Three observations from the Broncos loss to the Bengals in Week 15

The Denver Broncos saw their playoff hopes go up in smoke – or at least close to being gone – since they lost to the Cincinnati Bengals in Week 15 by a score of 15-10. With four games left in the season heading into the game, the Broncos had seven wins, but they needed to get to 10 wins in order to give themselves the best shot to make the dance.

Now, with three divisional games left are the Broncos simply out of gas? They’ve fought through injuries; they’ve fought through coaching issues, and they’ve put up a good fight most weeks. However, this week they just couldn’t get over the hump.

After the game, Broncos head coach Vic Fangio stated the team’s playoff hopes are not dashed just yet.

“We’re not out. We’re just going to strap it up, have another good week of preparation and get ready for the next game,” Fangio said.

Here are the top-three observations from the Broncos-Bengals game.

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All About Defense

The performance of the Broncos defense is going to be overshadowed by the “L” in the W-L column. The Bengals feature some of the best skill position players in the NFL, and they have a superstar franchise quarterback in Joe Burrow. The Broncos defense was able to shut them down, for the most part.

The defense did their job, and their performance should not be overlooked or forgotten about. Once again, the Broncos offense didn’t make enough plays while the defense kept them in the game.

Entering Week 15, the Bengals were 0-5 in one-score games – and the Broncos became the first team they beat in 2021 in such a contest. I like the way players on the Broncos defense were playing, including guys like Jonathon Cooper, Baron Browning, Jonas Griffith and Justin Simmons – just to name a few.

Fangio knows his defense played well against a high-powered offense.

“I thought the defensive players did a great job. That’s a really good offense. They score a lot of points against most everybody. They get a lot of yards. My hat’s off to the defense, I thought they played extremely well,” Fangio said.

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Your Worst Nightmare

It was a worst-case scenario that played out on Sunday for the Broncos offensive line. The Broncos had found an identity in their rushing attack, and the offensive line was blasting open holes for the Broncos rushing attack early and often. The key to jump-starting the offense was running the ball and putting the offensive line in the best position to have a positive impact on the game.

The one thing you didn’t want to do was have the game turn into a come-from-behind situation where it was obvious, they were going to pass. You certainly didn’t want that situation to arise with a backup quarterback the team doesn’t trust.

With the game on the line, Drew Lock was rushed and hurried on most throws. He throws off his back foot regularly, even when the pocket is clean, but a little bit of pressure and any sort of mechanics are thrown out the window.
Fangio admitted his O-line had struggles protecting the quarterback.

“When it becomes an obvious pass, that’s the o-line’s biggest nightmare. Our protection was good for the most part, but at the end we had some breakdowns and had a penalty. It does make it hard on them,” Fangio said.

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Don’t Start Hot, Don’t Get Hot

Starting hot is usually a problem for the Broncos offense on a weekly basis. Very rarely, unless they’re playing a bad team like the Lions, do the Broncos jump out to an early lead. Weeks will go by and this team won’t score on their opening drive – even if it’s just a field goal.

Starting hot is just something the Broncos do not do. So, when they didn’t start hot against the Bengals you had a feeling they would ramp things up as the game went on. That didn’t happen either.

Even though the Broncos won the time of possession, their offense couldn’t get into the end zone. Even though they rushed for over 100 yards as a team against a defense that gives up an average of 93.1 yards per game (no.4 in the NFL), their offense couldn’t even get more than one field goal in the first half. They set up Brandon McManus for a second field goal in the second quarter but he missed.

Fangio knows the flaws on his time reside mainly with the offense.

“You’re not going to win many games scoring 10 points. We just never found any rhythm, especially in our passing game to get that going and to be more of a balanced offense. The run game kind of went the way I thought it would be, because they’re good at defending the run. We had some good runs. Some that weren’t good, but that was to be expected against that team. We just couldn’t get the passing game going consistently enough to keep drives moving,” Fangio said.

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