Managing to win
Play-it-safe QB Siemian of Broncos meets another in K.C.’s Smith
Calling a quarterback a “game manager” is like saying Santa Claus is a good eater. It’s a backhanded compliment, equal parts putdown and praise. A game manager is stable, steady and unexceptional.
“I’ve heard ‘game managing’ quite a bit,” Broncos quarterback Trevor Siemian said Wednesday from his locker at Dove Valley. “I don’t really know (what that means). If it means not turning the ball over? It gets thrown around a lot.”
But game managers win. And the Broncos, at 8-6 and in desperation mode, can only hope first-year starter Siemian is up to managing a meager offense to two necessary victories to keep playoff hopes alive.
Football parlance settled on the term “game manager” to describe a quarterback who, with limited ability, wins games by limiting mistakes. They might not light up the stats sheet, but they don’t give games away.
On Sunday, Siemian will line up under center opposite the gold standard of game managers, Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Alex Smith. A No. 1 pick of San Francisco in 2005, Smith went 13-3 with the 49ers in 2011 to reach the NFC championship game, then lost his job the next season to Colin Kaepernick, a quarterback with more verve.
Smith then landed with Kansas City, where he combined to throw 61 touchdown passes to just 20 interceptions in his first three seasons. This season, he is still keeping his interceptions to a low number, with six, but his TDs have dropped to just 12 with two games left. He does not often win a game single-handedly, but he rarely loses them.
“You want to play smart,” Smith said Wednesday. “As frustrating as it is to not move the football, you don’t want a negative play that gives the game away.”
Trevor Siemian is Alex Smith. They each rely on a defense that will nearly always hold scores low. They each avoid mistakes enough to keep their teams alive in the fourth quarter. They each rank near the bottom third among NFL quarterbacks for scoring but among the top 10 for fewest turnovers.
In their first meeting Nov. 27 in Denver, Smith and Siemian slowplayed through three quarters like robots. Both teams punted on their first four drives. Neither offense scored a touchdown in the first half. But in the final 15:30 of regulation, both teams scored two touchdowns.
Siemian threw two touchdown passes in the final eight minutes as the Broncos took an eightpoint lead. Smith countered with a touchdown pass and a twopoint conversion throw to tie the score with 12 seconds remaining. And Kansas City drove just far enough, twice, in overtime for two field goals to win the game.
“We lost the game about three different times,” Denver coach Gary Kubiak said. “That’s the type of team they are. I think they’ve been in 10 or 11 one-score football games this year and have won eight of them. That’s what they do, and that’s why they’re in the position that they are in.”
Against New England on Sunday, the Broncos gave Siemian control of the offense to begin the game, using a hurry-up, nohuddle scheme that relied on the 24-year-old quarterback to make decisions on the fly. It worked to a point. But Denver managed just three points.
The Broncos last season leaned on Peyton Manning as a deft manager of games. After multiple neck surgeries eroded his raw ability and injuries took away six games in the regular season, Kubiak turned him into a chess player.
The Broncos finished 12-4, with Manning returning just in time to lead his team to a Super Bowl title by winning field-position battles.
Siemian and Smith play in a similar way. Siemian has thrown 33 passes this season longer than 20 yards, 12.6 percent of his total passes. Smith has thrown 36 passes longer than 20 yards, 11.8 percent. Each has among the lowest deep-pass percentages in the NFL.
At 10-4, though, Kansas City is two games better than Denver. If that owes to the Chiefs and Smith being better game managers, the difference is slight.
“I think it’s hard enough to play in this league, so just do your best and do what you’re coached to do” Siemian said. “That (game management) hasn’t been the message in our room at all.”