Woody Paige: Nix, Broncos achieve 8-5, but are they doomed or destined

By Woody Paige December 7, 2024 | updated 8 months ago

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12_02_24 den cle05584.jpg — Denver Broncos quarterback Bo Nix (10) runs down field during the second half against the Cleveland Browns Monday, Dec. 2, 2024, at Empower Field at Mile High in Denver. The Broncos won 41-32. (The Gazette, Christian Murdock)
Christian Murdock

For the Broncos, it’s a good bye with good vibrations.

Good-bye again Browns. Add another Cleveland calamity against the Broncos to The Drive, The Fumble, The Blowout and now The Three Picks & The Bo Bomb Monday night.

Jimmy and Dee Haslam, who attended the same University of Tennessee as Payton Manning and I did, do not own the Browns. The Broncos’ highest winning percentage (79) in the NFL against a team not named Cardinals (87.5) is their ownership of the Browns with a 23-7 regular season record and a sweep of the AFC Championship games of 1986-87-89 (behind John Elway).

Next up for the Broncos is a horse of a different color. The Broncos haven’t dominated the Colts, possessing a 14-12 edge in regular-season games and losing two playoff games in Indianapolis (to a guy named Manning) and one in Denver (with a guy named Manning).

This season the Broncos would kick the Colts in Mile High Stadium or the London Palladium. The Broncos don’t need Elway or Manning. They’ve got Nix. Bo already has broken Broncos’ rookie quarterback records of Elway, Mickey Slaughter, Marlin Briscoe and Drew Lock – in passes attempted and completed, passing yards, touchdowns thrown and rushed for and caught, total offensive yardage and longest scoring pass. His 94-yard connection with Marvin Mims is the fourth-longest touchdown among all QBs in Broncos history. He soon will set several more standards.

Trevor Siemian posted eight victories in his first starting season in 2016. But he had appeared briefly in one game as a rookie the prior year. If the Broncos defeat the Colts, Nix will earn his ninth.

The Broncos are 8-5 for only the 13th time since the Broncos became a pro football team in 1960. (They have been better through 13 games and certainly worse).

The first time the Broncos were 8-5 was in 1976, John Ralston’s last season as head coach and when NFL teams had 14-game schedules. The Red Miller Broncos of 1978 had the same record before finishing 10-6. The other 8-5 records were achieved by coach Dan Reeves in 1981, Wade Phillips in 1993, Mike Shanahan in 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006 and 2008, Josh McDaniels in 2009, John Fox in 2011 and Gary Kubiak in 2016.

Sean Peyton has reached the 8-5 level this season (after ending ’23 with an eighth victory in the 16th game and losing the final game for an 8-9 record).

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What happened in those dozen previous seasons when the Broncos were 8-5 in December?

Curiously, none of the teams won or even made it to the Super Bowl. The ’76 Broncos barely missed their first post-season. Two years later the Broncos fell in their first playoff road game in Pittsburgh on a field that turned into ice skating rink. Despite a 10-6 overall record in 1981, the Broncos fell short of advancing. The Phillips Screwdrivers of ’93 lost their last regular-season game to the Raiders at the Los Angeles Coliseum in overtime 33-30 and had to return there a week later for a “play-oof’’ mess that resulted in the Broncos getting thumped.

Under Shanahan, the Broncos were at 8-5 in five separate seasons of eight in the early 2000s after winning successive Super Bowls. The 2002 Broncos dropped four of their final six to miss the playoffs. Two years later they were stampeded by the Colts in the wild card round.

Although the Broncos reached the AFC Championship in 2005 (winning eight of their last nine games for a 13-3 record) they were 9-7 in ’06 and didn’t advance. The ’08 Broncos gagged the last three to wind up 8-8, and Shanahan was done.

Newbie McDaniels won his first six as a head coach, then only two more the rest of the year. No playoffs. He, too, was soon done.

However, in 2011, with Tim Tebow elevated to starter, the Broncos were 8-5 before losing three in the stretch and limping into the playoffs against the Steelers. Guess who won on the first play of overtime.

The ’16 Broncos, after the Super Bowl 50 victory, won six of their first eight and became 8-5, but they plummeted in five of their last eight and became the first of eight playoff failures.

Are the 2024 Broncos, as their 8-5 predecessors, doomed or destined?

They are a good buy.

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Woody Paige: Nix, Broncos achieve 8-5, but are they doomed or destined

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