It's time to talk that talk, and we talk it like no one else. This is the stinking truth. Now, here's your host, Mark Schlereth. Hey, welcome into the Stinkin' Truth Podcast. Alongside Mike Evans, I am Mark Schler. Thank you so much for making us a part of your day. Make sure you subscribe. Make sure you like it. Send us your questions. Always try to get on there and answer them on the YouTube channel. Mike, it is a Broncos edition of the Stinkin' Truth Podcast. Two in one right now, coming off a big Sunday night victory over the LA Rams. And I know Sean Payton has talked throughout the offseason and into the preseason and even into the start of the regular season. Hey, we can't keep walking this high wire act, right? We can't keep playing these games where we get off to these slow starts and think that we're going to be able to pull these wins out of our butt.
But they do. They continue to do it. So why can't it continue? Well, you know, you love the fact that your quarterback plays his best when his nuts are on the line. When they're not playing well, when they're not executing through the first two or three quarters, then all of a sudden it becomes yarble cut in time and this guy goes out and plays his best. I'd much rather have a guy play his best when the game is on the line as opposed to the guy who comes out in the first quarter and plays lights out and then the pressure gets on and he wilts like a flower in the summer heat. I'd much rather have that guy.
But the question is, and the question remains, how do you start faster? And I've heard all kinds of different kind of opinions on, well, they need to do this or they need to do that or whatever the case may be. But the question remains, how do you start faster, Mike? That's it. You're asking me? Yeah. How do you start faster? I thought you were the expert. Well, I'm going to throw it back at you. Yeah. So.
I think there's a couple of things. I think there's a couple of things about a young quarterback that you have to do. And so I'll give you a couple of theories that I've heard, that I've thought about, that we've walked through. And you and I have walked through this on a radio show with Brandon Stokely as well. But one of the theories is, and you might have brought this up, what about up-tempo? What about starting in some up-tempo stuff? Because...
When you're down by 14 in the third quarter, or 16 in the third quarter, like they were on Sunday night, all of a sudden you're like, we're down to, what, five or six possessions? We've got to score on all these possessions. Let's pick up our pace a little bit. And maybe Bo Nix plays better in that pace. Well, then I start thinking, well, why would you play better in up-tempo? Because it does what? It pairs down the number of things you can do. So now all of a sudden I'm becoming an expert as opposed to being the guy that's a jack of all and master of none. I really hone down what I'm doing. So there's that theory behind it.
As much as we get into, as a football community, got to have a dynamic play caller. Got to attack them over the top. Got to get after them and play action. You know? And I'm like, no. You got to have a North Star. You got to have an identity. You got to know what you are. So my belief, when I watched them, and I went back through every play on the coach's tape of this offense, and I looked at everything. I just kind of nitpicked every play. And here's what I've come up with.
A couple of different things. One is you got to pare down your volume and find two or three things you can do and you can do well, regardless of what the defense gives you. Sometimes I think we start off in a level 400 class early in the first quarter. Dude, you're just barely out of the one-on-one classes right now. We might let you move up to the 200 level classes, but you're not ready for the 400 level classes. You're not. And there's an old saying in the NFL that success leaves fingerprints. Well, so does failure.
Because when you watch this offense, there are multiple things that go wrong. It may be your quarterback that predetermines, I'm going to throw a deep post regardless of what I get. And then all of a sudden when the safety rolls over the top and he stays on top of the post where the corner's got outside leverage and you throw it anyhow, when you've got to go to the over or the check down, like that to me is, that's a quarterback failure. You decided. that this post was going to be open, and you were going to throw the post regardless of what the defensive coverage is. And all quarterback play is, if you boil it down to its essence, it's a game of keep away. We're putting one defender in conflict. If the defender plays high, throw it low. If the defender plays low, throw it high. It's not that hard. And yet you make this predetermined...
or you have this predetermined thought of where you're going to go with the fall ball before you actually read it out. And so that's a quarterback failure right there. You've brought up so many great points and I got so much I want to respond to and ask you about. When you say you looked at every play that the Broncos ran against the Rams the other night, when you looked at the beginning of the game, did it feel like the plays that were called were complex? Were complicated? Or were they plays that you see everybody run, the Broncos just didn't execute them? Well, yeah, it's a failure of execution. So it is, and it's, like I said, it's not just Bo.
It's not both predetermining. I'm going to throw it here regardless. It's it's play design. It's lack of spacing in play design or lack of thought of what if we get this? It is a missed block here, a missed assignment here. It is something that is like on multiple levels. It's players missed assignments, player technique, technique issues. It is failure of coaching.
So it's all three levels, if you will, because I heard Bruce Arians come out. I thought it was really interesting. Bruce Arians is a buddy of mine, was a great coach in this league for a very long time, offensive coordinator for a very long time. He was a player at Temple. I mean, Bruce Arians has been around forever. But Bruce Arians said, hey, a lot of times for the Broncos, you come out and you're getting some looks that you haven't necessarily prepared for. Young quarterback, you're going to get the exotic looks, the disguised looks, and you're going to try to fool a young quarterback.
I mean, that lines up. That is 100% some of the stuff that goes on. So my thought process to that is, if we're going to get some looks that are what we call bastard looks, what am I going to do? I'm going to live in three or four things that I know I can execute against any front, against any look, against any blitz. It's the globo gym of football. I'm better than you, and I know it. But here's the problem with that. You've got Sean Payton, and now you've got Davis Webb, two super creative offensive minds who put in all this work, study all this tape.
and spend all these hours late at night carefully constructing a game plan. They want to see it come to fruition on Sunday. Yes, yeah. And what you're saying is you've got a quarterback or you've got an offense that isn't ready for all this work. And that maybe you've got to somehow convince Sean and Davis Webb that, hey, you don't have to do as much during the week, at least not right now, because your quarterback, your offense isn't ready for it. Your offense is, like I said, it is struggling with certain things. And they're close, man. They're close. You see a lot of things that are really good, and then it's one mistake here, one mistake there.
Over like, is it overcomplicated? Is it too much stuff? You know, again, my answer is always going to be let's it's this old Neil McCoy country song. Let's small up and simple down. Right. Make it as easy as possible and find your three or four things that you do exceptionally well and live in those areas and then build off, you know, tangentially build off of those areas to create opportunity. And so those are the things, Mike, that need to need to happen. I'll tell you the other thing. I think that Bo Nix has been coached so hard.
to, hey, and I've talked to Sean Payton about this. I believe, and Sean Payton believes, that sacks are a quarterback-driven statistic. And I also know that once you get sacked in a drive, it's almost impossible to come away with points in that drive. Almost impossible. So I know it's been drilled into Bo's head that you can never give up a sack. You cannot take a sack. Well, the issue is there are times when Bo Nix is paying more attention to the rush than he is the coverage. And therefore, instead of stepping up and delivering a football in the midst of, you know, what we used to call staring down the gun barrel, you're escaping out the back of the pocket. You're getting out of there before the route's fully developed. And I saw that as well. I want to draw up something. And this would be, for me, this would be one of the issues that we see. I talked about, I saw missed assignments. And I talked about like...
Bo predetermining things. Bo being nervous about taking a pressure or a sack so he leaves a little bit early. But here's a design issue that I saw the other night early in this game that I looked at and said, this is just not, this design probably looked great when you drew it up on the grease board. But then you get into the game and you realize why it didn't work. You happen to have a grease board. I do. This is perfect. Here we go. All right. So in this particular. Sorry. You're good. You're good. All right. In this particular play, we're going to watch. I didn't draw up a defense here, but we're going to watch a general flood route. OK. And how you get to this flood route. You're on this far hash. Right. So this is the boundary on that side of the ball. OK. And so here's what ended up happening. They motion across the formation. Right. And this guy releases out. It's just a spacing. He goes down the sideline. OK. They run fake pitch.
So they're getting all this movement from the defense this way. Fake pitch, boot keep out, okay? So here's what ends up happening. Cortland Sutton, inside release, and he goes down. He's the deep, okay? And now they're going to run switch release with 82 and 17. That is Waddle and Troutman. And they're trying to get back to the opposite side, right? So they go, uh, shallow. And they go, uh, low cross. So by the time this fake pitch happens out here, Bo Nix is...
all the way out to the numbers. He's out of the numbers. Defensive end comes forcing over here. He's out of the numbers. And these guys have yet to cross the hash. So you're looking for this linear progression. Just because they're getting caught up in all the washout there, right? So you're looking for this linear progression that goes like this. One, two, three. That's your progression. Well, one hasn't even gotten into your eyeline. And now your flat defender, this guy, call him a nickel, is your flat defender. There's nobody.
to hold him. So now he falls off and he creates a situation where you can't fit a ball in. And that to me is a bad design because you got your quarterback out there and nobody is in his line of sight to throw it to. And so I'm sure when you drew it up on the grease board and then you probably practiced it and everybody got through clean because you designed it that way. Well, that's not how the game actually plays out. And so that was, that was one of the issues, Mike, I'm going to draw one more quick issue for you that they can never be. All right. And this drives, this stuff drives me insane.
So you have a day one installation, and we're just going to do a half line situation here, okay? So we've got center, we've got right guard, right tackle, defensive end, and defensive tackle, and we are what we're calling a shotgun run. So we are doing mid-zone this way, okay? And now what we've got is the quarterback is faking that handoff, and he is responsible for holding off this defensive end because you're zone reading that. So you're handing that into the running back's belly, and you're looking at that defensive end, so you're going to hold him, right? So these two guys are doing what we call scoop to this guy.
Day one installation. One of the easiest things in the world to do. You've got to know. So they execute the original block right here on the defensive tackle. It's great. And then what happens? All of a sudden, McGlinchey goes, oh, let me go pick this end up. And he falls off of that. Meanwhile, Miners are going, oh, let me get to the backer. And guess who's blocking him? Johnny B. Air is blocking him. And now the running back goes up, cut back. Bam! Minus two. Now, that's one of those situations where that's not game plan issue. That's not a coaching issue. That's a dumbass player issue.
You can never, ever. What are you doing? That's not your responsibility. That's held by the quarterback. And if this guy starts pinching down here, guess what the coaches call? They call this boot run out here. And they give that on the edge and they say, hey, man, if you're going to do that, then we're going to counter that with our quarterback run. And you guys are going to be gutted in that formation, in that particular play group. So those are the things that you see as they start the game that you're like, how does this happen? As you talk about all this, how much of this do you think would be improved?
if they had Bo under center more. I don't get the fascination with shotgun. And I see the value in it, but to live in it, I think the other day the stat was 37 snaps in shotgun, 21 under center. And it would just seem to me, to your idea of, let's simple this down a little bit. Wouldn't it be easier to simplify things if your quarterback was just under center?
The issue that you get into is then it's with a guy that hasn't played a lot under center, your footwork, your timing, all those things become more prevalent. You've got to be perfect in that stuff. But does he have to learn? Well... My thought, you're not going to get an argument out of me. I would much rather be under center. The top 10 teams in the league that went under center, eight of them went to the playoffs. The discrepancy is the top teams are 56%, 54%, 50%, 52%. I'm a believer in being under center because I just know what it does for your run game. It opens your run game up. There's so much more you can do from under center than you can in shotgun. It also really sells your play action hard. Ultimately, Mike, my answer is always going to be the same.
If you're struggling in games, you're struggling in your first 15, then you have to find what your identity is. Find one thing. You know, I had this conversation with a coach, an offensive coordinator years ago, who's a head coach now, but their run game was really struggling. And he was offensive coordinator. I met with him, you know, in a production meeting. And we just started talking about the run game and some things in general. And he said, hey, man, I'd like to talk to you further on this. Like, oh, here's my number, whatever. And so we ended up having these conversations about run game. And my advice was, listen, find, I don't care what it is.
Find one thing that you do well. One concept that you can execute well. And you can execute it against any defense. Any defense. It doesn't matter what you line up in. We know how to block this thing. And then live in that. And then find the things that match it, right? And grow it from there. But you've got to find one. Call it one North Star play. We can run this against anybody. And you and I have talked about this. You covered me when I played and covered my teams and went back-to-back Super Bowl champions. We ran. Literally, we ran.
four offensive or five offensive runs. We had, like, we literally, we ran 14-15, which was just a mid-zone handoff, 18-19, mid-zone handoff. That's what we ran. The other team knew it was coming. Right. But you just executed better. 18 handoff strong. Then if we want, hey, you're rolling your safety down and we still want to run strong. Like, we didn't let a safety call us out of the run game. Like, oh, they're bringing a safety down. It's an eight-man front, you guys. Hey, check pass, check pass. You know, we didn't know. We were like, oh, you want to bring the safety down?
18 handoff for us. We're going to put our fullback Griff on you. What are you going to do now? We are just going to smash you. We're getting goosebumps. We didn't let you dictate to us the audacity of thinking that you as a defense can dictate to us. We ran what we ran, and we just ran it better than you. And we just shoved it down your gullet. And I think that's what you have to do. You want to start fast? Simple down. We're spending a lot of time on the offense. I understand why. But quick thought about what you saw from this defense, which, again, came up big at the end. They didn't get off to a great start. Defensively, they didn't get off to a great start.
But, you know, they got better as the game went along. And then it was this defense making the big plays at the end, the pick six of Matthew Stafford from Hufunga. And then Hufunga again with the big play at the goal line. Just some thoughts about what you saw from the defense the other night. Yeah, the defense just seemed to get stronger as the game went on and more locked in. And then I thought Vance Joseph, from an adjustment standpoint, a couple of blitzes that he drew up. Hufunga again. Yeah, just a couple of blitzes he drew up. And then on the pick six, playing zero. And Matthew Stafford knows it's zero.
He knows the ball's got to get out quick, okay? He knows that. And you get a receiving core that's kind of stacked right there, right? And Hufunga's on one. And so Matthew Stafford just felt like that's who he's covering. There's a safety over the top. So, hey, man, that safety is never going to get to the quick out because he's eight yards, nine yards deep, right? So Matthew Stafford snaps the ball and just throws it without even looking because he knows, hey, man, this guy's wide open and this is going to be a first down. So Hufunga on the guy, he's out. He just leaves and undercuts the out route.
and leaves that dude that he's covering for the safety. So it's just a switch up. But again, this is Vance Joseph going, hey man, they know where the hots are, but I know where the hots are and I know where he's going with this. So what we're going to do is we're going to line up in man. We're going to show them zero pressure, but we're going to switch the responsibilities between Hufunga and the deep safety. He switches it. There's Hufunga steps right in front of the out route, the quick out route. They know, I mean, that's from scouting and that's from understanding that that's what they're going to throw. And they switch that up and whoop.
Out the gate he goes. What a great run back by Hufunga, too. He looked like a running back, right? But again, that's where Vance Joseph, and I'll tell you, man, I know he interviewed last year, and it was one of those, you know, interviewed in Arizona, and nothing really transpired. And I understand how everybody's, you know, hot after the next big offensive coordinator guy. But Vance Joseph deserves another opportunity to be a head coach in this league. You know, it's funny that you say that, because when it comes to Vance Joseph, for me, I'm with you. The guy should be a head coach. He sounds more and more like a head coach. Every time I hear him talk, I think he deserves a chance. But the selfish Bronco part of me is like...
No, stay. I don't want you to go. You're just doing too good of a job with this defense, and you just gave an example why. Yeah, no question about it. Hey, listen, for everybody involved in the Stinky Truth Podcast, the Broncos edition, thank you so much for making us a part of your day. Please make sure you share it. Make sure you share it with your friends and your family. Make sure you subscribe and you like. Whether you watch us here on our YouTube channel, whether you listen to us, wherever you download your podcast, we thank you so much. We'll be back with you later on in the week.