Pump the brakes on any bold Troy Franklin predictions in 2026

Bold predictions are supposed to make you uncomfortable. That’s the entire point. They push past the safe projections and force a conversation about outcomes that live on the fringes of plausibility.

But on a recent edition of “Stokley and Evans, with Mark Schlereth” on 104.3 The Fan, one bold prediction about Troy Franklin ran headfirst into a reality check that even the most optimistic Broncos fan would have trouble dismissing.

The prediction was straightforward. Could Troy Franklin finish top-three in the NFL in touchdown receptions this season?

The case isn’t built on nothing. Franklin recorded six touchdowns last year on 65 catches and 709 yards. More importantly, he was lethal inside the red zone, catching four of his eight targets within 10 yards of the end zone and converting every single one of them into a score.

That’s a 50-percent catch rate and a 100-percent touchdown rate on receptions in the most valuable real estate on the football field. Those are the kinds of numbers that make offensive coordinators design plays specifically for a player.

But Brandon Stokley quickly identified the flaw in projecting that production forward.

“Here’s the problem with it, and here’s what you didn’t say. Troy Franklin’s not gonna have the opportunities he had last year,” Stokley said.

That single sentence reframes the entire conversation. Last season, Franklin operated in a receiver room where Courtland Sutton was the clear number one and everyone else rotated behind him. That structure gave Franklin enough targets to produce meaningful numbers. The landscape in 2026 looks fundamentally different.

Stokley walked through the new pecking order with precision.

“You got Jaylen Waddle starting now. So when you get in the red zone, if you go three wides, who’s the third wide gonna be? I don’t think it’s always gonna be Troy Franklin. Sometimes, you’re gonna have Marvin Mims in there. Sometimes, you’re gonna have Pat Bryant in there. Guess who you’re always gonna have in there. Waddle and Sutton,” Stokley said.

That’s the math that works against Franklin’s bold prediction. The two receivers who will see the field on virtually every meaningful snap are locked in. The third spot becomes a rotation, and rotations, by definition, dilute individual opportunity. Franklin isn’t losing his role because he did something wrong. He is losing volume because the team got better around him.

Stokley closed with the honest summary.

“That’s the one problem. I don’t know if he’ll have the opportunities that he had a year ago, when it was just Courtland Sutton, and then mix in whoever else you want,” Stokley said.

Franklin’s talent isn’t in question. His red-zone efficiency was elite. His growth over two seasons has been one of the quieter success stories on the roster. But finishing top-three in the league in touchdown receptions requires more than ability; it requires volume. And the volume that made last year’s production possible may simply not exist in the same way with Waddle now commanding his share of the target pie.

The prediction was bold. Stokley just isn’t sure the opportunity will be there to back it up.

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