05-06-24 Ryan Michael with Broncos Country Tonight

Episode Transcript

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We're gonna go right out to theka Comsperl hotline though, and bring Ryan

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Michaels on because we're gonna go insidethe numbers, No, inside the numbers
with Ryan Michael. Ryan, howyou doing this evening? Doing well?
Ben? Nick? How are youguys doing pretty well? Gave you the
homework assignment. It's about the fivegreatest rookie seasons in Broncos franchise history.

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And I've seen some previewing on thisstuff, and I'm going to tell you
Nick Nick has posted some of itin his group chat the former players,
and this one, uh, thisone I think is going to get some
some conversation going on Twitter. Sowithout further Ado's jump right into it.
What are the five greatest rookie seasonsin Denver Broncos history? Could be honest
with you, Ben, there wereso many. I couldn't keep it to

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a top five. I had toexpend it to a top seven. And
there's some honorable mentions that I putout on Twitter. But for the sake
of brevity, I'll start off withnumber seven and work my way up to
number one. Number seven, Ihave one of my favorite defensive acts of
all times. Steve Atwater came insecond place for Defensive Review of the Year
honors. Three interceptions, one hundredand twenty nine total tackles. The Broncos

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in eighty nine had the number onescoring defense in the league, won the
AFC Championship at number Did we loseRyn? Sounds like we lost him.
I can hear you, guys.Okay, yeah we lost here. Sell
let's reset that number two, allright? So we got number six Goose
Gonslin and how this is an oldschool A Ring of Famer. Okay,

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nineteen sixty, first year in Broncoshistory. He was a first team All
Pro selection. He hauled in eleveninterceptions, which not only led the AFL
that year, but to this dayremains the Broncos single season franchise record.
At number five, this is oneof my personal favorites. I have Ryan
Klfty in two thousand and eight andhe was a second team All Pro selection,

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didn't make the Pro Bowl, whichsays everything it needs to say about
what I think about the Pro Bowl. Actually came in third place for Offensive
Rookie of the Year honors, whichis not a small feat for a left
tackle. And since you don't havestats, specifically on left tackles. I'm
going to share a quarterback that thatis just as much a credit to Ryan
Clady as it is to Jay Cutler. In two thousand and eight, Jay

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Cutler led the NFL with a onepoint eight percent sack percentage. There have
been eighty two seasons an NFL historywhere a quarterback is thrown six hundred or
more passes. Cutler's one point eightpercent sack percentage is the second highest in
the history of the NFL. OnlyDan Marino in nineteen eighty eight was thatack
one percent of the time was better. Number four I have Terrell Davis nineteen

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ninety five. He put up onethy four hundred and eighty four total yard,
eight touchdowns, average four point sevenyards per carry, which is tied
for the second best mark of hisHall of Fame career with nineteen ninety seven.
Only ninety eight did the average moreyards per carry, and he came
in second place for Offensive Rookie ofthe Year. Now, this might be
a little bit controversial having Mike Andersonover Torell Davis, but Mike Anderson in

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two thousand did win Offensive Rookie ofthe Year honors. He put up one
thousand, six hundred and fifty sixtotal yards from scrimmage, fifteen total touchdowns,
and averaged five yards per carry.Number two I have Von Miller came
in top ten in sacks. Hehad eleven and a half and he actually
missed a game, so he couldhave been even higher. Twenty nine quarterback
hit, sixty four tackles, twoforced fumbles, and four passes defended.

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He was a second team All Proselection, and he was named Defensive Rookie
of the Year and at number one, and this one wasn't too much of
a struggle. I have Clinton Portisin two thousand and two, he put
up one thousand, eight hundred seventytwo total yards from scrimmage, seventeen total
touchdowns. He played in all sixteengames, but he only started twelve of

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those games. So shout out andthank you to Clinton for retweeting that before
I hopped on. That's my numberone pick for the greatest rookie season in
Broncos franchise history. Wow, that'sa bunch of great rookies. But the
one thing that jumps out to mein this seven players sample size, there's
a majority of offensive players on theboard and a lot of them playing for

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Mike Shanahan. So what does thatsay about Mike Shanahan and his creativity Because
there's three running backs on this list. I mean, what Mike Shanahan was
able to do in the ground gameduring his tenure in the NFL maybe second
to night because it wasn't just TorellDavis in his Hall of Fame career,
but you had Alandi Scarry in nineteenninety nine stepping in rushing for over eleven

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hundred yards. You had Mike Anderson, as we just mentioned, offensive work
of the Year, and two yearslater you're plugging Clinton Portis and he's the
offensive rookie of the year when hemoved over to Washington. Alfred Morrison his
first year rushed for over fourteen hundredyards alone. So if there's a term
running back whisperer, maybe Mike Shanahanwould be that in addition to being a

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quarterback whisperer. Yeah. I meana lot of people I think you would
would agree with you that you know, and often running backs have been called
plug and play in the Shanahan system, but there were there were special The
thing that was probably most impressive tome was what Mike Anderson did. And
I understand, you know Clinton andall that kind of stuff. I you
know that, but Mike Anderson wasa guy who'd been a Marine for four

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years. Uh, you know,into college, comes out, Uh.
You know, he gets in withthe uh with the with the Denver Broncos
as a six round draft pick,and then you see him in his rookie
season, which he only started.I believe it was twelve games a year.
I'd have to go back and doublecheck. Uh, but he had
more yardage than than any running backhad in the NFL last year. I
mean, Christian McCaffrey had had,you know, fourteen hundred yards. He

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was he was above that. ChristianMcCaffrey had fourteen touchdowns last year. You
know, Anderston had what fifteen isa rookie year, which would have been
tied for uh for a second intouchdowns last year, which by the way,
would have been tied. Two ofthose guys were quarterbacks. I mean
Josh Allen, Jalen Hurts, youknow, sneaking him in goal line stuff
or he moster would thank the onlyguy that that'sur passed that another guy who's
in that system. I which ofthese jumps out at you as as I

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mean, I get that we willranking them as a rookie, but what
was the most impressive feat to you? Whether or not it was Clinton Portis
there at number one or not,what was the most impressive thing about these
rookie seasons? I would say,arguably the most impressive may have been Ryan
Clady in two thousand and eight,because for Cutler to have the second best
sack percentage in the history of theNFL, and I posted to Twitter the

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top eight sack percentage seasons of alltime with six hundred and one passes.
So it's a big sample size,right, So all the other names in
the list are all either first ballotHall of Fame quarterbacks or future first ballot
Hall of Fame quarterback. You haveMarino one, Cutler two, Breeze three,
Roethlisberger four, Peyton Manning five,Breeze again at six, Peyton again
at seven, also tied with Marinoagain, So there's a tie for seventh

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place. For Ryan Clady to stepin as a rookie protecting the blindside for
a quarterback who only had two othertop ten finishes in sack percentage in his
career, it's one of the mostastonishing statistics in Broncos franchise history. Fascinating
stuff. We talk a lot aboutthe running backs in the Shannian system.
The Shannan system is not we runhere anymore. But Denver does have a
great lineage of running backs. Theydrafted one in this past draft in order

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guest Man and more Dame, whatkind of rookie season could we maybe see
out of the rookie You know,I don't know if Audric is going to
be quite at the level of aClinton Portis, or a Mike Anderson,
or even necessarily an Orlando Sciary.But what I would say to his I
like the comp that you gave uslast week for Mary and Barbara, both
of them standing five to eleven.Barbara was to eighteen estimates two twenty one.

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I like him as a first andsecond down back. I like him
as a red zone thread. Youknow, he's a smart football player,
great pre staff vision, downfield power. He's slow off the snap, so
it takes him a little while toget going in the red zone. For
a Broncos team that only scored fiverushing touchdowns amongst running backs last year in
seventeen games, Audri estime in hisfinal year of college football, produced eleven

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rushing touchdowns in his final five games. I'd like to see what we can
do plugging him into some red zonesituations, giving bo Nicks a little bit
of ring to brief. All right, let's take a look in the famous
crystal ball and look ahead, notbackwards, and let's see if we can
project maybe what bow Nick's step linemight be after this season campaign. So

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tell me, have you dug intothose stats, snaps and those stats and
tell us what do you think thosenumbers could actually be. Nick, I'm
gonna channel your optimism here and youknow we're going to hope for the best.
You know, the offensive genius labelhas followed him for a very long
time, and obviously, as we'vetalked about in recent months, he's had

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a lot of struggles without your recentquarterback. So this is the ultimate opportunity
for Sean Payton to show exactly whohe is as a play caller. So,
looking at the number of passing attemptswe've seen out of Sean Payton offenses
in recent years, say Bonnicks throwsfive hundred and fifty passes and he's able
to start all seventeen games, Ihave him completing three fifty two, which

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would be sixty four percent for fouryfifteen passing yards, So he'd be averaging
seven point three yards per attempt,twenty five touchdowns to thirteen picks, a
ninety one point one passer rating.I think somewhere in that ballpark would be
a very optimistic stat line, providedhe's able to start all seventeen games,
and provided Sean Payton is able tochannel that offensive genius that we all know

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that he has in him. SoI'm looking forward to see what both can
do in the system. Wow,that's amazing. Now I want to go
back for just a second. Now, Yeah, you mentioned von milone your
list, So I want to goback and revisit the twenty eleven draft because

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I'll give you the top four picksand then I'll get to my question.
Cam went off the board first,then I believe it was Vaughn, Marcel
Darius and AJ Green. Now withthe Broncos facing off against Cam new then
the Panthers and Super Bowl fifty.Now when we look at it, I
mean Cam's no longer playing, Vaughnis still playing. Per say all about

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the better of the pick. Wasit the Panthers? What was the Broncos?
You know, as tempted as Iam to very quickly just say von
Miller, and as if it's obvious, I do want to give Cam Newton
a little bit of credit. AndI just recently, as a matter of
fact, wrote a piece for thePro Football Hall of fam that's going to
be coming out shortly about how dominanthe was in twenty fifteen. So Cam

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Newton at the peak of his powerwas as good as Von Miller was at
the peak of his power. Forme, it's really a master of how
did they play throughout the totality oftheir careers. VN is an eight time
Pro Bowl selection of three time FirstTeam All Pro. Cam made it to
three Pro Bowls and had that onefirst Team All Pro MVP season in twenty
fifteen. So Von Miller unquestionably abetter football player at his position than Cam

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was at his But the quarterback positiondoes provide a lot more value. It's
an impact the results of games.Given the reality that we picked up Peyton
Manning in twenty twelve, which certainlywould not have been the case if Cam
Newton hypothetically had fallen to number two. And we took him. I'm very
happy with the fact that we tookvon Miller, and I think that if
there was any doubt about who wasthe better choice between the two, Super

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Bowl fifty is the evidence that providesthe answer to that question. Talking with
Ryan Michael at the Ryan Michael onTwitter, Sorry I had to coughing fit
there for a minute there. Ithink as we talk about rookie performances,
all eyes here in Broncos Country areobviously all the number twelve pick. Bo
Dick's drafted like quarterback out of Oregon. You know, he obviously he's got

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to beat out Zach Wilson Jarret Stidham, which I you know, I'm not
gonna say it's a foregone conclusion,but certainly would be disappointing if he did
not. What can we expect outof the rookie in his debut season,
you know, I think for boneNicks, the most important thing is going
to be him the learning Sean Payton'ssystem, and it's going to be a
tremendous challenge for the team to providehim with the supports in terms of pass

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protection, in terms of the runninggame, and certainly in terms of defensive
performance. I'm excited to see whatour defense can do on the opposite side
of the ball, because if we'regoing to be in the bottom quarter of
scoring defenses this year, you're goingto force bone Nicks into a situation where
he's going to throw a lot ofpicks. Rookies throw picks. Ask Peydon
Man and he'll tell you. Andso I think bone Knicks will have an

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opportunity to be, as I saidlast week, a poor man's Drew Brees,
provided he's given the supports that heneeds to succeed. I'm also confident
that he'll get the starting nod forWeek one, and we hope that he
stays healthy and is able to playthrough all seventeen games. For me,
you look at the rookie season asthe ultimate learning opportunity. Worked for Paydon

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Man and worked for Dan Marino,and you saw how much better those two
quarterbacks were in their second year.So I'm optimistic in terms of what we'll
see from Bow, but I'm notexpecting a Robert Griffin the third CD Stroud
type of rookie season. I don'tthink we have the team in place to
be able to support such a year, right Ryan, does that change because
you mentioned support having a support system, and I'm really big on quarterbacks more

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importantly having a support system. Butwith Troy Franklin, who is a rookie
and we're talking about, you know, being on your list of top rookie
performers, could this now benefit bothTroy Franklin, which now benefits bon Knicks
and put him higher on this listbased on his overall performance. I think
it has the potential because the chemistrythat they had at Oregon was arguably second

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to nine in all of college football, and there's definitely going to be an
opening for that wide receiver two spotwith the Broncos this year. So,
you know, Franklin was a guywho ranked third in the nation and touchdown
deceptions last year fourteen. Some ofthem were pretty deep, which is not
so bad for a guy who's claimedto be the king of the screen game.
In bon Nicks. The two ofthem have proven they can stretch the
field. So if we get somethingeven comparable to what Eddie Royle did in

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two thousand and eight with Jay Cutler, I think that will be a good
foundation of the future moving forward.Ryan, we appreciate it as always the
Ryan Michael on Twitter. What doyou what are you cooking up for us?
Next time? You know, you'vegot to give me an assignment.
I've been so caught up with theNBA playoffs, to be honest with you,
haven't given it a lot of thoughts. So we'll see what we can
do later this evening. But ifyou have any ideas, yeah, we'll

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work on it. Areas of emphasisin which the Broncos maybe you weren't as
productive this past season with with SeanPayton, that they can improve on in
year two. I like that.Let's do it. Let's do it.
Absolutely, ran Michael that the BryanMichael on Twitter looking forward to it.
Always great going inside the numbers withhim.