Numbers to watch for the Broncos: Here's why 420 -- points, that is -- could have them flying high

For better or for worse, few numbers are more Colorado than 420.

But scoring 420 points in a season would appear to be an aspirational thought for the Broncos. Denver has finished with point totals below the league per-team average for six consecutive years, dating back to 2015, when the Broncos scored 355 points — 7.2 below the league average.

Since then, the Broncos haven’t matched even that modest total, which ranked 19th in 2015 — but was good enough to power them to Super Bowl 50, since it was partnered with a powerful, top-ranked defense.

From 2016 through 2020, the Broncos never ranked higher than 22nd in scoring — a ranking they achieved in 2016, when they finished 9-7 — and even being an average offense is a goal that has drifted farther from sight. Last year, the Broncos scored 323 points, good for 28th in the league — and nearly 4.6 points per game below the league average of 24.79 points.

If that league average remains the same next year, then on a 17-game basis it would translate to 421 points scored in a season.

For ease of analysis, we’ll round down to 420.

That’s 24.7 points per game.

That would give the Broncos average scoring production if the 2020 standards are maintained. With the defense the Broncos possess, average is good enough to take the Broncos higher than they’ve ever been in the last five seasons — all the way back to the postseason.

OF FURTHER NOTE:

Scoring reached an all-time high on a league-wide basis last season, with teams averaging 24.8 points per game — 2.0 points above the 2019 average, and 1.4 points above the previous record set in 2013 (23.4).

But what is more illuminating than the single-year averages are the rolling three-year averages. Aside from a dip in the early 1990s — which included a three-year stretch from 1991-93 in which the per-game average dropped to 18.8 points — the averages have been on a steady rise over the decades, from a three-year low of 18.2 points from 1976-78 to the current three-year average of 23.6 points a game.

What is worth noting is that the current three-year period is the only one since the AFL-NFL merger of 1970 to see teams average at least 23.0 points per game. Until the 2018-20 seasons, the three-year average was always between 18.2 and 22.9 points per game. Furthermore, since 1993-95, the three-year average never dropped below 20.1 and never went above 22.9.

We are truly in an offensive age unlike no other — and for the Broncos to keep pace, 420 points is the number they need to hit.