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Mason's Mailbag: Is Denver’s handling of Lock a reflection on his ability?

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Andrew Mason
November 12, 2019
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If you want in on the next Mailbag, leave your questions in the comment section below or tweet them #AskMase!

Let’s talk about Drew Lock …

“Dingus” is a harsh word and one that I think is inaccurate. What is fair to say is that the Broncos’ offensive scheme is complex, it asks him to work from under center more than he ever did at Missouri, and its verbiage demands the verbal relay of a playcall to his teammates in the huddle that far exceeds anything from almost any college scheme.

It doesn’t mean a young quarterback cannot find success. But don’t expect it to click right away.

“Every guy is a little different,” offensive coordinator Rich Scangarello said on Oct. 31. “We’ll see where he’s at, but I just think he just wants to go out here and take snaps, cadence, break the huddle, visualize and have the guys and all that stuff. Scout-team reps and all that stuff, that’s just really honing your craft and that’s an opportunity for him to get better, get him along and see where we can take him.”

These stories tend to come out once the narrative has been set with on-field play. With Rodgers, those vignettes began to surface as his preseason play improved. By his third preseason (2007) he’d posted back-to-back preseasons with a passer rating of at least 98.0, with a 6-to-1 touchdown-to-interception ratio in the 2006 and 2007 preseasons.

At that point, Rodgers’ ascension was not a matter of if, but when.

Also, Rodgers had a worse passer rating in his first preseason than Lock. As a rookie, Rodgers had a 53.0 rating on 20-of-37 passing with one touchdown and two interceptions; Lock’s rating was 71.9 on 31-of-51 passing with a touchdown and an interception.

Don’t forget that Lock has not even had a scout-team repetition in the regular season — yet. That is expected to come sometime this week as he works his way up to speed following his Tuesday return to practice.

The Broncos don’t hold Lock in low regard.

But my take is that if you do not know what Lock is — and didn’t feel comfortable getting him into action as a rookie — then you have to assume he is an unknown, and, thus, his progress and potential must be evaluated against every top-flight quarterback coming out in the 2020 NFL Draft. Who has the higher ceiling — Lock, or, say, Oregon’s Justin Herbert?

And if the Broncos draft one, so what if there’s a competition? If this happens, consider it a test of their young quarterbacks. If they can’t handle the pressure of a QB derby, how can you expect them to deal with pressure from, say, Joey Bosa and Melvin Ingram?

Should both quarterbacks become starting-caliber, you trade the surplus — just as the Dallas Cowboys did in 1990 when they dealt Steve Walsh to the New Orleans Saints, one year after using a supplemental first-round pick to take him — which was just two months after they selected Troy Aikman with the No. 1 overall pick.

It’s a small price to pay for finding “the guy,” and as we have seen, the presence of an elite quarterback is the most certain path to long-term relevance and contention, giving you the highest floor, the highest ceiling and a greater (but not limitless) margin for error.

I could see a two-game winning streak after a loss to Minnesota.

A little background: The Broncos opened the week as a 10-point underdog. Since 1980, the Broncos have been a double-digit underdog just 12 times, according to pro-football-reference.com. The Broncos are 2-10 straight-up in these games. One of the two wins was Super Bowl XXXII.

(Aside: The Super Bowl XXXII triumph over the Green Bay Packers was at a neutral site — San Diego’s Qualcomm Stadium. The other win came during the 1987 strike, when the Raiders had a slew of players cross the picket line, leading to the Broncos being an 11-point underdog. Vince Evans, a former Bears starter, was under center for the Raiders; Ken Karcher got the nod for the Broncos. Future Hall of Famer Howie Long and longtime starter Bill Pickel were among the Raiders to cross the picket line; the Broncos’ regulars who were in action included wide receiver Steve Watson, offensive linemen Dave Studdard, Billy Bryan and Keith Kartz and linebacker Jim Ryan. The game wasn’t close — in the Broncos’ favor. Joe Dudek rambled through the Raiders for 128 rushing yards and two touchdowns in a 30-14 Monday Night Football romp.)

But what is interesting is that the Broncos have not won a road game in which they were a road underdog by more than 9 points since at least 1979, which is as far back as pro-football-reference’s point-spread database goes. They’re 0-9. Just one of those games — the 1991 AFC Championship game, a 10-7 loss at Buffalo — was decided by fewer than 10 points. The average margin of defeat is 19.8 points.

So what I’m saying is that a win Sunday in Minneapolis would be historic. One to savor. And as they said back in the 1980s, one to grow on.

And wouldn’t it be fun?

But let’s say the Broncos fall to the Vikings.

The Week 12 game in Buffalo looks like a contest in which both teams score between 10 and 16 points, a duel decided by which young quarterback makes the fatal mistake.

The Chargers game in Week 13 is hard to figure. At their best, they can throttle the Packers. At their worst, their offense accounts for six points, fritters away prime scoring chances and flops around on the deck like a fish that needs to be thrown back into the water — as was the case in Week 5 against the Broncos. I’d expect Denver to win, but one doesn’t know which Chargers team will show up.

Then you have back-to-back road games against teams currently leading their divisions — Houston and Kansas City. The Broncos could play well in both and still fall each time, no matter who starts at quarterback.

If your definition of “soon” is in the next few months to a year, then, no, I don’t expect resolution in that time frame. If your definition is within the next three to four years, then, yes, I think it will be.

The next two years could be thorny with the collective bargaining agreement expiring after the 2020 season. Once the Broncos and the NFL come through on the other side with a new CBA (and new streaming-media and TV contracts), the environment should be stable to facilitate a potential transition, especially if the team remains in the Bowlen family.

The pre-game huddle — that’s a good question, and I don’t know the answer to that. They’ve been doing some form of the “ahhhh … oooh” chant for several years now, going back to when John Fox coached the team. They do this immediately after stretching during each practice, which they then carry forward to game day.

The significance of this is that timing is that because it comes after stretching and warmups, it happens at the end of the portion of practice that is run by the strength-and-conditioning coaches, who bark the instructions to the players.

And as I recall, I first remember seeing this particular routine in 2012, which was the first season for both Peyton Manning and the team’s head strength coach at the time, Luke Richesson. Loren Landow is now the team’s head strength-and-conditioning coach, but his two assistants — Anthony Lomando and Cedric Smith — both worked under Richesson.

As for “seventy-five,” here is the story:

On Radio Row in the days before Super Bowl LII in Minneapolis, Steve Atwater, Ryan Edwards and I chatted with former NFL offensive lineman Kyle Turley, who casually mentioned that he and Atwater made a movie together.

Our reaction could be summarized thusly:

“WHAT?”

This changed the Orange and Blue 760 show that the three of us had. The movie, a slasher flick, was originally called Se7enty 5ive — yes, it was stylized like that — but was subsequently changed to “Dead Tone” for DVD and download release.

Steve is listed as one of the producers of the movie. His Broncos teammate, Ray Crockett, was also a producer — and even had a speaking role, in which he plays the police investigator who actually knows what he is doing, unlike his incompetent partner, played by the late Rutger Hauer. Another ex-Bronco, Ephraim Salaam, is also a producer.

Anyway, here’s the premise: A group of kids plays a game called “Seventy-Five,” in which they prank-call a random number and try to keep the answering party on the line for 75 seconds. Of course, at some point, they call the wrong person, and that’s where the killing spree begins.

The second iteration of the game begins midway through the movie when an obnoxious preppie college student asks if anyone at a party as a better game. One character responds, “As a matter of fact, I do!”

Then he slams the speakerphone down on a table and says, “Seventy-five!”

seventy five

So at one point on the show, when the number came up, I said it exactly as it was uttered in the film. Then Ryan began doing it. Then we started getting text messages into the show egging us on, so we continued. We pressed on, even though Steve didn’t want us to reference the movie at all, despite the fact that it’s so freaking awesome that he actually was a PRODUCER ON A MOVIE!

Ryan and I did an on-air commentary for the film. Ray joined us and relished his memories of his brief time in cinema. Steve smiled and winced.

As time went by, Ryan and I found it remarkable how many times the number SEVENTY-FIVE! arose in football.

And then, in Week 9, Noah Fant took a pass from Brandon Allen, ran through a pair of tacklers and accelerated down the west sideline, reaching full gallop. By the time he was done, he had the longest play for a Broncos tight end in 17 years.

Its length?

It’s magic. It makes us all think of perhaps the greatest person ever to wear orange and blue: Atwater, ever an exemplary gentleman and sportsman. And I’m grateful that we have continued the SEVENTY-FIVE! tradition here at DNVR.

1. If Yorkshire puddings are a thing here in the States, I haven’t found where they are a thing. The only restaurants at which I’ve seen one on the menu in North America were in Victoria, British Columbia, which I visited eight years ago. They were delicious, although not as good as my mum used to make. Any recommendations on Yorkshire puddings over here are welcome.

(Speaking of Canada, I’m always on the lookout for splendid poutine, so I will accept any and all suggestions here, too.)

2. That’s a good question, and frankly, I’m not sure the answer will be the same as it was before. They’ve tried the veteran, win-now QB the last two years, and neither panned out. Yet the model that probably works best is the one of the Seahawks in the early-to-mid-2010s, with Russell Wilson on a rookie contract and an outsized percentage of cap and cash resources poured into an elite defense (and in their case, a proven running back in his prime named Marshawn Lynch).

The wisest play appears to be to keep this defense together, re-sign as many of the key players under contract as possible (Justin Simmons, Chris Harris Jr. and Derek Wolfe are a good start) and then use the rest of the cap space to target at least one offensive lineman and No. 2 or No. 3 wide receiver, if DaeSean Hamilton and Tim Patrick can’t handle the job. Then the question becomes, “Is the young QB on the roster? Or must we go back into a QB-heavy draft to find him?” You don’t have to look long to find examples of young QBs who helped their teams win when paired with support from the rest of the roster.

That’s a good question, but none pop into my mind. Most call me “Mase,” and the occasional one has called me “Drew” — C.J. Anderson in particular, but those aren’t nicknames of the ilk that Tiger Woods uses.

I’m sure all of us have had nicknames bestowed behind our backs, and if that is the case for me, I’d just as soon not know.

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