Bo Nix: ‘It’s a playoff game’ — Broncos set tone ahead of Jags rematch

The Denver Broncos were on an 11-game win streak with an important day’s work ahead of them to try for the AFC’s No. 1 seed the last time they played the Jacksonville Jaguars — in December last year.

Given the stakes of the game and how the Broncos were playing it did feel like a playoff game. It went south, though. The Jags rode off some small-market smack talk to lay it down on Denver. Now the teams meet at the same site but just in Week 2 of the season. The Broncos are favored despite losing in Week 1 whereas the Jags crushed the lowly Browns.

And for the Broncos, this is the second in a line of six brutally hard games to start their schedule (Rams, 49ers, Chargers and Seahawks to com) so the team is looking at this as a playoff game. Sure, it’s way too early for that, but this game could have real implications in the AFC come January. And both because starting off 0-2 is nearly a death sentence and what’s immediately in front of the Broncos, they may have a good point.

“There’s nothing like a home field advantage,” Bo Nix said Thursday. “Nothing like playing at home. I know as an away team, what it’s like to go and play in a loud environment. It’s definitely not easy. There’s a lot of variables and things that go into it. A lot of communication tactics, and it’s just not easy. And that’s what the crowd does. The crowd makes it not easy for them.”

“So hopefully, we’ll have you know like we always do a sellout. Hopefully we’ll have a loud environment, and I expect it to be a really fun time being the home opener, Nix went on. “And you know I expect it to be loud, and essentially what it is, it’s a playoff game, you know. So I expect it to be that kind of environment, sort of like we had it at the end of the season last year.”

Those Broncos games were loud and thrilling last year, culminating in the overtime victory over the Bills where Nix broke his ankle derailing their hopes in the AFC Championship Game. Nix’s first game back on Monday against the Chiefs was one of the worst games of his career, but he’s not pressing the panic button. He believes the team is in a good spot and didn’t play as bad as many thought.

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