Schlereth: Wolfe’s remarks show Broncos made effort to draft ‘adults’

Following the final day of this year’s NFL Draft, Denver Broncos general manager John Elway, when asked about the high number of college team captains the club drafted, said the team pays attention to those characteristics “all the time.”

“It just so happened that the guys who were falling close to us were high-quality guys,” Elway said. “We always try to go high-character, but we were fortunate with all these guys. This is a special group.”

However, “Schlereth and Evans” co-host Mark Schlereth said defensive end Derek Wolfe’s comments this week indicate the Broncos pursued more mature players in the draft.

“All you have to do is hear Derek Wolfe right there, talking about no whining, no complaining. They went out and tried to draft really good football players who are adults,” Schlereth said.

Wolfe, when asked about the maturity of this year’s draft class this week, said, “There’s no complaining. That’s the one thing that you notice from an immature draft class, is that they complain a lot, whine and cry a lot.

“There’s none of that coming from this group.”

In January, Wolfe told Big Al and DMac there’s an “entitlement problem” around the league — that “young kids” come into the NFL and think they’re “entitled to something.”

“You can feel it with the rookies every year. It’s like they get more and more entitled,” Wolfe said at the time.

Schlereth said Wolfe’s comments only serve to validate his argument that the Broncos didn’t just select the best available player in the draft but intentionally targeted more mature prospects.

“Everybody was like, ‘Oh, come on. They didn’t do that intentionally. Those were the best players on the board at the time.’ And I’m like, no, I think there was some intent,” Schlereth said. “I believe there was some intent.”