Broncos-Chiefs: The good, the bad and the ugly from Thursday

The Broncos suffered an embarrassing loss to the Chiefs on Thursday night. They lost by a score of 30-6 and most of the game was quarterbacked by Kansas City’s backup, Matt Moore, after superstar Patrick Mahomes was knocked from the game with a knee injury.

Broncos head coach Vic Fangio was asked after the game if the team is back in a world of suck.

“That was a statement I regret making. I still believe in these guys, the players we have, who they are and what they’re about. I think we’ll take this extra time to refocus and get going here on the second half of the season,” Fangio said.

The Broncos have a lot to think about with 10 days until their next game. Before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let’s take a look at the good, the bad and the ugly from Week 7 loss.

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The Good

My push to get the hashtag #FeedPhil going didn’t quite get off the ground. I’ll blame offensive coordinator Rich Scangarello for that, but I do like how much we saw from Courtland Sutton on Thursday night.

Sutton was targeted his usual eight times and finished the game with six catches for 87 yards. He made some big plays and showed the energy after those plays that teammates can respond to during the game. Sutton is a leader on the field and he’s developing into a leader in the locker room as well.

After the game, Sutton showed off his leadership ability as he tried to stay positive at what I consider the low point of the season.

“This one was a big game. This game could have put us in a really strong position in this division. However, there’s a lot more games left and anything can happen, we’ve just got to keep pushing forward. We get 24 hours to dwell on this and study it, figure out where the problems were and come back and get back to the drawing board for the Colts,” Sutton said.

The Broncos look better when Sutton is getting the ball. I wouldn’t mind seeing him get more targets as we roll into future games.

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The Bad

Just when we thought Mike Munchak had fixed the offensive line, they have arguably the worst game of the season. At halftime, the line had given up five sacks to the Chiefs defense. Those sacks were on Joe Flacco and there was one credited when punter Colby Wadman was tackled behind the line of scrimmage on a horrible fake punt call.

“We have to block better. It’s as simple as that. If you’re getting called for a lot of holding, it’s either technique and we had a couple in the secondary too or you just have to be good enough to block the guy without cheating. Again, I haven’t seen. I will see them on the field at the time. That’s an area that we’re going to have to improve in. Again, that’s part of the pass offense,” Fangio said.

At one point, it seemed like the Broncos were going to bench left tackle Garett Bolles. There were reports of backup tackle Jake Rodgers warming up to come into the game late, but that never materialized.

With 10 days between games, one has to wonder if Ja’Wuan James is going to be back for the contest against the Colts in Week 8. If that’s the case, could current right tackle Eli Wilkinson actually move over to the left side to replace Bolles? Is James a better fit at left tackle?

Either way, the Broncos need to consider all options when it comes to finding their best offensive line combination.

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The Ugly

Nobody wants to see superstar players get injured. Empower Field at Mile High fell quiet when Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes went down with a knee injury in the second quarter. The medical cart was called out for Mahomes, but he waved it off and was helped to the sideline by trainers. Once to the sideline, Mahomes was able to walk into the locker room under his own power.

Chiefs head coach Andy Reid commented on his conversation with Mahomes after the win.

“He’s in a good place. He was in a good place on the field when it happened. Our doctor was phenomenal calming everything down, he calmed the storm right there. Patrick was good and felt very comfortable with him. He refused to get in that cart,” Reid said.

It wasn’t that long before we learned that Mahomes was going to miss the rest of the game with a knee injury.
After that, it was revealed that the training staff for the Chiefs had to pop Mahomes knee back into place when he was laying on the field.

That’s a gruesome injury that could keep Mahomes out of action for quite some time. No updates are yet available late Thursday night, but losing Mahomes for an extended period of time would crush the Chiefs hopes of making it to the Super Bowl.

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