don't trust the contributions of Nik Bonitto right now. What have you seen to think he is "ready to step up"?

Bonitto was terrible last year if we're being honest. He isn't anywhere near athletic enough to justify the fact he is so underweight.

Being drafted in the 2nd round means nothing now. The GM who drafted him ain't got the sway to force playing time if he's not good enough to help us win. 

I have no faith in Gregory staying healthy, so us losing players at OLB right seems risky and puts pressure to bring in bodies in UFA/the draft.

[AkronsWitness]

4 hours ago, lomaxgrUK said:

Not sure I agree with this. If Martin isn't willing to change his detail at all, then I would agree that a cut would be most likely.

But I would be a bit surprised if this happened prior to the draft, because I sure as hell don't trust the contributions of Nik Bonitto right now. What have you seen to think he is "ready to step up"?

Bonitto was terrible last year if we're being honest. He isn't anywhere near athletic enough to justify the fact he is so underweight.

Being drafted in the 2nd round means nothing now. The GM who drafted him ain't got the sway to force playing time if he's not good enough to help us win. 

I have no faith in Gregory staying healthy, so us losing players at OLB right seems risky and puts pressure to bring in bodies in UFA/the draft.

Can somebody explain to me why we are likely losing Dre'mont? I thought the whole idea for the last 2 years was we were only going to have enough money for Chubb or Jones so one of them had to go. Trading Chubb I thought meant they were going to pay Jones. Now we are going to lose BOTH of them? I dont understand.

Finding a interior rusher like Jones is incredibly difficult. Way harder than it is to find a decent EDGE rusher. Why let someone like that walk out the door when you have the money to pay him (or franchise tag). Especially when you have to watch what Chris Jones does against you in KC every year.

Who the heck are the Broncos paying if we just keep trading/losing guys like Sutton/Chubb/Jones + all of the cuts they already made. Are we going to pay Surtain 400M+ or something? Im not following this max exodus the Broncos are currently in, who are the targets they are clearing space for?

 

Edited March 13, 2023 by AkronsWitness