It’s a Lone Star State Showdown!

Password: new england clam chowder

That’s right kids, I am back from my weeklong backwoods retreat. I must admit it is quite liberating to get away from your cell phone and laptop for a few days. Life is much simpler when your biggest concerns are the weather on the horizon, avoiding jet skis in your kayak and identifying the right lure color or fly pattern.

Of course, it figures that I am gone when the national crisis also known as the Brett Favre situation is resolved. The Jets huh? Maybe the Jets figure the only way to beat New England and their AARP-card carrying defense is to have a quarterback that is even older.

At least in New York, Brett’s every move won’t be scrutinized by the press. We should put the over/under on the number of weeks into the season the New York Post makes some horrible pun about the Favre era being a disappointment on its back page. I set it at week 4 right now.

Oh and for all you idiots that set a single day record for buying Favre Jets jerseys on NFL.com? I have a Joe Namath - Rams jersey, O.J. Simpson – 49ers jersey, Tony Dorsett – Broncos jersey, Jerry Rice - Seahawks jersey, Joe Montana – Chiefs jersey, and Emmitt Smith – Cardinals jersey for you. All for the low-low price of $299 each.

Anyway, no reason to beat a dead Favre, that is old news. Last night we had our first live action of your Denver Broncos, in a riveting pre-season game against the Houston Texans (and our old friend head coach Gary Kubiak – or Koobs to some of us). So what did we learn? I’m glad you asked.

• While it is hard to learn much from the two short series by the offense there were a couple things that jumped out at me.
  • Where was the running game? Selvin Young’s 3 yards on 4 carries didn’t exactly inspire confidence that the Broncos running game has returned to its former glory.
  • As if by admission that they couldn’t run, there were a lot of short passes into the flats, especially to running backs out of the backfield. I’ve send this offense before. It is the ‘running game’ that FSU used to run. No, not the offense in those 14 straight years of top-five finishes. That would be the offense in those two straight years of 6 losses. Not that I am saying that is what could happen to the Broncos. There is little chance they have only 6 losses this year.
  • Now that the suspension has been handed down by the Commish it is interesting to see the Broncos make the conscious effort to not throw to Brandon Marshall. Young and Eddie Royal (promoted to starter with Darrell Jackson moving over to Marshall’s position) just jumped about 2 rounds in fantasy drafts this coming week.
• How about poor Matt Prater? Misses his first field goal attempt – a thirty yarder – causing roughly 437,896 Bronco fans mutter ‘I knew we never should’ve let Elam go’. Should we just nickname him Brian Griese right now? Ok, done.
• Speaking of former Bronco quarterbacks, I am reading Stefan Fatsis’s book ‘A Few Seconds of Panic’ right now. A fascinating look at the 2006 Broncos by a Wall Street Journal writer who spent training camp as a kicker with the team. Highly recommended reading, but I just read a chapter focusing on Jake Plummer (this was the year they had just drafted Cutler to replace Jake after he guided the team to the AFC Title game). It was nice to see that my long held feelings about Plummer (here and here) were validated. As were my feelings about Mark Kiszla, the second worst sports writer in Denver (congratulations Bernie Lincicome!).
• I haven’t spoken to Turner yet but I am sure he was thrilled with former Sooner Larry Birdine making a nice defensive play in the last minute. Unfortunately Gary Miller, probably the worst play-by-play announcer in all of pre-season football screwed up his number so his moment of glory was short lived.
• Not to toot my horn but – toot, toot – my two early picks for sleepers of camp played well (and even got mentioned by Woody Paige today, the best sportswriter in Denver). Anthony Alridge accounted for 40 yards of offense and another 23 on a kick-off return, flashing that 4.3 speed for the home folks. The only blip was a fumble, but if he can keep it from becoming a habit he should be ok. My boy Christian Morton accounted for six tackles and a sack in a secondary that was depleted with injuries and resting starters. Next week when he shuts down T.O. you will see (ok, that probably isn’t happening).
• My final note is a shout out to Wesley Woodyard, the leading tackler for the Broncos, a rookie out of Kentucky. Why are we still surprised by productive college players who don’t have the ‘right’ measurables looking good in the pros? Woodyard was the defensive leader on last year’s resurgent Wildcat team and recorded over 100 tackles in each of his final 3 seasons in college in the SEC (as we are told 453 times each fall, the best conference in college football).
• So why did he go undrafted? Apparently he is considered small (6’0”, 230 lbs) and a little slow (4.5 40-yard dash). Hmm, let’s pick a random former Bronco linebacker for comparison.
  • There was one player that was close to his size (6’0”, 240 lbs) and speed (4.56 40-yard dash coming out of college) and was the defensive leader for a strong SEC team (ironically that also beat FSU in a bowl game in the player’s senior year).
  • But why would we want another player to have a career like Al Wilson? He was a total bust – only a 5 time Pro-Bowler and the heart and soul of an AFC championship game team. Nah, why would anyone want that type of guy on their team.

My Week at Summer Camp – Day One

Note: This week, after realizing that planned (and desperately needed) vacation time coincided with the opening week of Bronco training camp, I decided to head down to Dove Valley for several days this week. I will be providing nightly updates on what we have learned about your 2008 Denver Broncos. Note #2: Given that I recently celebrated a 33^rd birthday and have been ‘with’ the Broncos longer than some of these players have been alive (Ryan Clady, born: September 6, 1986) I have accepted Mike Shanahan’s offer to long time veterans to only participate in one of the two-a-day practices each day.

Sunday, July 27th

o       I arrive at Dove Valley 30 minutes early with my Denver Post sports section and a Propel and find a spot high on the tree-lined berm lining the side of the practice field. Despite, expectations that temperatures will reach nearly 100 today, the place is packed. Clearly, I am not the only one that is already over baseball and looking forward to football.

o       As the first drops of sweat say hello, I realize that morning workouts may be a tactical error. I am facing due east into the rising sun and there is nowhere to hide.

o       I am about to begin whining about the folly of drowning in my own pool of sweat while watching 80 enormous humans sort-of, kind-of stretch when a Bronco official comes over and asks a young girl sitting in front of me wearing a Jay Cutler jersey (one of the Jessica Simpson pink ones for the record) if she would like to receive a ball from Jay. She agrees and to a round of applause from the crowd she walks across the field, meets Jay, shakes hands with him and while handing her the ball in his hands, he introduces her to Patrick Ramsey. A Vandy guy and a Tulane guy? There is about a 97.6% chance that girl is marrying a guy who wears a ratty old ball cap, khakis and a polo some day.

o        For the record, big props to the Broncos for making training camp as fan friendly as possible. They now allow you to bring in a personal drink, hand you a roster as you walk in so you know who you are looking at, open up for autographs (not to mention the above little girl). They also sell drinks right on the premises and a bottle of water only costs a buck! If this was Rockies training camp there is no way that water costs anything less than $4.

o       On to the actual play on the field. I have decided to pick a few positions and focus on them each day. Today: running backs, wide receivers and secondary

o       The Running back battle is probably the most interesting position battle in Bronco camp this year.

o        Selvin Young enters as the favorite and didn’t do anything to dissuade that opinion. He played well if not spectacularly. Outside of one move that absolutely embarrassed some poor second string DB and even elicited hoots and hollers from teammates. Those are always fun.

o        Further down the list of possible starters is Ryan Torain, probably the most anticipated 5^th round pick in Bronco history. Ryan looks very impressive in person – he is big and tall (6’1”, 225 lbs) and looks like he should be a star. I have to admit, after hearing about him since mini-camps he was a little underwhelming

§         I’m not sure whether it is his size but he doesn’t look like he is running real hard a lot of the time. He did put one ankle-breaker on a DB but for the most part he seemed to jog up into the line and get swallowed up by the linebackers and linemen.

o        On the other hand, my first sleeper of camp is Anthony Alridge, an undrafted free agent signed out of Houston. He is small (5’8”, 185 lbs) but extremely quick (reportedly a 4.3 40-yard dash). Not only did he look like he was going full speed, there were several times they sent him on a sweep around the corner and he flew past the defense.

§         One of the guys sitting near me, hopes that they can use him as a Glyn Milburn type, a third down specialist, too small to play every down. I have two problems with this. First, clearly this guy is not familiar with a man named Warrick Dunn (5’9”, 180 lbs, 10,181 career rushing yards). Second, while I appreciate the Milburn comparison (if for no other reason than its relative obscurity), can’t we aim a little higher for Alridge? Milburn accounted for less than 700 yards rushing and 1,050 yards receiving in his three years with the Broncos (2 of which occurred in the Wade Philips, so we can’t hold that against him). If we are going to compare him to smaller guys who are much more valuable in point-per-reception leagues….umm…I mean who are dual threats, let’s hope Alridge can play more like W.D. or Brian Westbrook (5’8”, 200 lbs.)

§         Not only was A.A. (as I call him) showing game when he was handed the ball he also got up in front during stretches and got both the crowd and players to start a rhythmic clap and boo the Chargers. Clearly, this guy is ready to play the role of Tulo in an unlikely Bronco up-rising in 2008!

·         Before Turner pulls a groin jumping to write a comment mocking my homerism, I don’t actually expect an unlikely Bronco uprising in 2008.

·         However a few more days in the sun with these guys and I may be convinced/sun stroked into believing it.

o       At the wide receiver position, there were two big off season storylines: the Jerry Springer-esque life of Brandon Marshall and the endless line of re-treads brought in by Shanahan to complement B-Marsh (as someone who I bludgeoned repeatedly calls Marshall).

o        First, just in time for all of those fantasy football drafts, I am happy to report that Marshall showed no signs of any lingering effects from the cut he took to his arm. He looked great today, catching everything and using his size to absolutely abuse Champ Bailey in one-on-one goal line battles.

o        On to the second question, I can tell you who I think will be the one left standing in this game of wide receiver musical chairs. That would be one Keary Colbert formerly of the Carolina Panthers and USC Trojans. Colbert did not have his best day today. He couldn’t get open, seemed to be tentative on where to go and when the ball got to him, he couldn’t catch it.

§         Besides the bad play, he wore long pants during practice, showing a remarkable lack of common sense.

o        One of the other receivers in is Darrell Jackson (or D-Jack to those that despise his underachieving ways in Seattle and San Francisco). I can’t say whether he will become that other receiver, but I will say he has the kickingest beard in camp.

o        I am also withholding opinion on second round pick Eddie Royal. At a minimum I will say he could be a great addition as a slot receiver replacing Brandon Stokley after his inevitable injury.

o        In the secondary much of the focus has been on whether John Lynch’s role will be reduced to mostly running downs with the arrival of Marlon McCree from the Chargers. Well, they may have forgotten about someone as Roderick Rogers was the defensive star today with two tipped ball interceptions.

§         My other sleeper of the draft also made his presence known in the secondary today. Free Agent Christian Morton, looked great both in the one-on-one goal line drills and in the broader seven-on-seven and full team drills.

o        Of course all of these opinions were based on one 2 hour practice. I am sure that by the time the regular season starts these will look almost as bad as that whole ‘the-Giants-are-a-joke thing’ from last year.