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ENGLEWOOD, Colo. – Peer into the locker of most members of the Denver Broncos and you’ll see a t-shirt. The gray garment depicts a majestic white Bronco with an orange mane, racing through a burst of flames. The script underneath reads, “Into the Fire.”
The motto could mean a lot of different things to different people. The most likely being the fire representing the journey through an entire season with a target on your back as Super Bowl champs, chasing another championship.
To Broncos defensive end Billy Winn, though, it may mean a little something different.
A sixth-round pick out of Boise State in 2012, Winn was solid in his first three seasons with the Cleveland Browns, totaling 78 tackles and three sacks in that time, but was traded to Indianapolis at the start of the 2015 season for a conditional pick. After playing 12 games in Indy, he was placed on injured reserve with a torn rotator cuff.
Making it in the NFL is a fire of its own.
When he knew he wouldn’t be re-signing with the Colts, Winn packed up all of his belongings and headed towards his hometown, the desert that is Las Vegas, Nevada. The symbolism of that fire was about to become a lot more real.
After arriving in Vegas a couple days before his moving truck, Winn got a devastating call.
“All of my belongings caught fire in the moving truck,” he says, shaking his head.
It was all gone.
“Every single article of everything. A hyperbaric chamber, my bed, furniture, letters from my great grandmother, everything. . . It was an entire house; it was all gone. ”
Overall, more than $100,000 worth of damage but certain things, like the letters from his grandmother were invaluable, “It was a little rough.”
As Winn tells this story, he remembers he’s forgetting something.
“That was actually the second fire to happen in four months, my truck caught fire in Chicago, two months prior,” he explains, citing after-market headlights as the culprit. “I pulled over to the side of the road, and I saw smoke. Within 10 minutes my entire hood was engulfed in flames.”
Without any worldly possessions or a team to play for, Billy Winn’s NFL dreams were nearing the flames as well. That’s when he got a call from the Denver Broncos.
At the time, as he took the place of the injured Phil Taylor on the roster, many thought Winn was merely a camp body, but he took his opportunity and ran with it. When another DL went down in Vance Walker, the path to making the team became clear.
The chips were finally starting to fall in his favor, and when the 53-man roster was set, there he was, No. 97. Not only on a team but maybe the perfect team.
“I love the guys I’m around, and I feel like the guys in this locker room make me a better player,” he explains as he catches playful flack from everyone around him. “Oh my gosh, it’s night and day from anywhere I’ve ever played. I mean, the guys in this locker room are such stand-up guys. I can honestly say that I’ve been here for two months now and I can trust every single guy in this locker room. You just know that in some aspect they are going to try and help you out. Same thing for me—in some way, I am going to help them at some point.”
Coming off of a fumble recovery last week, Winn feels like he’s playing the best football of his career. He went through the fire, and now he’s headed right back in, this time with 50-plus friends he trusts.
“It does feel like a clean slate,” he explained of it all. “This may be a new beginning for me.”
