The Broncos say they aren’t panicking, but sound like they are

The Broncos have lost four-straight games. Their 3-0 start in September has turned into a losing record heading into the final game of October. A once-promising season is derailing in Denver, as a 3-4 team is teetering on brink with the Washington Football Team coming to town on Halloween.

How does that make the coaches and players feel? Well if Wednesday’s press conferences are any indication, they’re searching for answers.

“We’ve had a lot of meetings,” Justin Simmons said when asked how the Broncos can right the ship. “I’ve had meetings with Vic (Fangio). I’ve had meetings with Ed (Donatell). I’ve had meetings with ‘Jack’ (Kareem Jackson) and Von (Miller). We’ve just been meeting like crazy.”

Sounds more like a corporate nightmare than a football team. But if the meetings provide a good outcome, then they’re worth the time and effort.

“(We’re) just trying to figure out, what can we do?” the All-Pro safety added. “What are the little differences we need to make? Picking guys brains about some things we need to improve on throughout the week that’ll help better in preparation and execution for game day. Little things like that.”

It sounds like a team going back to the drawing board. It reeks of a team grasping at straws.

“Like I said, at the end of the day, you just got to find ways to make it happen,” Simmons explained. “We’re doing some things and just got to find a way to win.”

It sounds like a desperate team. That can be good. Or it can be bad.

“It’s not time to panic, but it almost is because this thing can go in the wrong direction fast,” Teddy Bridgewater said on Wednesday. “We have a sense of urgency. We go out there with the right mindset. It starts in practice, though. We practice with the right mindset. We make this competitive environment. We can turn this thing around.”

That means getting back to their winning ways, something that feels like a long time ago.

“We’re sitting at 3-4. We’ve played 10 games – three preseason games, seven regular season games. So we’re right at the halfway point and we’re not in a bad position,” the quarterback added. “We’d like to be in a better position but all we can do is control what’s in front of us. We can’t go back and fix what happened in the past.”

That means forging ahead. That means battling through adversity.

“You can’t flinch,” Simmons explained. “There’s no panic. There’s no everyone jumping off the ship or anything like that.”

He reiterated that the time is now, however. The season is slipping away.

“You have to feel the sense of urgency,” the safety added. “We’ve been preaching this the last four weeks now. We have to go out there and just do it at this point.”

That’s been the issue. Saying it is one thing; doing it is another.

“There’s no talking about it,” Simmons continued. “There’s nothing I can say to the media that’s gonna make fans happy about what we’re doing in terms of preparing other than getting a win. And so that’s all we’re focused on.”

Perhaps that galvanizes the team. Maybe it creates a focus that has been lacking since the calendar turned to October.

But it also sounds like a team that will be pressing. It sounds like a group that knows their season is on the line and they aren’t sure how to save it.

The Broncos say they aren’t panicking. But it kind of sounded like they are.

Related

Cecil Lammey has one word to describe Davis Webb’s offenseTrading Peyton Watson signals the downfall of the NuggetsThe Broncos need to treat the preseason like It actually mattersBroncos-Packers: Three players to watchThey were briefly Broncos; now they want back into college footballWhat the Broncos’ addition of Taylor Rapp says about their safety depth