How do the Denver Broncos ‘buy-in’ at a championship level again?

A major difference between the past few seasons for the Denver Broncos, Mike Pritchard said on Tuesday, and it’s Super Bowl window during the Peyton Manning era is, with changing rosters and coaching staffs, the level of commitment and “buy-in” dropped off.

Despite having “great, great” players performing at high levels, the “Pritchard and Cecil” co-host said “the investment was not the same as it was when they were chasing a championship.”

“A lot of guys, their game slipped the past two years. That’s how you get into this mess,” Pritchard said. “And so, to me, they need to figure out how to get the buy-in back to the level that it was when they were chasing championships.”

And how the Broncos get back to that championship-level commitment, Pritchard said, rests within the coaching staff and the organization.

“… That’s on the coach. That’s on the organization to recognize,” Pritchard said. “Hey man, what’s going on with you? How come you’re not buying in? How come I’m not seeing the same commitment level that I saw when we had Peyton Manning here? Where’s the disconnect? What’s going on here?”

Later Tuesday, “Stokley and Zach” co-host Brandon Stokley said he didn’t know if he saw guys not “buying in” necessarily, that he has seen guys like Chris Harris Jr. and Von Miller play very hard.

But Stokley said if new head coach Vic Fangio wants to get his players to “buy in,” with the hopes of turning things around, he’s going to need to go out of his way to “build a relationship” with the captains, leaders, and veterans on the team.

“You call them up and you meet with them and you bring them up to your office and you sit them down man to man, face to face, and have a talk with them about what you expect from them, about what you want to accomplish, and how you’re going to do it,” Stokley said.

Stokley said it’s not necessarily a conversation that should be opened up for all on the team, but certainly the leaders and captains on the roster.

“You don’t need to go out there in front of a team in a team meeting and give a big rah-rah speech and this and that,” Stokley said. “You need to sit down individually with your leaders and the guys that you are expecting to play at a high level, face to face, man to man, and lay everything out.”

Follow digital content producer Johnny Hart on Twitter: @JohnnyHart7.