2018 wasn’t the first time the Broncos pursued Case Keenum

DENVER — Casey Austin Keenum started the 2017 NFL season on the bench. After an incredible season—both in storylines and performance—Case, as he goes by, became a near-instant success story.

During the 2017 football season, he went viral, if you will.

Keenum’s flip from a journeyman quarterback to household name was an exceptional underdog story, along the lines of the captain of the chess team finding overnight popularity to become the prom king in Texas, fittingly, and winning over the girl of his dreams.

But the Denver Broncos liked him before he was the cool kid on the block, before he was the cool thing to like.

The organization’s affinity for the now-30-year-old quarterback goes back beyond the organization itself. After setting career NCAA passing records in touchdowns, completions, and yards, only one team called the outstanding college quarterback. That team wasn’t the Broncos; it was the Houston Texans led by then-head-coach Gary Kubiak.

During the next two seasons, Kubiak would promote Keenum from the practice squad to the starting quarterback for eight games—a remarkable show of confidence from a head coach to an undrafted signal-caller.

Now, Kubiak is a senior personnel advisor for the Broncos—a.k.a one of John Elway’s few trusted right-hand men. Additionally, Vance Joseph was with Kubiak and Keenum during those two seasons in Houston as the team’s defensive backs coach. Now, he’s the Broncos’ head coach.

In 2015, two years after Kubiak and Keenum left Houston, Kubiak attempted to make a reunion. This time, leading the Broncos as the team’s head coach.

“There was interest two years ago,” Elway said, opening up after signing Keenum two additional years later. “It was coming off after Peyton [Manning] had retired. We had Trevor [Siemian] as well as Paxton [Lynch] was in his first year. We felt inexperienced there. We had interest in Case back then.”

At the time, Keenum was coming off his first full season with the St. Louis Rams, a season in which he started five games, going 3-2 and throwing for four touchdowns to one interception.

Yet while the Rams traded up to the first overall pick in order to select their quarterback of the future Jared Goff, they also thought so highly of Keenum, they placed a first-round tender on him, essentially ensuring he would be a Ram the following season.

“It was more of the fact that the Rams didn’t want to let him go and we wanted him, and we were trying to get something done, and we couldn’t get it done,” Elway said, explaining why a deal didn’t get done for Case in 2015. “I think they knew what they had in Case and that’s why we couldn’t get it done. We’re thrilled we could get it done this time.”

Don’t forget, all of this interest from the Broncos in Keenum was before his great season with the Minnesota Vikings last year in which he threw for 22 touchdowns to only seven interceptions, posting the second-best completion percentage and QBR in the entire league.

Don’t even begin to imagine how this team could have looked different the last two years with quarterback play like that. Regardless, the Broncos got their guy now and Keenum officially pulled off the miraculous underdog story.

Outsiders continue to question if the Broncos ponied up $18 million per year for a one-hit wonder. Inside the organization, Keenum’s anything but a one-hit wonder.