Denver Broncos Executive vice president of football operations and general manager John Elway is looking forward to making his team better this offseason, and that may just start with the big uglies up front.
“We’re going to try to add on both sides offensively and defensively,” explained Elway, who spoke on other positions but always seemed to come back to line play, especially offensively.
“I think we’re good enough on the defensive side,” said the Broncos legend. “I think that we have to get better offensively and this is the time of year that we have to get better. I think we’re still in a position to where we can compete, but we got a hell of a division.”
Improving on offense starts up front, where Elway and the Broncos have lots of decisions to make as the unit has now struggled in consecutive seasons.
“I’d hoped that we’d been a little more solid than we have,” said Elway. “I wanted to play better last year, you know with Russell [Okung] coming in and [Donald] Stephenson coming in I thought that we might have played a bit better on the offensive line than we did. But yeah, that’s an area of concern for us, and we continue to work on it and that’s my goal is to make it right.”
Getting things right up front starts with some important decisions regarding the Broncos current starters; Russell Okung on the left side and Donald Stephenson on the right. Neither is a guarantee to stay in Denver after uneven first seasons with the Broncos in 2016 and Okung—whose extension was not picked up by the franchise—is particularly doubtful to return.
“I wouldn’t say we moved on we just didn’t exercise an option, that doesn’t mean that we’ve moved on,” explained the GM. “We’d still like to talk to Russell, and I’m still going to talk to Russell about what he wants to do. But obviously, he’s looking at the market and seeing what’s out there also. So we’re not counting Russell out, but he’s part of the process.”
Elway went on to explain that he still considers Okung an option as starting left tackle, while Stephenson who’s still under contract but could be cut saving the team $3 million in cap space, could be retained depending on the Broncos alternatives in the open market.
“They’re not guys that grow on trees either,” explained Elway in finding offensive tackles. “They’re difficult to find, and we’ll do everything we can to try and find the best fit. And if that’s Russell great, if not we’ll see what else is out there.”
“It comes down to money too,” he added. “It’s not a bottomless pit, so there’s only so many different things that we can do. As I said, even though we didn’t exercise the option on Russell that’s not saying he’s not going to be back. Now, he may find another opportunity which it is what it is but you know Russell is somebody we’d like to continue to talk to and then we’ll look at the other guys that are going to be on the market.”
Of course, there’s also the 2017 Draft which Elway and other Broncos execs are evaluating while in Indianapolis at the NFL’s annual scouting combine.
“It’s not real deep,” said the GM, repeating himself twice about the offensive tackle class. “Then again, you don’t have depth as far as the top six or seven guys at offensive tackle that went in the first last year. You don’t necessarily have that same setup, but there are some guys down the line that hopefully, you can train and eventually can be good football players.”
As they figure out the best pieces to put together in the offseason, the Broncos will also have to find a way to make all the new pieces work with a new coaching staff and potentially scheme on the o-line.
“As Mike McCoy said—because I’ve asked him the same thing—he’s said, ‘Whatever we do best’ and I said, ‘Well we have to draft a something and I’m not sure what we do best.’ Obviously, you got Matt [Paradis] who’s probably more of a zone center and Max [Garcia] who’s probably more of a gap guard, so we’ve gotta find the best of both worlds and put them all together. I think Jeff Davidson and Chris Strausser do a good job, there and Mike will do a good job of putting everybody in a good situation to be successful. I’m excited that Mike’s back, I think he’ll do a good job and I’m excited about the prospects of what we’ll do offensively.”
The Broncos have options, and they’ll be adaptable in fitting those options to best benefit the team. But as of now, one thing is clear—the offensive and defensive lines are the priority and getting better up front is a must in 2017.
