Pre-draft concerns about Garett Bolles’ age have not come to pass

Google the terms “Garett Bolles” and “overaged” and you’ll get a bushel of stories leading up to the 2017 NFL Draft citing Bolles’ relatively advanced age as a reason for caution regarding his status that year.

Bolles turned 25 years of age before his first regular-season game. His first contract expired at age 28, which is two or three years past the same point for most NFL players.

He turned 30 last Friday.

And the talking point that seemed so concerning five years ago is rarely mentioned today.

To date, Bolles has been quite durable. Of the 81 possible games played in his career, he’s missed just four — and two of them were for non-injury reasons. He missed a 2020 game at Carolina due to illness and he sat out the home win over the Chargers last year while on the COVID-19 list.

Over time, he’s also become sturdier on the mental side.

“Now, I look back at myself, I’m a lot more humble, a lot more vulnerable. I feel like I’ve grown in all aspects of my life,” he said. “I’m a big believer in the way you live your life off the field is the way you play on the field. So, I had to realize how to balance my family life [and] at the same time, being a professional athlete.”

In fact, Bolles’ life experience and career ups and downs have made him into a leader in the offensive-line room. Few players have gone from being the pariah of the fan base to becoming a second-team All-Pro as he did.

In April, he mentioned how he hired a mental-health consultant to help him with the cerebral side of the game. He made that move in November 2019, during the Broncos’ Week 10 bye. It was then that his game started to turn around. He became more effective. The frequency of holding penalties — which peaked when he had four against Chicago in Week 2 of 2019 — dropped.

Yes, the critique that the Broncos could have drafted tackle Ryan Ramczyk remains a valid one. Bolles eventually found his form, but his career hasn’t had the consistency of Ramczyk, who has been a first- or second-team All-Pro in three of his six New Orleans seasons, most recently 2020.

But as Bolles heads into his 30s with only two games missed to injury over his first five seasons, age and its accumulated effects is not a concern.

Tackles like Trent Williams, Andrew Whitworth and Jason Peters flourished well into their 30s. Compared with most, Bolles had minimal football experience before the Broncos drafted him. Thus, he doesn’t carry the accumulated wear and tear of most tackles at his age.

The concern now? Whether he can successfully re-adapt to a zone-blocking based scheme. There are similarities to what then-offensive coordinator Rich Scangarello installed in 2019. But Nathaniel Hackett’s scheme is not a carbon copy.

“There are some differences,” Bolles said after a voluntary-veteran minicamp practice last month. “I think it’s more detail-oriented [now]; there’s a lot more details.”

But it also rewards athleticism and quickness, which have long been Bolles’ strong points.

“I feel good. This offense is an outside-zone scheme, so you’ve got to be quick and agile and you’ve got to stay on your angle, and you’ve got to use your hands [and] use your feet,” he said at voluntary veteran minicamp. “And I feel like with my lacrosse background, being able to move my feet, running up and down the field, I think [I] just fit this scheme really well.”

If Bolles does, his best could still be yet to come.

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