By Nick Gustafson
The Broncos stepped out of the bye week healthy and fresh, but unfortunately they stepped directly into oncoming traffic and were promptly run over by Ed Reed and the Ravens. Much like Knowshon Moreno after he was hit by Reed, the Broncos dropped the ball. With both teams coming off of a bye week neither had a distinct advantage. Both teams knew the game would be decided based on who executed better and who wanted it more. It was clear that team was the Ravens after just the first play of the game when Orton was blindsided as he dropped back to pass. The Broncos never did seem to get on track after that. Their lone scoring drive was sustained more by penalties rather than a well executed game plan. The Ravens dominated the Broncos from the very first play of the game and they never let up.
In the NFL the Broncos will receive no pity after their first loss of the season. Instead for the second time in three weeks the Broncos will be playing on Monday night football and they will be playing the defending Super Bowl Champs. This week on a national stage the Broncos will show for the first time how they rebound from a loss under Coach McDaniels. After wins McDaniels was somewhat generous with the players, giving them time off and other perks that came with winning. However even when the team won McDaniels was critical of areas where improvement was needed. You can bet that after this blowout loss there were no free passes this week in practice and that the Broncos were consistently reminded of all that they did wrong.
Pittsburgh has been coming on strong as of late and they are the only team to get a win over the red hot Vikings. However 3 of the Steeler’s wins have come against some of the leagues worst teams. The Steelers surely took note of how the Raven’s beat the Broncos and with a similar style of defense they are probably hoping for the same kind of success. The Broncos have been slow starters on offense all year and they need to correct that asap. McDaniel’s game plans in New England were famous for putting up insurmountable leads early in games, but it has been quite the opposite here in Denver.
This week will be a good chance for McDaniels to go back to the drawing board so to speak and figure out why exactly the Broncos are so slow out of the gate. Coach Shanahan almost always scripted the first 15 plays of his games and for the most part they were successful. McDaniels is not a fan of scripting plays and instead likes to let other factors of the game essentially call the play for him. He relies more on down and distance, position on the field and personnel to determine the correct play call. However, those play calls have led to very few points early in games for the Broncos. Can McDaniels find a way to spark the Broncos offense early against a physical Steelers team? The nation will find out on Monday night.
November 6th, 2009 at 1:28 pm
They have proven they are a solid team but the fact we got manhandled, and the fact we have not destroyed a good team, or broke any runs with our fancy new running back is not too confidence inspiring. If all else fails the nuggets should be very exciting to watch when the wheels fall off this train.