Broncos Quarterback Scoreboard: Drops, timing issues add up to frustrating day

Editor’s note: A Broncos quarterback competition can only mean one thing — another Broncos quarterback scoreboard. A fan favorite in the past, these stories will be posted after each and every training camp practice updating just how Denver’s quarterback competition is unfolding. At the end of each practice, 10 points will be divided among Drew Lock and Teddy Bridgewater with a cumulative score of the entire camp following. Which quarterback is in the lead? Find out now.

ENGLEWOOD, Colo. — The Broncos’ first traditional training-camp practice in eight days was hardly what Vic Fangio wanted to see.

“We’ve gotta focus,” Fangio said. “We come back and do a normal training-camp-type practice, we’ve got to get locked in better. We’ve got to catch the ball, we’ve got to throw it better, all that.”

Five passes were dropped. During one seven-on-seven period, Drew Lock, Teddy Bridgewater and Brett Rypien all had attempts dropped.

It was a day to forget. But even with the drops, it was also not a day that saw either quarterback in the competition sustain or build on the momentum that they gathered on Saturday in Minnesota.

Drew Lock: Up and down under pressure

The first time Lock dropped back to pass, he looked up and saw Dre’Mont Jones bearing down on him early in the first team period of practice. The sight of Jones bursting into the backfield is nothing new at this point; Jones has wreaked havoc during multiple practices in the last three weeks. It might have been a sack under game conditions, but Lock did make a good decision to dump the pass off to Royce Freeman in the flat.

In his next burst of work during a seven-on-seven period, timing and drops came into play, leading to a pair of incompletions in three attempts. He threw toward KJ Hamler down the right seam, but Hamler didn’t turn around and the ball was low. Two plays later, after a short completion to Jerry Jeudy, Courtland Sutton dropped a pass from Lock in the right flat.

His next team period saw more pressure like what he faced early in practice. Edge rusher Jonathon Cooper burst into the backfield for what could have been a sack in game conditions, but with contact minimized, Lock dumped the football off to newly-added Adrian Killins. One play later, Cooper forced a throwaway hat was Lock’s only incompletion of the period.

He was briefly removed after a seven-on-seven repetition for some instruction from offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur; that followed a dump-off to Javonte Williams on which the whistle blew as he threw the football. Lock quickly returned. After all, this is practice, and while the quarterback competition remains afoot, teaching and reinforcement is the priority.

The day lacked splash moments for Lock, aside from a deep strike to Jerry Jeudy in the one-on-one period. He just missed on deep attempts. His longest connection was a 25-yard pass to Noah Fant in the move-the-ball period at the end of practice.

That drive began at the offense’s 32-yard line with first-and-10, 2:10 on the clock, one timeout and a 7-point deficit. The No. 1 offense featured Quinn Meinerz and Netane Muti at the guard spots. The drive was called off after the offense advanced as far as the defense’s 21-yard line, but the march had some rough spots.

First, the offense immediately found itself in fourth-and-3 at its 39-yard line. On second-and-10 after an incompletion, Lock was pressured for what likely would have been a sack by Shamar Stephen in game conditions; however, the play stood, an Lock scrambled for 5 yards. A third-down Lock scramble gained 2 yards with 1:50 left, but after that, the clock kept running, and Lock and the offense took their time, huddling up before fourth-and-3.

By the time the snap finally came, 39 seconds had elapsed since the previous play. Lock made a successful pre-snap check, and the result was a 25-yard strike to Noah Fant, beating Michael Ojemudia, who was in for Pat Surtain. But by the time the subsequent first-and-10 ended in an incompletion with Lock throwing at the feet of Williams, just 43 seconds remained.

Lock hit Damraea Crockett on a fourth-and-2 pass three plays later to keep the drive alive, but after a subsequent clock-stopping spike, the double horn blew on a drive that had flashes, but might not have gotten off the ground under game conditions.

Teddy Bridgewater: A day of near-misses

Some of the missed chances were beyond Bridgewater’s control.

Given Bridgewater’s practice struggles in the red zone, his performance in that area of the field Saturday was promising; he was a Cameron Fleming penalty away from going 2-for-2 in red-zone opportunities. But, as has been noted frequently regarding the two quarterbacks, that came against the Vikings’ reserves.

So, in a late-practice red-zone period, Bridgewater took his chances on finding Sutton in goal-to-go. His previous two red-zone passes had resulted in a short completion to Fant and a throwaway under pressure from Jones that hit Pita Taumoepenu in a rather unfortunate and sensitive region of the body.

Bridgewater found Sutton in the back of the end zone on a slant, and led Sutton perfectly, whizzing the ball past end-zone coverage … and the ball bounced off of Sutton’s hands. He threw it out of bounds on a fade route in tight coverage one play later, and that was his final throw.

Another missed opportunity for a significant play would have involved significant yardage after the catch.

During the second team period of the day, Bridgewater worked with and against first teasers. After completing two of his three attempts — although one completion to Albert Okwuegbunam might have ended in a Malik Reed sack under game conditions — he found Jerry Jeudy in the right flat past Kyle Fuller. Jeudy turned upfield, the kind of move that could have turned a 5-yard catch into an explosive 25-yard gain. But he slipped and fell to the grass.

Two deep attempts from Bridgewater in a seven-on-seven period — to Austin Fort and Diontae Spencer — saw each pass-catcher get one hand on the ball, but fail to reel in the play.

So it went on a frustrating day for the entire offense.

Bridgewater’s one move-the-ball opportunity saw him complete two passes to move the offense into field-goal range. The drive began at the 50, and the score was tied with 40 seconds left in the half, leaving a field goal as an acceptable outcome. Bridgewater followed those two completions by missing long for Jeudy down the seam, then throwing it away twice to avoid risking a chance at three points. Brandon McManus then cleaned up the drive with a 53-ayrd field goal.

There were no huge mistakes for Bridgewater. But despite some close calls, the splash plays didn’t come to fruition, either.

QB Play of the Day

On a day that saw near-misses on deep shots in the team and seven-on-seven periods, Brett Rypien had the best deep connection, hitting Austin Fort does the left sideline past Ojemudia for a gain of at last 30 yards in game conditions. On a day that saw drops galore, Fort was clean, and Rypien had a solid connection.

Scoreboard

Both dealt with drops. Both had two-minute drill drives that, at best, moved in fits and starts. Bridgewater had slightly better ball placement on a consistent basis, but that wasn’t enough to yield any real separation.

It’s a draw — an uninspiring outcome for a frustrating day.

Daily 10-point scale score: 5-5

Collective 10-point scale score: 75.5-74.5, Bridgewater