05-23-24 Chris Tomasson with Broncos Country Tonight

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Well, I mean, couldn't youjust kind of elaborate when you saw on
Zach versus what you've seen on thefilm all easier? Yeah, good question.
I like his experience. You couldtell he's played, and I feel
like he's got very live arm strengthand he's picking up the offense pretty quickly.
Welcome to it, Broncos Country tonight. But with all Brian Dick Ferguson,

(00:21):
Grant Smith was right man, ChrisThomason, they get the good question
from Sean Payton. You know,we keep the scoreboard here in the studio
because I constantly am fishing for thegood question from the coach. But Chris,
Chris got it today down there atthe press conference. Chris Thompson from
the Gazette joining us now, oneof my favorites out there. Chris,
how you doing? See me?Hey? Doing well? Yeah, it
was great to get a quote goodquestion. Sometimes Peyton says a fair question.

(00:46):
He never said in a bad question. But if he gives you a
three word answer, he probably wasa bad question. So thanks for having
me on, guys. Definitely,Yeah, and we're out of practice.
It's OTA's today. Obviously we're notin full pads. It's early, but
you know how everybody wants to scorecard, the report card, how are the
quarterbacks doing all that stuff? Inmy observation today, it's it's day one,

(01:07):
so I don't want to get overreactiveto anything, but it felt like
that, you know, bo Nickswas was hit or busy through a few
that were behind guys, but overallwasn't bad. It was a, you
know, a day one type performance. Zach Wilson has moments where you're like,
this is a train wreck and momentswhere you're like, wow, look
at that. And Jared Stidham,who I have affectionately named Jared Stidwater,
reminded me of the the you know, kind of steady veteran who just kind
of knows the offense, knows whathe's doing and doesn't rock the boat.

(01:30):
Would you disagree with any of thator agree with it or what did you
think? Yeah? I wouldn't necessarilydisagree with any of that. I think
set him. They kind of knowwhat he can do. I mean,
I don't think he's gonna dramatically allof a sudden improve over the last time
we saw him against the Chargers andthe Raiders, So he's kind of the
steady guy that you know what hecan do, and but they're certainly hoping

(01:55):
that they can find somebody who's better. And you know, Nick has looked
decent with his accuracy, and yeah, I agree with you on Zack Wilson,
he'll throw a up. You know, he's kind of erratic. But
he talked today about what a lotof people have said that he thinks,
under the tutelage of Sean Payton thathe can blossom with this fresh start.

(02:21):
So we'll definitely see if that happens. And you can tell Sean Payton is
very intrigued about Zach Wilson because he'sthe I mean, they studied bow Nick's
thoroughly. I think he's got agood handle on him. But Zack Wilson
is kind of a little bit ofa mystery to Sean Payton. He's probably
saying to himself, the guy can'tgo from number two in the draft to

(02:44):
being as bad as he was withthe Jets. Just let me get my
hands on him now. Chris todayalso Stidham spoke, but he said,
look, I'm not willing to allowsomeone to come in here just be paaraphrasing
for him and take position from me, So he's willing to compete. Do
you see a situation where it's goingto be provided that all three quarterbacks have

(03:07):
an equal stake in competing for thestarting spot. Well, that's been the
case so far this week. Steadham, being the incumbent, got the first
team reps on Tuesday, Zach Wilsongot him on Wednesday, bon Nicks got
him today. Sean Payton said thatwill continue for a while, but obviously

(03:30):
that could change, and of courseonly one you know, well, I
see what things look like at themandatory mini camp, which is open for
three days. But I guess technicallythe media is only allowed there one day
a week during ogas. So ifanything changes and Nick starts, for instance,
running more often with the first team, you know, we might not

(03:51):
know immediately because we'll just assume,oh, it must be Knicks's day.
This today, let's going to talkwith Chris Thomason from the Gazette. The
second most common question I get askedafter anything about the quarterbacks is what's going
on with Courtland Sutton? And Suttonobviously sitting out and hoping for a reupp
to deal. Sutton was very productivelast year with Russell Wilson, especially in

(04:13):
terms of touchdowns. But at theend of the day, with only two
million dollars left on his deal,I don't feel like he has exactly a
ton of leverage. You look aroundat what the Broncos did in the room
this year that getting Tim Patrick back, they added Josh Reynolds, You've got
little Jordan Humphrey, Brandon Johnson,you drafted Vallet. It just doesn't feel
like that Courtland Sutton has a lotof leverage in these in this potential negotiation,

(04:34):
even if I agree that he probablydoes need to be spiffed on his
deal, Yeah, I agree withyou there. I think the way Courtland
Sutton would get leverage would be toshow up here and wow people in practice
and then prove that he's a thirteenmillion dollar receiver, which if he can't

(04:58):
stayed on EI fifteen contracts and theBroncos didn't do anything with them, he'd
make thirteen million this year. Butas it stands now, the way he's
stay, you know, not beinghere, if other receivers kind of step
up, and there might come atime where the Broncos say, hey,
he's not a thirteen million dollar receiver. We're not going to give them money
once and who knows if not tradethem, even release them. I mean,

(05:23):
I think it's a long shot theywould release them. But the bottom
line is the two million that he'sguaranteed. If you released him, that
amount would be offset because he's certainlygoing to sign with somebody else for more
than two million, So they wouldget that two million back, So it
will cost them nothing essentially to releasethem. I don't think it'll come to
that, but hopefully Sudden will realizethat he needs to just get in here

(05:46):
and prove once again that he's thebest receiver on the team this season.
Replaced in Justin Simmons. How isit that the Broncos do that? Known
as though they have a room fullof young and maybe the most experience in
the room is five years, Sohow do they get that accomplished? Well,
you know, Brandon Jones was talkingto some folks after he signed.

(06:11):
I was talking to Lewis Oliver,who's a former Pro Bowl safety with the
Miami Dolphins and follows him close outthere, and I was like, well,
Brandon Jones is so good, hopinghe wasn't a regular starting safety,
to which Oliver said, you know, yeah, that's kind of a mystery.
He should have been. So Ithink Jones could be a guy who

(06:31):
was ascending. So I think he'sdefinitely one of the starters, and I
think PJ. Locke and Cayden Stern'sbattle for the other spot. I mean,
Locke obviously closed last year pretty well, but keep mind Sterns was listed
at even with Kareem Jackson on thedepth charts before last season, and then

(06:53):
of course he got hurt and wasout for the season in Week one.
Oh yeah, with Chris Thomason,I thought, you know, Joshua and
especially Lucas Kroll had decent days today. You've got to figure that Kroll has
has got to be a heavy factorin their plans. I know they've talked
Aboutdulsage and if he can be healthy, but he's still not. He's still
out there. We saw what Troutmanis and what he isn't last year,

(07:14):
and the rest of the guys theyhad just really don't inspire. Nate Atkins
is a serviceable h back, butwe don't know anything about doing Leonard and
Thomas y Asman. Kroll looked likehe could be something six six sixty runs
a four to six forty. Whatdo you think of his chances this year?
You know, Sean Payton loves him, and he was extolling his virtues
last season when he had never caughta single pass ever in an NFL game.

(07:38):
I mean they even threw to himif you remember at the end of
that Texans game on the last playthat was intercepted. But I'm now reading
from the quote sheets and Sean Paytonis even more in love with Lucas Kroll.
He said today, if you didn'tnotice, every one in the media
was looking down at the rosters tosee who number eighty five was. I

(07:59):
said, somedays they're going to knowwho eighty five is. He's looking sharp,
so you know that might You know, with Greg Golchick's all of his
injury problems and what have you,a lot of people were saying, well,
why didn't they draft the tight end? But you know, certainly one
reason why they didn't is Peyton's lovefor Lucas Kroll. So when we look

(08:20):
at the the Broncos moving forward,they have a lot of depth at a
lot of positions. So this summeris going to be real key for certain
guys. One guy who I feelis going to be key for is Tim
Patrick, who recently changed his numbersfrom what did you see today about Tim
that gives you any type of ideathat hey, listen, Tim can come

(08:43):
back stronger than ever the season.Yeah, he looked you know, solid
today. I mean he looked likehe was looking a year ago when everybody
thought he was going to bounce backand have a nice season after missing one
year due to injury. Now it'stwo. But his injury now is pretty
far behind him because if he wasn'ton injury reserve last year in forrest to
miss the entire season, they wouldn'thave been out of the question that maybe

(09:07):
he could have returned at the endof the season because he was out on
a side field late last season,you know, doing some work running around.
So he seems to be well passedhis injury, his achilles tear there.
So yeah, I think he's anotherguy that's putting the pressure on Courtland
Sutton. I mean, if JoshReynolds looks good, Tim Patrick looks good,

(09:31):
if these rookies are okay, TroyFranklin, Devon Velly, you know,
who knows, maybe they'll say,you know, do we really need
to spend thirteen million on Courtland Suttontalking with Chris Thomason from The Gazette,
Chris, you know, one ofthe things that I don't if it bothered
me necessarily, but it's one ofthe things that made me raise my eyebrow

(09:52):
is the way that they sort ofdidn't address the offensive line in this offseason.
You know, we saw Russell Wilsontake a lot of sack last year,
and I guess the question is isdo the Broncos feel like that's on
Russ because they really didn't do muchfor this offensive line. Well, Kushberry
left the free agency, and it'ssort of a Wattenberg or Forsyth or must
have for next man up. Thestarters, the rest of the starters are

(10:13):
all the same last year, fromleft to right, Bulls, Powers,
Might's McGlinchey. They did add MattPert as a backup. They did draft
Nick gr Julio, which you knowthat glorious mullet mustache Combo's fantastic. But
at the end of the day,it doesn't feel like they did much to
address the offensive line. Is thatbecause they feel like that the sacks were
on Russ last year? Yeah,I think they a do feel that way

(10:35):
that a lot of the sacks couldhave been avoided and b as you know
that went out And the first twobig name free agents they signed in March
of twenty twenty three were offensive linemanBen Powers and Mike mcglinchy. Those are
Sean Payton guys, and he's,you know, maybe he's going to go

(10:56):
down with the ship with those guysif they don't work out. So I
think having those guys and also QuinnMineharns something to have a wall caliber season
even though he didn't make the ProBowl. And you know, Garrett Bowles,
I think it's the case of,you know, where they're going to
find somebody better unless they you know, doled out twenty million, which is

(11:18):
money they didn't have this year.And then I think at center they lost
Lloyd Gushenberry. But center is kindof a position where you can, you
know, just find guys, youknow, maybe guys who were laid around
draft choices, free agent pickups.And they think they at least got three
guys who will battle for the jobin Luke Wattenberg's Zam must Defer and Alex

(11:43):
Forsyth Chris I know it's kind ofearly in the process where the Broncos having
their first OTAs and the team gettingtogether. Is there a certain position,
not quarterback, that you feel thatnot just only there's going to be a
major competition, is something of aproblematic position for the Denver Broncos. Yeah.

(12:05):
I think the running back battle isgoing to be fascinating. They got
Audric that's to me, in thefifth round. A lot of people thought
he would go before that, andthen they got you know, a nice
back out of Memphis in the secondround, and you know, undrafted guy
Watson out of Memphis. So Ithink those guys are going to push definitely

(12:30):
for roster spots, and there's onlyso many spots. And if you look
at Julia McLoughlin, figure, youknow, he's on a rookie contract,
he's cheap, and he's probably goingto stick around. Then you look at
Javonte Williams and some a GP Ryanwho have no guaranteed money left in their
deals, and one, if notboth, could be in jeopardy. Chris,

(12:52):
what's the sleeper story? What's what'sthat Broncos player that nobody's paying attention
to? That By training camp,the fans are going to know the name.
Well, oh, here's one guyfraud as levelle Bailey, who's undrafted
linebacker at a Fresno State and Idid a story in him a couple of
weeks ago. You might recall GeorgePayton at the owners meeting said well,

(13:16):
we got to get more athletic atlinebacker. Well, they didn't draft a
linebacker. And then Bailey was tellingme that Sean Payton called him not once,
but twice during the seventh round begginghim to sign with the Broncos as
an undrafted CREA agent, which hedid. So that's kind of out of

(13:39):
the ordinary. Is the head coachcalling twice and then now Drew Sanders,
a linebacker has gone down, Soyou know he might be a guy.
I'm not predicting he's going to startor anything, but certainly guy who could
make the fifty three man roster.Chris Thomason reporting that Levell Bailey's going to
be an all Pro this year.We got you. We got you down
for that. When I appreciate yourtime tonight, Chris. We got a

(14:03):
junior. Yeah, made all decadeand as undrafted and all will be all
decade. Chris is gonna be writingthis Hall of Fame speech. It's alright,
it's already started right now, souh no, Chris, Hey,
we really appreciate the time. Nowwe gotta roll. We got up against
the break. But you guys canfollow Chris on Twitter at Chris Thomas and
of course at the at the Gazette. Man, we appreciate your time this
evening. Thanks for absolutely sir.Take care. Chris thomasin from the Gazette