Broncos bank on Massie for consistency
Veteran right tackle signed one-year, $4 million deal with Denver in May
ENGLEWOOD —The Broncos started a dozen different right tackles over the past five seasons, a revolving door on the offensive line that Denver desperately needs to stop.
Enter Bobby Massie, who at 6-foot-6, 325 pounds, is the largest Bronco on the active roster. Massie is in his 10th season after signing a one-year, $4 million deal in May. And according to the coach who watched him morph from a nearhigh school dropout into an NFL mainstay, Massie will bring stability to the right side of Denver’s line.
“You can always count on Bobby Massie,” declared Robert Prunty,
Massie’s coach at Hargrave Military Academy in Virginia. “He’s going to come through. That’s something nobody needs to worry about. I’ve coached over 60 players who have gone on to the NFL, and Bobby Massie is the most reliable player I’ve ever coached.”
Massie attended Liberty Christian Academy in Virginia from his freshman through junior years, but transferred to Hargrave as a senior when his grades went in the tank. There, he played on the school’s post-graduate team against the JV squads of local Division I schools such as Georgia and Tennessee.
“At one point, I never thought I was going to graduate high school,” Massie said. “I ended up graduating high school with a 1.5 (GPA), so I wasn’t very studious. I had to go the prep school route, worked my (butt) off, got to Ole Miss and got drafted by Arizona (in 2012). Now I’ve been in the league 10 years. Once I started really focusing, the momentum kept coming.”
Prunty recalled a determined Massie who “came to Hargrave with the mindset to do hard work all the time.”
“Once he got that structure and got into a different environment, Bobby flourished,” Prunty said. “All of a sudden he’s wearing a military uniform every day. He’s got to go out there (in the afternoons) and march and drill, and he’s up every morning at 5:30. The rigid schedule, the mandatory study hall every night… it was a military environment and he got himself on track.”
Now, Massie’s part of the plan to get the Broncos back on track as general manager George Paton’s serendipitous free agent find for the offensive live. After Ja’wuan James’ off-site ACL injury put the Broncos in scramble mode this offseason, Massie was available because the Bears had declined his contract option.
He and his wife, Angel, had already bought a house in Castle Rock last year, so the fit was natural.
Massie said he feels “fantastic” physically heading into the season opener and is eager to re-establish his durability after missing six games in 2019 (high ankle sprain) and eight games last year (knee) with injuries surgery.
“I’m going to go out and do what I’ve been doing these past couple years of my career: Keeping the quarterback clean, opening the holes for the backs,” Massie said. “We’ve got a good offense with great skill players on it. As long as you don’t hear my name, I’m doing my job.”
Massie competed with thirdyear pro Calvin Anderson for the starting right tackle job throughout training camp and the preseason, with the two splitting reps with the No. 1 offense. Massie started the first and third preseason games, and Anderson the second.
As offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur noted, Massie’s confident presence and ability to set the edge set him apart.
“He’s pretty settled and calm out there so even when he gets edged a little bit, he can find a way to kind of save the down, which is good because it happens when you’re blocking really good players,” Shurmur said. “He’s got a veteran way about him that I appreciate. (For example) we were talking about cadence (this week) just off to the side. That’s what veteran players do.”
Head coach Vic Fangio, whose final three seasons as the Bears’ defensive coordinator (2016-18) overlapped with Massie’s first three in Chicago, said the tackle was a quick study when it came to the Denver playbook.
“He’s a guy that’s played for a lot of different offensive line coaches over the years,” Fangio said. “He’s good at adjusting, but there’s still an adjustment period that he had to go through. I thought he got through that well.”
Massie also has the attention of Giants coach Joe Judge, who believes the Broncos’ offensive success will “start with the run game” in the season opener Sunday at Metlife Stadium.
“Obviously Massie was brought in for a reason,” Judge said. “He’s an accomplished player in this league. He’s playing that spot for a reason… In terms of how they use their offensive line, I think they’re all five talented guys that do a very good job and it’s going to take everything we have this week to go ahead and face up against them.” that didn’t require