BRONCOS’ DEFENSE TIPS OFF OFFENSE
Defensive backs reveal how they can read the stances of the players on the other side of the ball and how they already know their routes. Such strategy helps all.
It’s a cool $70 million contract. But what Demaryius Thomas wants, money cannot buy. He envies the Super Bowl rings of Broncos legend Rod Smith.
“He wants a Super Bowl ring. ... And I kind of rub it on his chest,” Smith said Tuesday.
If the Broncos want to get back to the Super Bowl and win it this time, Smith offered novel advice for an NFL franchise he loves like family.
In the estimation of Smith, the Broncos have all the talent needed to win a championship. But the difference between hoisting the Lombardi Trophy and going home disappointed from the playoffs can often be attributed to the lack of brotherhood in the huddle.
So this is the sermon of Smith, and the Broncos could do worse than have him deliver it on the first Sunday of this NFL season: Denver players need to stop living inside the cellphone and spend more time finding out what really makes the heart of a teammate tick.
“Put the (expletive) phones down and have real conversations with people,” declared the 45-year-old Smith, so fired up he preached for more than an hour with passion hotter than the sun dancing in the gray flecks of his beard.
“Today, with social media, nobody knows who the hell they’re working with. Because he’s on Twitter doing his thing, and you’re on Facebook doing your thing. You all work together, but you have no idea what makes him tick. This is the locker room right now. This is why the locker room is so divided. Everybody worried about ‘likes’ versus worried about what (a teammate) is going through at home. I need to know that, because I’ve got to go to battle with this dude. But they’re all disconnected.”
From linebacker Von Miller to receiver Emmanuel Sanders, the Broncos sent 10 players to the Pro Bowl after the 2014 season. They were also eliminated after one sad game in the playoffs. From the beginning, however, the Broncos were better at fantasy football than on the field, when the going got tough.
“Not winning a championship the last couple years with
the group that we have is disappointing,” Smith said. “The answer is not putting more pieces in. It’s taking the pieces you have and putting them closer together.”
It’s a simply powerful idea: What the Broncos need is not more talent in the locker room. It’s more genuine love for one another.
Yes, when Smith waxes poetically about winning back-toback championships with the Broncos back in his day during the late 1990s, while lamenting these kids in the league today don’t know the meaning of true commitment, there’s an expectation the final exclamation in his rant will be: Get off my lawn!
Despite the growling, what makes Smith a cuddly bear is knowing he was the same curmudgeon while earning his first trip to the Pro Bowl at age 29 that he is now in middle age. To this day, there’s not a soul in Broncos Country who wants to see Denver back on top more than Smith. To help the cause, Smith has served as a mentor to Thomas, first in the refinement of receiving skills and later in the development of the quiet, unassuming D.T. as a leader.
“As long as Peyton Manning’s here, it’s always going to be Peyton Manning’s team,” Smith said.
But here’s my theory: Since the Broncos signed Peyton Manning in 2012, the team has leaned so heavily on his Hall of Fame ability that when former coach John Fox told me for the umpteenth time that Manning raises all boats, I began to wonder who was in charge of this clambake. Not only has Denver relied too much on Manning’s talent to throw touchdown passes, they raised him to such mythical status as a leader that Manning has lost touch with the common grunt in the Broncos locker room.
I’ve listened as too many teammates speak about Manning with hushed reverence, as if Manning were Santa Claus, omnipresent and the final arbiter of who’s naughty or nice. Oh, it is respect the quarterback has earned.
When all the best plans go to pieces as the snap sails over the QB’s head at the Super Bowl, however, there needs to be a strong voice that can rally downtrodden teammates, while Manning sits on the bench and studies the All-22 photographs to analyze how it went wrong.
“They didn’t keep me here just because I’m a good ballplayer, but to be a good leader,” Thomas said.
When Thomas insists his lucrative contract only makes him hungrier, it’s music to the ears of Smith. His hunger is for championships. To get that ring, Thomas must instill the hunger in teammates.
“It pays off, honestly, when you’re down in the fourth quarter and you’ve got a minute and a half left to win the game,” Smith said.
That’s more than leadership. That’s a band of football brothers, sharing the love.