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Denver Broncos' defense has chance to be legendary By Mark Kiszla Denver Post October 22, 2015 Broncos linebacker Brandon Marshall can name the tune of the Denver defense in two notes. To describe the attitude on every snap, no matter the score or the situation, all Marshall needs is two tiny syllables. "Nuh-uh," Marshall declared Sunday, as his eyes scanned the locker room for defensive teammates who stole the Browns' dreams of a victory and ripped out the heart out of Cleveland. Throughout the history of Denver sports, we have been blessed with other immovable, rock-solid defensive forces. The first chapter of pro football glory in Colorado was written by the Orange Crush. In basketball, the image of that not-in-my-house, wagging finger of Nuggets defender Dikembe Mutombo will never fade. And the steely blue eyes of goalie Patrick Roy stood behind two Stanley Cup championships by the Avalanche. Nuh-uh means no way, no how, not here. "That's the attitude we have. Every play. Every down," said Marshall, who leads the Broncos with 48 tackles. Nuh-uh is more than the flair in a sack dance by Denver linebacker Von Miller. Nuh-uh is faster and stronger than every stride Aqib Talib takes, stomping out the fighting spirit in a stadium, as the Denver cornerback returns an interception for a touchdown on the road. This is a mind-set. But I will allow somebody who lives that mind-set to explain what makes the Broncos so intimidating on defense. "That's the grit and it's the resolve of this defense. I love these guys, man. And I love going to war with them," Marshall said, "because when it looks all lost, we find a way." Through six victories on an unblemished record, the Denver defense has surrendered 17 points per game, which ranks fourth- best in the NFL. The stingy average of 281 yards per game allowed by the Broncos stands second only to the New York Jets. No defense in the league has more than the 17 takeaways produced by coordinator Wade Phillips' unit. Hey, we all realize it requires more than six games to make a legendary defense. In fact, as Denver cornerback Chris Harris has stressed, even a long list of pretty defensive statistics won't add up to legendary status unless the Broncos win the Super Bowl. For the most part, it's true that Denver has preyed on the weak. The constant defensive pressure has caused opposing quarterbacks to crack, whether we're talking a young talent such as Oakland's Derek Carr of an unspectacular journeyman in the mold of Cleveland's Josh McCown. What awaits Denver after the bye week are real tests of defensive greatness: Aaron Rodgers of Green Bay, Andrew Luck of Indianapolis, Tom Brady of New England and Philip Rivers of San Diego.

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Page 1: Denver Broncos' defense has chance to be legendarymedia.denverbroncos.com/images/9008/Daily Clippings/151023.pdf · Denver Broncos' defense has chance to ... Broncos linebacker Brandon

Denver Broncos' defense has chance to be legendary By Mark Kiszla Denver Post October 22, 2015 Broncos linebacker Brandon Marshall can name the tune of the Denver defense in two notes. To describe the attitude on every snap, no matter the score or the situation, all Marshall needs is two tiny syllables. "Nuh-uh," Marshall declared Sunday, as his eyes scanned the locker room for defensive teammates who stole the Browns' dreams of a victory and ripped out the heart out of Cleveland. Throughout the history of Denver sports, we have been blessed with other immovable, rock-solid defensive forces. The first chapter of pro football glory in Colorado was written by the Orange Crush. In basketball, the image of that not-in-my-house, wagging finger of Nuggets defender Dikembe Mutombo will never fade. And the steely blue eyes of goalie Patrick Roy stood behind two Stanley Cup championships by the Avalanche. Nuh-uh means no way, no how, not here. "That's the attitude we have. Every play. Every down," said Marshall, who leads the Broncos with 48 tackles. Nuh-uh is more than the flair in a sack dance by Denver linebacker Von Miller. Nuh-uh is faster and stronger than every stride Aqib Talib takes, stomping out the fighting spirit in a stadium, as the Denver cornerback returns an interception for a touchdown on the road. This is a mind-set. But I will allow somebody who lives that mind-set to explain what makes the Broncos so intimidating on defense. "That's the grit and it's the resolve of this defense. I love these guys, man. And I love going to war with them," Marshall said, "because when it looks all lost, we find a way." Through six victories on an unblemished record, the Denver defense has surrendered 17 points per game, which ranks fourth- best in the NFL. The stingy average of 281 yards per game allowed by the Broncos stands second only to the New York Jets. No defense in the league has more than the 17 takeaways produced by coordinator Wade Phillips' unit. Hey, we all realize it requires more than six games to make a legendary defense. In fact, as Denver cornerback Chris Harris has stressed, even a long list of pretty defensive statistics won't add up to legendary status unless the Broncos win the Super Bowl. For the most part, it's true that Denver has preyed on the weak. The constant defensive pressure has caused opposing quarterbacks to crack, whether we're talking a young talent such as Oakland's Derek Carr of an unspectacular journeyman in the mold of Cleveland's Josh McCown. What awaits Denver after the bye week are real tests of defensive greatness: Aaron Rodgers of Green Bay, Andrew Luck of Indianapolis, Tom Brady of New England and Philip Rivers of San Diego.

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"We're trying to be the bully," Harris said. Brady might be the best quarterback of this NFL generation. Brady owns four Super Bowl rings, and there's no way to take those championships away from him. But even with Brady, the Broncos' defense will have the same mind-set when the Patriots visit Sports Authority Field at Mile High for a game in late November. Nuh-uh. With the Broncos making a habit of not finding a way to win until the last moment, it's tough on the blood pressure of fans. Even emerging defensive star Shaquil Barrett admits his heart rate spikes when the outcome is in doubt late in the fourth quarter or into overtime. Nuh-uh means there's nothing to worry about. Chill. It's all going to be OK. Why? In the salary cap era of the NFL, when roster churn is an annual event and true team chemistry is hard to build much less maintain, the Denver defense has it. "You have to stay calm. ... It's bend, don't break. And when it's time to make a play, we always step up to make a play," Marshall said. "We have the best defense. This is the best defense I've ever been around in my life. Our players are so headstrong. And we're the brothers, man. We're all brothers." Keep calm and carry on. Even when it looks dark, this defense finds the light. If you listen to Marshall, what makes the Broncos so good on defense? It's the brotherhood.

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Broncos Mailbag: Is it time to scrap the new offense? By Troy Renck Denver Post October 22, 2015 Troy, I'm sure you've noticed that some of the Broncos defensive linemen have a disturbing habit of hanging a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on the team right when they've stopped the opposing team on a third-and-long situation. How does the Broncos coaching staff handle that nonsense? Is it even possible to coach that type of knuckle-headery out of a player? — Chip Whitson, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho When the Broncos switched to an aggressive 3-4 defense, some penalties were always going to be the price of doing business. A finesse tag hung on this team the last few seasons. It wasn't considered a compliment. This defense brings toughness, intimidates opponents. That said, some penalties are worse than others. There are penalties of effort and aggression and there are stupid penalties. The coaches have talked to the players about the difference repeatedly. As Von Miller told me on Tuesday, the biggest thing the Broncos defense must fix is "penalties, mainly penalties and then penalties." The coaches don't want to take the wag out the defense's tail, but they desire a smart team. Malik Jackson tossing the ball at Oakland's Michael Crabtree and Derek Wolfe shoving Cleveland's Josh McCown to the ground late in front of the referee were foolish fouls. Those must be eliminated. Eventually, they will cost the Broncos a game. It is possible to be smart and fierce. The Broncos will find that balance. Has Cleveland's coach said why he decided to go for two following the Browns' touchdown late in the game? — William Burns, Lakewood The thinking was go up by six, believing Denver couldn't score a touchdown if down 22-16. It wasn't the worst decision since the Broncos had gone 25 straight possessions — the longest streak in the NFL at that point — without scoring an offensive touchdown. It backfired when Peyton Manning connected with Emmanuel Sanders on the long touchdown. I thought the Browns chased points too early in this instance. But the decision was based on Denver's struggling offense. Why don't Broncos receivers go past the first-down line on third downs? I saw this at least three times during the first half. I saw it a lot last year. — Lawrence Kirsch, Aurora Some routes are designed for the receiver to catch in front of the marker and make a play after the catch. Other times, it's an oversight and the receiver cuts the route off too soon. It can be frustrating to watch, but it's not always intentional.

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With Brandon McManus and Matt Prater before him, it seems the Broncos have done a great job in developing kickers. Obviously the high altitude helps with the distance but not the accuracy. Any explanations? Do they have an excellent kicking coach? Are they great at kicking evaluation or are they simply fortunate? — Steve Green, Culver, Oregon The special teams coach has changed, so there's no common thread. The altitude helps, without question, whether it's hitting a baseball or booting a field goal. I would say it's more about identifying talent than developing it. The Broncos had their eye on McManus long before they traded for him. McManus struggled last year, but made a mechanical adjustment, going to a two-step approach. It didn't compromise his leg strength while making him more accurate. Troy, the Broncos are the worst 6-0 team remaining. Without Wade Phillips, the team could easily be 0-6. Is Peyton allowed to call his own plays? Is Peyton allowed to change the play call? Is age catching up to Peyton quicker than we thought it would? If this team had Adam Gase running the offense and Wade Phillips running the defense, this team might be unbeatable! Thoughts? — Brad Byers, Las Vegas The hypothetical scenario is fascinating, but a fantasy. The 2013 Broncos' offense isn't walking out of the locker room. And I would say that if the Broncos had their 2013 offense, their defense would be weakened. That Broncos offense excelled at short drives, rarely staying on the field even five minutes. It left Denver's defense on the field too much, exposing a rather vanilla scheme to big plays. Manning gives his feedback in the offense. Coach Gary Kubiak remains committed to putting Manning in the best position. Manning hasn't played well, committing too many turnovers. He continues to audible in this offense, and not just to pass plays. Going back to the old offense won't solve all the issues. That offense had Pro Bowl tight end Julius Thomas, and in 2013, a productive Wes Welker. The personnel is different. I realize how frustrating this offense can be to watch — my email is a testament to the anger — but the Broncos aren't going to reinvent themselves at this point in the season. Troy, when will Gary Kubiak be held accountable for the Broncos' offensive woes? It seems when he was hired that he promised to build his offensive philosophy around Peyton's strengths. Do you believe he has done that? It doesn't seem so. Why has John Elway been so quiet about this? — Bill F., Loveland Kubiak holds himself accountable for the offensive woes. He hasn't hidden from the lack of success or made excuses. He has bent to try and make Manning comfortable, while still keeping a semblance of a running game. The Broncos proved the last few years that they can't win a Super Bowl with the best offense in football. They wanted a more balanced attack which would allow them to run when they wanted to, not when they had to. We've only recently seen glimpses of that as the Broncos ran well at Cleveland, though the Browns' allowed 5.0 yards per carry entering the game. As for Elway, he doesn't provide weekly assessments of the team. He said in training camp that the offense would be a work in progress, recognizing that Manning is used to carrying a team by itself. Denver no longer needs that.

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The Broncos need Manning to get them in the right plays, protect the ball, and deliver the clutch drive when necessary. Can and should Denver trade for Steve Smith? Like now, during their bye week. — Tom, Simi Valley, California If the Broncos were to make a move, tight end is a more pressing need than receiver. Smith is a great player, but the Broncos are having trouble involving a third receiver at this point. They need more production from the tight end. Couldn't hurt to call St. Louis about Jared Cook or San Francisco about Vernon Davis, right? Problem is those teams can make an argument they are still in contention. In absence of a move, the Broncos need to figure out a way to get Owen Daniels and Virgil Green more targets. How cruel is it that Manning has been been paired with the best defense of his career just as his body seems to be failing him? — James Kane, Bonnie, Scotland It is a wicked irony. But this is typically the case. Rarely do teams have the best offense and top defense. At 39, Manning remains challenged. He is fighting against time. But can he become comfortable to be efficient in this offense? His teammates and coaches believe in him. They don't need Manning to carry the load anymore. Just do his part. Am I the only one seeing similarities between this year and the 2009 season? Broncos had the best defense since Orange Crush then and went 6-0 in 2009. No one cared about a mediocre offense led by pedestrian quarterback and the team ended 8-8. I am seeing deja vu. All the issues with running game, no yards after catch on short routes starts and ends with Peyton Manning. — Vijay, Alpharetta, Georgia I see no similarities because Josh McDaniels ran the team with paranoia and immaturity. He was overmatched, leaving a single pull of a loose thread unraveling the sweater. Kubiak provides a calming presence while issuing strong evaluations. The Broncos will lose some of their remaining games. But given the strength of their defense, they can be a 12 to 13-win team with a mediocre offense. And remember of their six wins, four have come on the road. Everyone says they haven't beaten anyone. That's fair. But it also applies to the other undefeated teams. The Broncos and Patriots are the only perfect teams who own a win against an opponent with a winning record. Denver beat Minnesota, and the Patriots topped Pittsburgh. So all the undefeated teams have flaws, even if the Patriots have fewer than others. I think the running issues originate from a lack of cohesiveness in the offensive line. The offensive line coach may need some help, any chance the Broncos bring back Alex Gibbs to help shape the line. It seems that he did a very good job last time he was in Denver.

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Also, it is obvious Manning is struggling from the current formations, why not scrap everything and open up the books from last year. If Manning fails then, we will all know that he is done but not until he gets a fair chance. — Jose, Miami The lack of continuity on Sundays and during the week has slowed the line's growth. The group played its best game at Cleveland. Yes, the Browns' run defense stinks. But the film showed a Broncos line eliminating mistakes it made earlier in the season. The expectation is that the Broncos will return from the bye week with Louis Vasquez, Evan Mathis and Ty Sambrailo all practicing. It should help accelerate the improvement needed with the schedule growing tougher. There's no talk of bringing in Alex Gibbs. Offensive coordinator Rick Dennison learned under Gibbs. I contend that this isn't a teaching issue, it's a personnel issue. The Broncos are trying to make mismatched parts fit. The bye week offers a chance to streamline what the team does well, and junk what hasn't. As I have said before, going back to last season's offense doesn't make sense for a number of reasons: this team doesn't have Julius Thomas, Wes Welker and shorter drives would only compromise the team's greatest strength, its defense.

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Why Broncos players turn to cryotherapy to help keep them in the game By Nicki Jhabvala Denver Post October 22, 2015 The image looks fit for a sci-fi movie poster. Malik Jackson, standing in a tube chamber that leaves only his head exposed, stares blankly as liquid nitrogen gas swirls around him. There are no cameras, though. And the scene has become part of a weekly routine for the Broncos defensive end and many of his teammates, including linebacker Von Miller, cornerbacks Aqib Talib and Kayvon Webster, and safeties Omar Bolden and T.J. Ward. The whole-body cryotherapy craze took off in 2011, when the Dallas Mavericks, the second-oldest team in the NBA that season, credited the treatment for helping them win their first league championship. Professional soccer and rugby players had long been using it in Europe and Asia, where it was first developed in 1978 to help treat arthritis and inflammatory diseases. But the use by professional athletes in the U.S. was in its infancy. Now LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers turn to it regularly. Major League Baseball players have used it. Floyd Mayweather incorporated it in his training before his fight with Manny Pacquiao. Olympic sprinters Usain Bolt and Justin Gatlin often take mobile cryotherapy units with them to races. And the Broncos have joined the growing trend. Call it an ice bath on steroids. For 2½ to 3 minutes, the players stand in a full-body chamber wearing only shorts, gloves and socks as liquid nitrogen gas engulfs their limbs and torso at temperatures of minus-250 to minus-300 degrees Fahrenheit. The treatment claims to rely on deception, lowering the temperature of the skin by 30 to 50 degrees to trick the brain into thinking the entire body is freezing. The mind game leads to a fight-or-flight response and the release of endorphins, the body's natural painkillers, to help reduce soreness and inflammation. Unlike traditional ice baths that require painful submersion in ice and water for about 15 minutes, cryotherapy sessions are said to be painless and more effective. "We'll actually use it with a lot of the guys Sunday morning before they go to the stadium, so about three hours before kickoff we'll go through and use the cryotherapy on them because it cleans out any inflammation, soreness that they have, but it also kind of dumps endorphins back into the body," said Dr. Ryan Tuscherer, a chiropractor and the co-founder of Cherry Creek Spine and Sport Clinic. "It really gets them amped up and ready to go, versus the old, traditional way of doing an ice bath or an ice tank." This year, Tuscherer, whose clinic is one of about 150 in the U.S. to house the $75,000 whole-body cryotherapy units, has worked with primarily defensive players from the Broncos, seeing them regularly during the season.

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Some players use them for maintenance, after game days and practices. Others use them for recovery from specific injuries. "With Aqib and his ankle injury, we'll use that to try to get it to speed up so we can get them back on the field quicker," Tuscherer said. "It's cutting the recovery time down, usually in half from what it usually would be. You're seeing it a lot with the professional athletes." But the research on whole-body cryotherapy, which is not Food and Drug Administration-approved, has offered mixed results. A 2011 study in France found a reduction of inflammation in participants who entered the chamber before and after a run on a treadmill that was designed to create muscle damage and soreness. The study indicated that the runners' reduced inflammation could cut back on their recovery time. But a 2015 review by Joseph Costello, a senior research associate at the University of Portsmouth in England, reported there was "insufficient evidence to determine whether whole-body cryotherapy reduces self-reported muscle soreness, or improves subjective recovery, after exercise" compared with rest or no cryotherapy in adult males. "Is it 100 percent? It's not," Tuscherer said. But the Broncos, like many other professional athletes, believe in the benefits of whole-body cryotherapy. "The professionals do it because that's their job," Tuscherer said. "That's how they make their money, keeping their body healthy."

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Chart: Peyton Manning’s career numbers in post-bye games By Nicki Jhabvala Denver Post October 22, 2015 Despite being 6-0, the criticism facing Peyton Manning and the Broncos’ offense is seemingly unwavering. The defense has starred the last six weeks, and although the offense has shown flashes of what most are used to from a Manning-led group — the fourth-quarter drive at Kansas City, the 75-yard touchdown pass to Emmanuel Sanders at Cleveland — the bad has outweighed the good. On Nov. 1, Manning & Co. face their biggest challenge yet, against the also-undefeated Packers, led by Aaron Rodgers. The game will be the Broncos’ first after the bye week, a situation in which Manning has historically performed well. Here’s a look at his passing numbers for each game after byes, followed by his 2015 averages for comparison.

Peyton Manning — Post-Bye Weeks

Year Week Opp. Result Comp. Pct. Yds. TDs Int. Sacks Rtg.

1998 9 Patriots L 16-21 30-52 57.7% 278 2 2 0 69.2

1999 5 Dolphins L 31-34 17-24 70.8% 274 3 1 2 130.9

2000 4 Jaguars W 43-14 23-36 63.9% 440 4 0 0 143.3

2001 5 Raiders L 18-23 26-41 63.4% 241 2 2 1 75.4

2002 5 Bengals W 28-21

21-34 61.8% 224 2 1 0 88.4

2003 8 Texans W 30-21

22-30 73.3% 269 3 0 0 133.9

2004 7 Jaguars L 24-27 27-39 69.2% 368 3 0 1 124.7

2005 9 at Patriots W 40-21

28-37 75.7% 321 3 1 0 117.1

2006 7 Redskins W 36-22

25-35 71.4% 342 4 0 0 140.4

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2007 7 at Jaguars W 29-7 23-37 62.2% 259 1 1 2 80.8

2008 5 at Texans W 31-27

25-34 73.5% 247 2 1 2 101.0

2009 7 at Rams W 42-6 23-34 67.6% 235 3 0 0 116.7

2010 8 Texans W 30-17

26-45 57.8% 268 2 0 1 89.9

2012 8 Saints W 34-14

22-30 73.3% 305 3 0 0 138.9

2013 10 at Chargers

W 28-20

25-36 69.4% 330 4 0 2 135.2

2014 5 Cardinals W 41-20

31-47 66.0% 479 4 2 1 110.2

2015 Averages 61.6% 254 1.2 1.7 2 72.5

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Broncos are no longer America’s favorite NFL team By Nicki Jhabvala Denver Post October 22, 2015 The Cowboys — in spite of Greg Hardy and Jerry Jones — have reclaimed their title as America’s favorite NFL team. According to the 2015 Harris Poll, the Broncos fell from the top spot last year to No. 4 among fans’ favorite NFL teams this year. The Packers and Patriots are tied at No. 2, and the Steelers remained at No. 5 for the second consecutive year. The Chicago Bears, now led by former Broncos coach John Fox, somehow moved up two spots from No. 9 to rank No. 7 this year. And Eli Manning’s Giants fell from No. 2 to No. 8. The Harris Poll, which surveyed 2,368 U.S. adults between Sept. 9-17, 2015, also found: The Cowboys are the favorites among adults 30-64, Southerners, Blacks, and Hispanics. American men and adults living on the east coast claim the Patriots as their favorite team. Women, Midwesterners, and whites are love the Packers the most. As do Americans between the ages of 18-24 and 65 and older. Americans between the ages of 25-29 prefer the Steelers. And Westerners and Asians root for the 49ers the most. The Broncos rank fourth among expected Super Bowl champions, with 7 percent of participants believing they’ll win. The Patriots (23 percent), Seahawks (15 percent) and Packers (13 percent) rank higher. And most Americans want a day off after the Super Bowl. Of course. The complete list, with last year’s ranking in parentheses: 1. Cowboys (4) 2-T. Packers (3) 2-T. Patriots (8) 4. Broncos (1) 5. Steelers (5) 6. Seahawks (6) 7. Bears (9) 8. Giants (2) 9. 49ers (7) 10. Saints (10) 11. Cardinals (19) 12. Falcons (22) 13. Redskins (14) 14. Eagles (15-T) 15. Raiders (18) 16. Panthers (28) 17-T. Dolphins (15-T) 17-T. Colts (26) 19. Bills (20-T) 20. Lions (13)

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21-T. Jets (11) 21-T. Ravens (23-T) 23. Vikings (12) 24. Texans (27) 25. Bengals (17) 26. Chiefs (23-T) 27. Browns (20-T) 28. Buccaneers (30) 29. Titans (31-T) 30-T. Chargers (23-T) 30-T. Rams (29) 32. Jaguars (31-T)

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CEO: Broncos' success means Super Bowl plans every year By Denver Business Journal 9 News October 22, 2015 The key to maintaining the Denver Broncos' brand is expecting the team will go to the Super Bowl every year, said president and CEO Joe Ellis Wednesday at the National Association of Corporate Directors, Colorado chapter event. And a planned Super Bowl win is how the team keeps the brand alive with the stakeholders, he said. "If you are not trying to do that, I'm not sure I'd buy tickets," he said. "You won't go every year, but you better try." Denver Broncos president and CEO Joe Ellis sat among 100 corporate board members and talked about building a world-class brand at the event.

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Broncos still feel effects of late start on offensive line By Jeff Legwold ESPN.com October 23, 2015 The bottom line is the Denver Broncos liked what they saw from their embattled offensive line in the victory over the Cleveland Browns. Now, with the meat of the schedule still on the docket when they return from their bye week – a Nov. 1 home matchup against the Green Bay Packers – the Broncos will soon find out if the group’s work in an overtime victory over a struggling defense is the start of a good trend or another short blip in what has largely been a difficult season to this point. The Broncos did not allow a sack against the Browns and rushed for a season-best 152 yards, including Ronnie Hillman’s second 100-yard game in the last three weeks. Broncos coach Gary Kubiak called it “the best we've played this year up front. I saw vast improvement with various players." There are some elements of good news/bad news with in that. The good news is this the Broncos needed any kind anof uptick in one of the real trouble spots in the season’s early going. The fact that last Sunday’s effort was the best of the season does show what a struggle it’s been to this point. The Browns had surrendered at least 150 yards rushing in four of their previous five games before the Broncos added another one. The Browns also were able to create some pressure on quarterback Peyton Manning in a three-man look on one of Manning’s interceptions in the game. “We just executed better," said tackle Ryan Harris. “I felt like we were all on the same page. The great thing about [Sunday] though, is there is a lot of improvement we can still make and we're focused on that. We're far from a finished product." The issue, at the moment, is practice. It's difficult for the Broncos to play like a cohesive unit on game day, one that makes quality decisions on the fly because the players know each other so well in any and all situations, when the group doesn’t practice together through the week. The Broncos' line simply hasn't worked together much because of a shoulder injury to left tackle Ty Sambrailo, a hamstring injury to guard Evan Mathis and guard Louis Vasquez’s troublesome knee, along with a missed practice or two by Harris. And that has shown at times on game day. During the last four weeks, including the on-field work the Broncos did this week before the team sent the players into the bye week, the Broncos' starting offensive line has practiced together just two days. And in the days leading up to the game in Cleveland, the offensive line that started that game did not work together in any of the full practices that week. Opposing defenses have taken note how the Broncos’ don’t always come off double-teams soon enough to pick up extra rushers. Defenses have repeatedly gotten to Manning by bringing an extra rusher from off the line of scrimmage after a short delay.

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The defenses also have attacked what the Broncos had believed would be their greatest strength: Mathis and Vasquez. In the opinion of some of those who have them faced them, their physical ailments are affecting their ability to move the way the Broncos would like them to move. But Kubiak said he remains hopeful that if the group can work together in practice, things will improve in games. The Broncos had rookie Max Garcia take 15 snaps in Mathis’ place against the Browns as well. We played a lot of people. Max played a lot in the game," Kubiak said. “I liked what I saw from him. I'm encouraged by how we played. That was a big positive coming out of the game. We haven't arrived, by any means, but that was a big step forward. I'm excited about what they can become if they'll just stay the course and keep going." Of the Broncos' next five opponents – they face the Packers, Colts, Chiefs, Bears and Patriots – four are ranked 20th or worse in run defense, with only Kansas City in the top 20. And the Broncos expect Sambrailo to be back in the lineup against the Packers. “We improved last week. That's important," Kubiak said. “It can be very big if we can get Evan on the field full-time and Lou on the field full-time, which we seem to think that we can when we come back. Time will tell. … Let's see what happens.’’ “There was a lot of good," Mathis said. “ … We know that it's very close and we're continuing to evolve. We're more towards who we want to be as an offense."

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Brandon Lloyd's 2010 season with Broncos still a study in contrasts By Jeff Legwold ESPN.com October 22, 2015 Brandon Lloyd authored what was one of the best individual seasons any player has ever had for the Denver Broncos. He just so happened to do it in one of the worst years the franchise has ever endured. Lloyd, who announced his retirement from the NFL on Thursday, led the NFL in receiving in 2010 with 1,448 yards. It is the third-highest single-season total in Broncos history (and was the second-highest single-season total when he did it), trailing only Demaryius Thomas' 1,619 yards in 2014 and Rod Smith's 1,602 yards in 2000. “I am so thankful for the years I spent in the NFL," Lloyd said, in a statement. “I do not have one regret, and I am blessed to leave the game in such a healthy and happy place." Lloyd, who played for the Broncos for just more than two seasons in a 12-year career, had six 100-yard games in 2010, including 169 yards against the Colts and 169 yards against the 49ers. His final line that year was 77 catches for those 1,448 yards and 11 touchdowns, career bests in all three categories. However, Lloyd’s best season, with Kyle Orton starting 13 games at quarterback and Tim Tebow three, came in a year when the Broncos hit rock bottom as an organization. Denver finished with a 4-12 record, they fired coach Josh McDaniels with four games left after the penalties from the Broncos’ Spygate scandal were handed down by the league, and after a 2-2 start the team went 2-10 the rest of the way. Lloyd’s yardage that season was 24 percent of his career total (5,989), and his touchdowns were 30.6 percent of his career total (36). It was the only 1,000-yard season of his career, and the only season in which he had more than six touchdowns. John Elway was hired as the Broncos’ executive vice president of football operations/general manager just after the 2010 season, and Lloyd was traded to the Rams four games into the 2011 season for a sixth-round pick that was set to become a fifth-round pick if Lloyd caught at least 30 passes for the Rams that year. Lloyd caught 51 passes for the Rams following the trade, finishing with a combined 70 catches for 966 yards that season. Lloyd had his third 70-catch season (74) in 2012 with the Patriots.

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Peyton Manning's interceptions tell the story of the struggles By Jeff Legwold ESPN.com October 22, 2015 Like any quarterback should, Denver Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning will own his interceptions. He routinely says “every interception has its own story ... and your signature is on all of them." Manning’s team is 6-0 with an almost improbable 3½-game lead in the AFC West after six weeks of the season. But the big takeaway for many is the number of stories that come with Manning’s 10 interceptions. He leads the league, and it's his highest total after six games since he was a rookie in 1998. A look at the game video shows there are trends with those interceptions, as defenses are playing the percentages against Manning -- and winning plenty. The Broncos also may have to deal with the fact their preferred personnel grouping for passing comes with the most risk. Or as Manning put it after his three-interception day in Cleveland Sunday: "I won’t be going to Vegas for my bye week, I’m not feeling real lucky right now. I’ll say that." Nine of the 10 interceptions have come with the Broncos in a three-wide receiver set -- not surprising because the Broncos are in that personnel grouping to throw the ball most often. However, defenses haven’t much cared if they get to Manning or not with the rush. They have rushed just four players on six of the interceptions, with just three rushers on another. Only three of the interceptions have come with an extra rusher coming after Manning -- two of those were five-man rush packages while the Raiders sent six rushers at Manning on Charles Woodson’s first of two interceptions in the Week 5 matchup. Manning was trying to go to Demaryius Thomas on four of the interceptions, two passes were meant for tight end Owen Daniels and the others came on pass attempts to Jordan Norwood, Andre Caldwell, Ronnie Hillman and Emmanuel Sanders. The Sanders number is notable because when defenses choose to put an extra defender underneath in coverage, they usually do it in Thomas' area of the field. On Woodson’s second interception, he came from the middle of the field and ran by another Broncos receiver to snare the pass headed for Thomas. Browns linebacker Barkevious Mingo dropped underneath Thomas' route to get a pass Manning later said he shouldn’t "have tried to force in to [Thomas]." “Which is certainly the case on that throw in overtime, going to DT they ... had it covered up," Manning said. “As opposed to just saying they got us on this play, tried to make it happen and obviously put us in a bad spot." Two things are happening, according to both game video and some defensive coaches around the league. Defenses are dropping defenders underneath the Broncos' favorite routes because the feeling is

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if Manning misses, he's going to miss underneath because he wants to avoid overthrows into traffic -- two of his interceptions have come on overthrows in traffic, Woodson's in the end zone as well as Vikings safety Hunter Smith’s interception in Week 3. There are also multiple times among the interception plays where the Broncos tried play-action, but the defenders kept dropping out to cover the underneath throws anyway given the Broncos' struggles running the ball. The only ways the Broncos can clean out some of that traffic is to make defenses pay in the run game or find a way to give Manning the time, and room, to fully stride to drive the ball down the field. Manning has lamented tipped passes along the way, and three of the interceptions have indeed been tipped in some fashion -- Glover Quin’s in Detroit to go with two of the interceptions Sunday against the Browns. In the end, defensive coaches have done the math. They believe they know where Manning can, and can’t, throw in given situations, or at least where the Broncos have, and haven’t, thrown in those situations. They think Manning will stare down Thomas at times, especially if Thomas is lined up solo to one side of the formation in a three-wide set. And most of all the video shows the defensive coaches believe they can create enough pressure with four-man rushes against the Broncos' line that they can routinely drop seven into coverage and that most of the seven will swirl in the intermediate areas.

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Friday NFL preview: Can Cassel, Jones get playmakers involved in first starts? By ESPN.com Staff ESPN.com October 22, 2015 NFL Nation reporters look ahead to what Friday has in store for each team. AFC EAST Buffalo Bills: The Bills' week of preparation in London for the Jaguars took an unexpected turn Thursday when quarterback Tyrod Taylor did not practice and was ruled out for the game by coach Rex Ryan. Ryan said doctors were concerned about Taylor's knee being sore after Wednesday's practice and they felt it was best to give it more time to heal. That means EJ Manuel will finish the week of practice as the Bills' starter and will be in the spotlight Sunday against the Jaguars, whose offensive coordinator (Nate Hackett) and offensive line coach (Doug Marrone) coached Manuel last season. -- Mike Rodak Miami Dolphins: Dolphins Pro Bowl defensive end Cameron Wake (hamstring) said he's finally feeling closer to 100 percent, as evidenced by his four-sack performance last week against the Titans. Wake on Thursday had his first full participation in practice in more than two weeks, and duplicating that level of pass rush will be key Sunday against the Texans. -- James Walker New England Patriots: The question of whether wide receiver Brandon LaFell might be activated for Sunday's game against the Jets might have been answered when the team created a roster spot by waiving DT Khyri Thornton on Thursday. LaFell has practiced the past two days, and with Keshawn Martin showing up on the injury report Thursday for the first time (hamstring/limited), momentum is building for LaFell's return Sunday. -- Mike Reiss New York Jets: The Jets will use Friday's practice to take a last look at two injured players, cornerback Buster Skrine (concussion) and running back Stevan Ridley (knee/PUP). As of Thursday, Skrine still was in the concussion protocol, but making progress. Ridley has practiced only twice, but he could be added to the 53-man roster. -- Rich Cimini AFC NORTH Baltimore Ravens: The most interesting part of the Ravens' injury report was the names missing from it. Wide receiver Steve Smith (back) and running back Justin Forsett were surprisingly not listed after both being questionable for last Sunday's game. Smith is dealing with four microfractures in his back. This is obviously good news for the Ravens, who need all of the offensive production they can get Monday night against the Cardinals, the NFL's second-highest scoring team. -- Jamison Hensley Cincinnati Bengals: The 6-0 Bengals are on a bye this week before going on the road in Week 8 and playing the Steelers. -- ESPN.com staff Cleveland Browns: The Browns' offensive line has its hands full this week with the Rams' pass rush, especially end Robert Quinn and tackle Aaron Donald. Guard Joel Bitonio said Donald presents unique problems with his explosive first step and superior strength. -- Pat McManamon

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Pittsburgh Steelers: Landry Jones is getting closer to his first start, and expect him to rely on his best playmakers to get him out of Kansas City with the win. Le'Veon Bell will get 20-plus touches, and Jones knows keeping Antonio Brown involved in the passing game early will pay off. Brown is eager to shake his three-game slump. -- Jeremy Fowler AFC SOUTH Houston Texans: With cornerback Kareem Jackson out for Sunday's game with an ankle injury, the Texans will give more playing time to rookie first-round pick Kevin Johnson. Miami quarterback Ryan Tannehill said on film he didn't even realize Johnson was a rookie. Texans veteran Johnathan Joseph likes that Johnson is smart, but also willing to ask questions. "On the field his tenacity, he's always competing," Johnson said. "He's really knowledgeable about the game. He's really smart, communicates well. He doesn't think he knows it all. He is willing to learn each and every day and he just fits right in this locker room." -- Tania Ganguli Indianapolis Colts: The Colts played their best game of the season (outside of the botched fake punt) in their loss against New England last weekend. But coach Chuck Pagano doesn't want his team to be playing its best football after just Week 6 of the season. "I want to play better in Week 7 [against New Orleans] than we did Week 6 and hopefully we do what's right, we control our own destiny," he said. "We're up a game and a half in our division I think if I'm correct. We need to win." -- Mike Wells Jacksonville Jaguars: The Jaguars are scheduled to arrive in London at 7:30 a.m. local time (2:30 a.m. ET). This is a change from their previous two trips to London, when they arrived on Monday and Tuesday and spent the week in the U.K. The Jaguars switched up travel plans this year to see if that has any impact on their performance against Buffalo at Wembley Stadium. -- Mike DiRocco Tennessee Titans: Inside linebacker Avery Williamson is on track to return from a hamstring injury that kept him out against Miami. That should mean Zach Brown returns to nickel linebacker duty with Wesley Woodyard starting opposite Williamson. -- Paul Kuharsky AFC WEST Denver Broncos: The undefeated Broncos are off this week before playing the Packers at home in Week 8. Check out Jeff Legwold's Broncos bye week to-do list here. -- ESPN.com staff Kansas City Chiefs: The Chiefs received some great play from their defensive linemen in last week's game against Minnesota and could be even stronger Sunday against Pittsburgh if potentially their best lineman, Dontari Poe, returns to their lineup. He didn't play against the Vikings because of a high-ankle sprain but returned to practice this week on a limited basis. -- Adam Teicher Oakland Raiders: The Raiders are hoping their return game gets a positive jolt in the form of Walt Powell, Powell, signed from Buffalo's practice squad, is expected to make his Oakland debut Sunday at San Diego. The Raiders haven't had a kick return for a touchdown in seven seasons. Also, the presence of Powell should keep starters TJ Carrie and Amari Cooper out of the return mix. Carrie suffered a chest injury while returning a punt earlier this season. -- Bill Williamson San Diego Chargers: Tight end Antonio Gates suffered a knee injury on the final drive in his second game back against the Green Bay Packers. Gates hasn't practiced this week, but the 35-year-old veteran doesn't need a lot of practice time to get ready for game days. Gates still could find his way back onto

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the field against the Raiders on Sunday. "I have no concern with the preparation part of it," Chargers coach Mike McCoy said. "He'll be ready to roll." -- Eric D. Williams NFC EAST Dallas Cowboys: Matt Cassel will not wear a wristband with the play calls Sunday as he makes his first start as the Cowboys' quarterback against the New York Giants. Cassel has been with the team for a month since his trade from Buffalo and the Cowboys feel comfortable he can relay the calls without an issue. Offensive coordinator Scott Linehan said the Cowboys will likely have to pare down some of their situational calls because of Cassel's inexperience in the system, but they believe they will have enough in the game plan to keep the Giants off balance. -- Todd Archer New York Giants: The Giants' pass rush has been absent for the first six games of the season, but it could get some help this week with the return of defensive end Robert Ayers and linebacker Devon Kennard from hamstring injuries. Only two teams in the league have fewer sacks than the Giants, and while Sunday marks the first start of the season for Dallas quarterback Matt Cassel, the Giants know it's important for them to make him uncomfortable if they're to keep him from being the latest quarterback to come back and beat them. -- Dan Graziano Philadelphia Eagles: Under Chip Kelly, the Eagles have an unusual practice schedule. Fridays are normally relatively low-key, but this week, because of the Monday night game, the Eagles still have some prep work to do for Sunday night's game at Carolina. They will have their Saturday session before getting on the plane to Charlotte. -- Phil Sheridan Washington Redskins: The Redskins are optimistic that tight end Jordan Reed will return Sunday after a two-game absence because of a concussion. It's welcome news and his presence is missed, especially on third down. Of Reed's 24 catches in the first four games, nine came on third down -- and eight of those resulted in first downs. Look for the Redskins to split him out wide on occasion, forcing the Bucs to cover him with a safety. It's a matchup they want. -- John Keim NFC NORTH Chicago Bears: The Bears, who cut defensive tackle Jeremiah Ratliff on Thursday, have a bye this week. They take on the Vikings at home next Sunday. -- ESPN.com staff Detroit Lions: Some potentially good news for the Lions as tight end Eric Ebron (knee) practiced again Thursday, as did tailback Joique Bell (ankle/Achilles). The Lions could use two of their offensive playmakers back -- and for fantasy purposes, Ebron would be a good person to watch this week. If he's available both on the field and on your waiver wire, it could be time to snag him back up. Before his injury, he was on pace for a strong season. -- Michael Rothstein Green Bay Packers: The Packers won't have the luxury of watching their next opponent on the bye week, but on the flip side the fact that the Broncos also don't play this weekend gives coach Mike McCarthy and his staff the chance to work on the game plan well in advance of the Nov. 1 battle of unbeatens in Denver without having to worry about adjusting to any new wrinkles Gary Kubiak and his staff might have shown had they had a game this week. -- Rob Demovsky Minnesota Vikings: The Vikings will see if defensive tackle Sharrif Floyd can practice Friday after missing the first two practices of the week with knee and ankle injuries. Coach Mike Zimmer said Floyd might be able to play without practicing this week, but if he's out Sunday against Detroit, the Vikings will be

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missing a disruptive tackle who's coming off one of his best games with the Vikings last Sunday against Kansas City. -- Ben Goessling NFC SOUTH Atlanta Falcons: The Falcons upgraded starting center Mike Person to full participation in practice coming off a sprained left ankle that caused him to miss last week's Saints game. Coach Dan Quinn expressed optimism about Person and starting weakside linebacker Justin Durant (elbow) returning to face the Titans on Sunday, although Durant was limited for the second straight day. -- Vaughn McClure Carolina Panthers: The Panthers hope to get the final word today on whether linebacker A.J. Klein and cornerback Teddy Williams are cleared from the concussion protocol. They appear on track to get clearance from the independent neuro consultant. Barring a setback defensive end Jared Allen is ready to return after missing last week's game with a pinched nerve, but coach Ron Rivera stopped short of saying the league's active sack leader would start Sunday night against Philadelphia. -- David Newton New Orleans Saints: Saints coach Sean Payton has been drilling home the importance of ball security this week. Both of the Saints' wins this year came when they didn't turn the ball over, including last Thursday's big win over Atlanta. And Payton pointed out that New Orleans is a whopping 34-1 when it has zero turnovers since 2006. Payton said that is obviously easier said than done, but he also called it an issue of focus, saying that the Saints have been 15-19 in the weeks following those zero-turnover games. The Saints will try to reverse that trend Sunday at Indianapolis. -- Mike Triplett Tampa Bay Buccaneers: The Bucs received positive news on the injury front Thursday, when left guard Logan Mankins returned to practice as a limited participant. The fact that Mankins participated could bode well for his prospects to return Sunday against the Redskins. Friday's practice should reveal more about his condition. -- Andrew Astleford NFC WEST Arizona Cardinals: Arizona had its second padded practice of the week -- the one week of the year the Cardinals can have two padded practices -- on Thursday. It was also a healthy day off for veteran WR Larry Fitzgerald. The immediate future of Darren Fells continues to be uncertain as he recovers from a shoulder injury suffered against Pittsburgh. -- Josh Weinfuss St. Louis Rams: While the Rams aren't very familiar with the Browns -- this is the first regular-season meeting between the teams since Jeff Fisher took over in 2012 -- they believe there are some similarities between the Browns and the teams they've played recently, especially on defense. Cleveland is the fourth consecutive 3-4 defense on the Rams' schedule, which they hope will help make up for the lack of familiarity. -- Nick Wagoner San Francisco 49ers: The Niners were feeling good about their passing game after facing suspect secondaries in the New York Giants and Baltimore Ravens the previous two weeks. The Legion of Boom, though, is an entirely different animal, one that helped limit the Niners to a mere 55 yards of offense in the first half, and its coverage helped the front seven rack up six sacks in Seattle's 20-3 victory Thursday night. -- Paul Gutierrez Seattle Seahawks: Following the team's dominant defensive performance Thursday night, the players will get extended time off. As rocky as the first seven weeks have been, the Seahawks are healthy, and

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with a win next week against the Dallas Cowboys, they'll go into their bye with a 4-4 record. -- Sheil Kapadia

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While Peyton struggles, Denver 'D' keeps Broncos in the game By Eddie Pells Associated Press October 23, 2015 Not so long ago, Peyton Manning had the Denver Broncos offense scoring at a record-setting clip. Those days are gone. Now, it's the defense pulling most of the weight and even providing some scoring. Six games into the season, the Broncos 'D' is drawing some comparisons, however preliminary, to some of the best. Some look at the statistics — Denver ranks in the top three in eight defensive categories — and immediately start bringing up the 1985 Bears. But that team's offense, led by Jim McMahon and Walter Payton, was ranked second. A more apt comparison might be the 2000 Ravens, whose top-ranked defense propped up an offense that often went nowhere. The Ravens defenders enjoyed their role. "There was really no frustration on our part, as a defense," said Peter Boulware, the four-time Pro Bowl linebacker who played alongside Ray Lewis. "We were a team that wanted to do whatever it took to win the games. As a defensive player, we liked the game being on us." The 2000 Ravens still own the record for fewest points (165) and fewest rushing yards (970) allowed in a 16-game season. In five straight games that season, the Baltimore offense failed to score a single touchdown and the Ravens still won two of those games. When the season was over, the Ravens defense ranked first in yards allowed while the offense ranked 14th in total gained. At first, Boulware recalls, there were some identity issues for the Ravens. How could a team with Priest Holmes and Shannon Sharpe, and coached by offense-minded Brian Billick, rely so heavily on defense? Eventually, Billick and the rest stopped fighting it. "Once Brian squared it away with the team, and said, 'You know what, we have a great defense, the objective is to win,' everyone got on board," Boulware said. "We went heavy run, very conservative pass, punt the ball and play field position. We did not try to reinvent that." The Broncos head into their bye week at 6-0 but with lots of issues on offense. Clearly not comfortable in coach Gary Kubiak's new system, Manning is struggling. He has seven touchdown passes and 10 interceptions, three of which have been returned for scores. The running game is worse. Kubiak wanted to take pressure off his 39-year-old quarterback with a better ground game, but the Broncos are ranked 30th in rushing at only 85 yards per game.

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Overall, the offense is ranked 29th, while the defense leads the league in sacks and is in the top five in yards allowed, interceptions and fumble recoveries. The Broncos joined the 2013 Chiefs as only the second team this century to record 17 takeaways and 26 sacks over the first six games. In all six games, the defense has made a sack or forced a turnover in the half of the fourth quarter or overtime to either save the game or win it. Denver's defense has scored a touchdown in four of six games. "We're able to produce. That gives our team the best chance to win," safety David Bruton said. "If we don't produce those numbers, don't play how we've been playing, who knows — we could easily be 0-6. We're 6-0 and have a long season to go and a lot more work to do." The question is how much Kubiak wants to mess with that formula. Denver's schedule is daunting. Green Bay is next, and there are also games against New England, Cincinnati and Pittsburgh. "I would never do anything that I don't think is best for the quarterback," Kubiak said. "That's my plan every day I go to work." If his defense keeps playing like this, he may want to take a page out of the 2000 Ravens playbook. "We felt like it was OK for us to score 17 points to win a ballgame," Boulware said. "It was OK for us not to put up thousands of yards. Once that got resolved in our minds, we really felt unstoppable."

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NFL extends deal to play games at Wembley through 2020 By Staff Associated Press October 22, 2015 The NFL extended its agreement with Wembley Stadium on Thursday for another five years, meaning the league will play at least two regular-season games a year at the London venue through 2020. The Jacksonville Jaguars will continue to play at Wembley every year throughout the agreement. The NFL also has an option to extend the Wembley deal for an extra five years beyond 2020. The league has played regular-season games at Wembley every year since 2007, and is playing three games in London this year for the second straight season. The new deal was announced ahead of Sunday's game between the Jaguars and Buffalo Bills. Earlier this year, the NFL announced a separate deal to play at least two games a season over a 10-year period at Premier League club Tottenham's new stadium, scheduled to open in 2018. "These agreements reiterate the NFL's commitment to the UK, with two stadium deals running concurrently," said Mark Waller, executive vice president of NFL International. "To be playing in Wembley, the national stadium, and at Tottenham, in what will be London's newest stadium, is fantastic." The Jaguars are in the third year of a four-year deal to play one home game at Wembley per year. Jaguars owner Shad Khan said the extension of the deal until 2020 "is great news for the Jaguars and the stability of the team in Jacksonville, which has come to embrace London as our home away from home." NFL owners recently approved a resolution to continue playing international regular-season games abroad through 2025, including possibly in Mexico, Germany and Canada.

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NFLPA files grievance over sleep monitoring devices being used by teams By Tom Pelissero USA Today October 22, 2015 The NFL Players Association has filed a grievance against the league and its 32 clubs over the use of sleep monitoring devices, union executive director DeMaurice Smith told players in a memo Thursday. The collective bargaining agreement allows the NFL to require players to wear sensors and other tracking devices during games and practices to collect performance, medical and safety-related information, as long as the NFLPA gives prior consent. The union argues the use of such technology outside of games and practice violates the CBA. “It has come to our attention that several Clubs are currently using or have used sensors to monitor players’ sleep,” Smith wrote in his memo to players. “Because the use of such technology occurs outside of games and practice, we believe such use violates the Collective Bargaining Agreement. Based on this information, the NFLPA has filed a grievance against the NFL and all 32 Clubs seeking an order compelling the NFL and its member clubs to immediately cease and desist from using unapproved sensor devices on players, unless or until such use is approved by the NFLPA. “To further monitor compliance with the CBA, the NFLPA in conjunction with the NFL Management Council created a 2015 Sensor Technology CBA Compliance Form which was distributed to all 32 Clubs during the 2015 Preseason. Any Clubs intending to use sensor equipment for health and/or medical purposes (e.g., monitoring core temperature, hydration, glucose level, etc.) must notify the NFLPA and obtain NFLPA approval through this form. “Please let us know if your club continues to use sensors outside of games and practices or for health/medical purposes.” The Seattle Seahawks and Philadelphia Eagles are among the teams known to use sleep monitoring devices in recent years. After the Seahawks' Super Bowl win, cornerback Richard Sherman -- who's now the team's NFLPA representative -- wrote in a column for TheMMQB.com that "sleep science has paid off for several guys" during the title run. "Every use of sleep sensor technology of which we are aware has occurred with the player’s specific consent," NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy said in an email.

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Remembering ex-Bronco Brandon Lloyd, unforgettable in forgettable 2010 season By David Ramsey Colorado Springs Gazette October 22, 2015 The Broncos were a mess in 2010. Josh McDaniels revealed himself as The Boy Blunder and the team finished 4-12 and the franchise seemed headed to continued disaster and a boring quarterback named Kyle Orton led the offense and Tebow-mania remained on the horizon and most Bronco fans wanted, and still want, to forget the entire mess. Except for wide receiver Brandon Lloyd. He retired Thursday, ending a journeyman's career in the NFL. Lloyd was sensational in 2010, leading the NFL in receiving yards with 1,448 and earning the only Pro Bowl honors of his career. Numbers don't tell the story. Many of Lloyd's catches were diving, juggling, utterly sensational efforts. He brought excitement into a downer season. He had never played at this level before 2010. And he would never play at that level again. When looking back at Broncos history, we tend to remember the players who remained in Denver for several years. We tend to remember the athletes were competed on winning teams. We tend to forget players like Lloyd. Don't forget this: He was sensational in 2010. Beyond sensational, really.

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NFL Europe is perhaps easily forgotten now, but it had an impact By Frank Schwab Yahoo! Sports October 22, 2015 NFL Europe is one of those “Oh, right!” things in sports history. Without prompting, you probably wouldn’t easily remember it existed. The league lasted a surprisingly long time for something that never really caught on outside of a relatively small pocket of fans. It went from 1991-2007, with no football played two of those years. Did you remember it lasted that long? There is no real reason to remember it, outside of “Kurt Warner played for the Amsterdam Admirals!” mentions or if you owned some of those snazzy Pro Set cards from the early 1990s. Maybe you remember the league better from its first name, the World League of American Football (and the unfortunate WLAF acronym). Then it became the World League, which later became NFL Europe, which then became NFL Europa. The league was successful in some ways, and not so much in others. NFL Europe reportedly lost about $30 million a season, according to the New York Times. With the insatiable appetite for the NFL, it seems odd there has never been a successful spring league or a viable minor league (major college football of course is the real minor league, which the NFL make sure stays strong through the unfair rule that a player needs to be three years removed from high school to get drafted). The USFL failed. The XFL didn’t work. When the World League started it included American teams, but after a couple seasons of that, it was clear that the WLAF wasn’t catching on in the United States. After a two-year hiatus, the league re-emerged in 1995 with only European teams. And the league did help develop some players who went on to have fine NFL careers. Warner is probably the best example, though Indianapolis Colts kicker Adam Vinatieri also established himself in Europe. Jake Delhomme, Jon Kitna, Brad Johnson, James Harrison, La’Roi Glover and Brian Waters are a few of the other players who graduated from NFL Europe and had nice NFL careers. Imagine NFL history without some of those guys. Maybe the most important legacy of NFL Europe is as a stepping stone to the NFL International Series. Some NFL Europe teams did fairly well in attendance, showing that American football could work there. When the NFL announced it was shuttering the league, the main reason given was that the NFL wanted to shift the focus to its own regular-season games being held overseas. The NFL has held at least one regular-season game at London’s Wembley Stadium in each season since 2007. The Buffalo Bills-Jacksonville Jaguars game on Sunday will be the 13th game as part of the NFL International Series. The NFL announced earlier this year that it has extended the ability to play regular-season games outside the United States through 2025, and some of those games could go to countries other than England. The Jaguars agreed on Thursday to play at least one game at London’s Wembley Stadium through at least 2020. The 15 seasons of NFL Europe certainly played some role in how the International Series has grown. The NFL saw that there were fans in Europe who enjoyed its league, and the fans there got a taste for the sport.

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While NFL Europe never blew up, it had its moments for those who participated or watched. The Frankfurt Galaxy became the most successful franchise, winning four World Bowls and appearing in four others before the league was ended. The Berlin Thunder won three titles, and the Rhein Fire won a couple. Stan Gelbaugh was the league's all-time leading passer, Siran Stacy was the all-time leading rusher and Mario Bailey was the all-time leader in receiving yards (h/t to Total Football Stats). Hamburg Sea Devils quarterback Casey Bramlet was the final World Bowl MVP. NFL Europe/WLAF/World League/NFL Europa hung around the fringes of the American sporting world, never getting much attention here. But it definitely has a legacy. Who knows, without it, there might not be a game in London on Sunday.

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MythBusters: Are Peyton Manning's mistakes more mental than physical? By Doug Farrar SI.com October 22, 2015 MYTH: Peyton Manning's body is breaking down, and it's his football mind that's keeping him in the NFL. REALITY: Right now, Manning is making throws—and decisions—we wouldn't expect of any great veteran quarterback. By any standard you'd choose to use, Peyton Manning is one of the worst starting quarterbacks in the NFL right now. There are no qualifying statements around that—it's not like 2014, when the future Hall-of-Famer would alternate iffy play with stretches in which he'd look like the Manning we're used to. This season, there are a few plays of pure goodness, surrounded by a bunch of sloppy stuff. As a result, Manning's numbers have plummeted this season—all of them, all the time. He's completed 146 of 237 passes for 1,524 yards, seven touchdowns and a league-leading 10 interceptions. His 61.6 completion rate is the lowest since his rookie year of 1998; his 3.0% touchdown rate is by far the lowest of his career and nearly half of his 5.8% career average; his 6.4 yards per attempt average is the lowest of his career and a full yard and a half lower than last year's 7.9 (his career average is 7.7); and his 4.2% interception rate is the highest he's put up since 2001. No matter the rating system, Manning isn't among the top 32. He currently ranks 33rd in Football Outsiders' opponent-adjusted DVOA and DYAR metrics, which is dead last among qualifying quarterbacks. He's never ranked lower than eighth in either category since his rookie season. He's completed 26.6% of his deep passes this season (six of 26 attempts, per Pro Football Focus), which is a lower deep completion rate than Sam Bradford's. We can parse this 100 different ways, but one thing is clear: There's no resemblance to the great player we've seen for so very long. Why the swift decline? Last week, I investigated the possible misfit between what Manning does best and what Kubiak wants out of his offense, but this goes beyond that. Despite throwing for 4,727 yards and 39 touchdowns in 2014, it was clear that Manning's arm was declining in 2014. Some believed that the quadriceps injury he suffered late in the season was the cause—Manning couldn't plant and throw as he was used to, while others thought he was suffering from a general decline in arm strength and he was relying on his legendary acumen to win games. Manning's ability to read protections, understand defensive structure as it was happening, and get the ball out quickly mitigated most of his physical issues, right down to the last month of the season. In any case, Manning's December, when he threw three touchdowns and six interceptions, seems less an outlier and more a precursor to his 2015 season. And it was assumed that when he came back for an 18th season, his renowned game intelligence would show through, offsetting his own limitations and any growing pains brought about by a system run by hew head coach Gary Kubiak. That obviously hasn't happened, and as much as people are wont to blame Kubiak as the rogue factor, a hard look at Manning's interceptions and other errant attempts this season paints a very different

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picture. For whatever reason, he's not seeing the field and reading defenses as before, and he's being fooled by simple stuff on a consistent basis for the first time in years. “He's got some decisions I know he'd like to have back,” Kubiak said of his quarterback after last Sunday's 26–23 win over the Browns, in which Manning threw three interceptions. “When you're the quarterback, you're the guy pulling the trigger all the time. We know we have to improve in the turnover department. As a coach, you always look at it and say, 'Okay, were we doing something on that route, maybe, that I shouldn't be asking him to do?' or those types [of things]. That's how you look at things. There is no skating around the fact that we're turning the ball over too much. He and I have got to get that improved, and we will. That's important for our team.” It certainly is, and the first step to improvement is to diagnose what's going wrong. We'll start with two of his three picks against the Browns, and the strange decisions involved. The Plays Manning's first pick against the Browns came at the end of Denver's first drive, with 12:12 left in the first quarter. Linebacker Karlos Dansby, one of the better pass defenders at his position, did a briliant job of faking a blitz at the snap and then dropping into straight coverage to take the ball away. The distressing thing here is that by the time Manning had turned his back to run play-action out of the pistol, with the goal of hitting Emmanuel Sanders on a crossing route, Dansby was already dropping back into that spot, and cornerback Tramon Williams trailed Sanders inside to provide double coverage. Perhaps Manning thought he'd have an opening on the playside because of the safety blitz look, but the throw was late and with sub-optimal velocity. This play had no chance. Manning's third interception of the day, by linebacker Barkevious Mingo with 14:34 left in overtime, is another example of a simple disguise presenting uncharacteristic issues for our hero. The Browns presented a wide overload blitz look to Manning's front side with linebackers Paul Kruger and Christian Kirksey, but Kirksey dropped back into coverage at the same rate as Mingo, who did so from inside the formation. Manning should have picked up on Mingo's drop, because Mingo went from a three-point to a two-point stance before the snap. Demaryius Thomas ran a simple curl route to that side, and there was no obvious way to get him the ball. Manning didn't look to his backside at all, and there was time after Kruger's stumble on the pass rush, but he made the throw he should absolutely not have made. The first of Manning's two picks thrown to Oakland safety Charles Woodson in Week 5 (the first time one 39-year-old NFL player had ever intercepted another, for you trivia fans out there) doesn't look good from any angle. Here, we have the overhead and the end zone to show you the flawed structure and execution of the play. Manning is trying to make a quick throw to TE Owen Daniels for a touchdown, but he's also got an easy open read to receiver Jordan Norwood out of a bunch formation to the left side, and he doesn't look there at all. Instead, and in part to counter a blitz from linebacker Malcolm Smith, he makes the quick throw to Daniels, despite the fact that linebacker Neiron Ball is trailing (some would say mugging) Daniels through the back half of his route. When Manning throws the ball, he's doing so to a slowed-up tight end, with Woodson obviously closing on the throw, and the need to throw the ball over the back judge.

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Again, how is this play going to succeed? Finally, there's this interception to Vikings linebacker Anthony Barr with 0:32 left in the first half of Denver's 23–20 Week 4 win. This is read you'd expect any high-quality collegiate quarterback to make. The pass is intended for receiver Andre Caldwell on a simple two-on-two game. Barr takes the underneath receiver, and cornerback Terence Newman takes the high guy. Pretty easy, right? For the Vikings, yes. Manning throws with enough time for Barr to jump the route, and that's that. Is Manning also hindered by Kubiak's reductive route concepts? Unquestionably, but he's also missing wide-open receivers he didn't before. Is his timing thrown off by a patchwork offensive line? You bet, but he's also making thoughtless throws with clean pockets. And would it help if Denver's running game could get any traction? Sure. But what we have at the epicenter of this dysfunctional offense is a quarterback whose season is collapsing in on him. Talk of benching Manning is generally regarded as heresy, but you can bet there would be a lot more of it were Denver's top defense not leading this team to its current 6–0 mark. With a bye this week, Manning and Kubiak can gameplan all they want, but getting to the root of Manning's astonishingly (for him) poor decision-making should be top priority.

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The Concussion Climate By Peter King MMQB.com October 23, 2015 News item, March 16, 2015: San Francisco inside linebacker Chris Borland, 24, retires from the NFL after one season, concerned about the long-term effects of football and head trauma on his life. News item, Oct. 13, 2015: An autopsy on the brain of former NFL linebacker Adrian Robinson, who committed suicide in May at age 25, finds evidence of degenerative brain disease chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), according to researchers at Boston University’s CTE Center. CTE, found in those with a history of repetitive head trauma, has been discovered in the brains of 88 deceased former NFL players. News item, Oct. 18, 2015: Playing for the first time in 34 days after suffering a concussion in the season-opener, ace Carolina middle linebacker Luke Kuechly, 24, is on the field for all 61 defensive snaps in Carolina’s victory at Seattle. Kuechly, playing with ferocity from sideline to sideline, leads all in the game with 14 tackles, and is in on nine stops of physical Seattle back Marshawn Lynch. “It’s hard to argue that linebacker, particularly middle linebacker, is not one of the riskiest positions on the field,” said the CTE Center’s Chris Nowinski. * * * The 2013 Defensive Player of the Year returned in Carolina’s 27-23 victory over Seattle, and not many people noticed. That’s because the story of the day was either the pair of Cam Newton’s marvelous 80-yard drives in the last eight minutes or the Panthers getting the Seattle monkey off their backs or the Seahawks continuing to be overly generous on defense in the money time of the game. “No matter the situation—and we were down double-digits on the road, in such a hostile environment—our guys fight,” Kuechly said. “I’m so proud of that. We fight.” After re-watching the game on NFL Game Pass on Thursday, one thing was clear: Kuechly was back with a vengeance. He was in on 14 tackles and close to the play on at least 10 more stops. He tussled with Lynch—once, Lynch shoved Kuechly’s helmet back, annoyed at the pest Kuechly was being—and, in general, was the nerve center of the Carolina defense, as he has been most games since being the Panthers’ first-round draft choice in 2012. On Sunday night, expect more of the same when the 5-0 Panthers host the Eagles: Kuechly mano a mano with DeMarco Murray and Ryan Mathews, and being ready to pounce if Sam Bradford dares to cross the line of scrimmage on a scramble. I wondered, talking to Kuechly, if watching Borland walk away, and hearing about another player dying far too early and being found with CTE, if he ever thought of the brain-trauma aspect of the game. Clearly, watching football today, middle linebackers seem to be in the middle of big hits as much as they were in the Butkus Era. Kuechly is so athletic, and so fast, that he doesn’t have to come off the field on passing downs; the Panthers trust him to be able to cover, if need be, and to play sideline to sideline on every snap.

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“It’s a game I love to play so much,” Kuechly said. “I’m going to play it as long as I can. Everybody at this level makes a choice, and you know what you sign up for. I have my mind right. I know what I’m doing. I know the risks. I love the game. I’m going to keep playing it.” I fully support that right. Peter Landesman, who made the “Concussion” movie, told me in August that playing football should be “an adult choice,” and what he said made sense to me. “You know that concussions can kill you and playing the sport can kill you,” Landesman said. “It’s the same with smoking, drinking and doing drugs. I like to think in some ways that life is an occupational hazard. Something we do in our life is going to kill us; maybe now, maybe 50 years from now.” As long as you know the risk, and you’re willing to take the risk, and the NFL is up-front about the risks of head trauma (which clearly the league has not always been), a professional player should be free to choose to play. That doesn’t mean players should be careless about the risks. I asked Kuechly about the severity of the concussion he suffered Week 1 against Jacksonville, and he didn’t think it was severe. “We just had to be careful with it,” he said. “I supported taking it slow, and not playing till we were sure I was right. We needed time to heal it. I trusted the care I got. I felt ready to come back.” I listened to hear in Kuechly's voice some hesitation, some worry. I heard none of it. He sounded all-in. Let's be clear: Five years ago, Kuechly wouldn't have missed 34 days. He probably wouldn't have missed 34 minutes. So the climate change around concussions is a good thing for the NFL. I just hope Kuechly and players like him are cautious, and I hope the NFL continues to allow the unaffiliated neuro-trauma consultants—the two neutral physicians present on the sidelines of every game—to have the power to take and keep woozy players off the field. It’s vital to making sure concussed players are not allowed on the field. Still, it’s impossible to think current players, even with all the safeguards, are going to be immune from CTE. That’s why it’s vital that, regardless of the flak he takes in other area, Roger Goodell must have as his primary mission the health and safety of the 1,696 players in the NFL. I’m not writing your typical preview-of-Sunday column this week. But sometimes I think it’s important to take stock of where the league is going on this very important issue for the future of the game and the future of the men who play it. * * * About Last Night … Seattle 20, San Francisco 3. So … the 49ers were trying to salvage their season, and the Seahawks were trying to show their first six weeks were not the debacle they seemed. Well, the Niners are what we thought they were—a five-win team, if that. “This team should be ashamed,” Deion Sanders said on CBS, and it was hard to argue with him. San Francisco is far and away the worst team in the NFC West. The Seahawks are actually good. Start with the defense, which finally had 11 men on the same page; Michael Bennett (3.5 sacks) tormented the shaky Colin Kaepernick. The Niners were as bad on offense as they’ve been since Kaepernick was drafted, and deserve to be in last place in the NFC West. As for the Seahawks, they’ve discovered the weapon they thought they had when they traded for Percy Harvin two-and-a-half years ago. Tyler Lockett, the rookie from Kansas State, caught a beautiful 43-yard touchdown rainbow from Russell Wilson to make it 17-0 at the half in Santa Clara—and that means Lockett has now scored on a touchdown catch, a punt return for touchdown (57 yards) and kickoff return for touchdown (105 yards) … in the first seven weeks of the season. The Seattle offensive line allowed five sacks, but Marshawn Lynch and Thomas Rawls ran it sufficiently enough to ease the

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concern about the line for another week. In all, this was a night the Seahawks could point to and say things aren’t as bad they looked the past two weeks. * * * Player You Need To Know This Week Stefon Diggs, wide receiver, Minnesota (number 14). After the Vikes left Diggs off the game-day roster for the first three weeks of the season, he has exploded in the past two games for 13 catches and 216 receiving yards. That’s good enough for the third-most receiving yards for any rookie this fall. Diggs, a fifth-round pick from Maryland, has performed so well in the injury absence of starter Charles Johnson (ribs) that there’s no guarantee Johnson will get his job back when he’s healthy. * * * Fantasy Player You Need to Know This Week Christine Michael, running back, Dallas. The 2013 second-round pick by the Seahawks was supposed to be the heir to Marshawn Lynch. But after two meh seasons—54 carries, 16 missed games due to injury and performance—Seattle shipped him to Dallas, where the Cowboys are looking for more production than they’ve gotten out of Joseph Randle. At the Giants on Sunday, look for Michael to get his second chance, and if he performs well, to take the lion’s share of carries in the Dallas running game. * * * Stat of the Week Dwayne Bowe can’t break into the top four wide receivers with the Browns, which is a bit of a problem. • Bowe’s catches and yards this season: zero and zero. • The catches and yards of Travis Benjamin, Andrew Hawkins, Taylor Gabriel and Brian Hartline: 73 and 989. • Bowe’s cap number: $6.25 million. • The combined cap number of Benjamin, Hawkins, Gabriel and Hartline: $7.21 million. Something about getting one’s money’s worth there doesn’t quite add up. * * * Quote of the Week “Joe Vitt is on the injury report. He'd probably be listed as doubtful. He tore his Achilles and broke his wrist, so he’s on a little scooter.” —New Orleans coach Sean Payton on Vitt, his longtime defensive assistant, who was injured chasing two thieves who broke into the cars of Vitt and a neighbor last weekend.

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* * * Ten Things I’ll Be Watching For This Weekend 1. Ladies and gentlemen, start your computers. For the first time in history, the NFL will stream a game live on computers around the world Sunday. Bills-Jags isn’t exactly Pats-Packers, but it should provide an interesting barometer on Yahoo (which paid millions for the rights to the game) to see who in America will take to the computer to watch a mediocre game. But this is significant: With the game starting at 9:30 a.m. on the East Coast, it will be in prime time Sunday night in large swatches of Asia. So let’s see if the Chinese pay attention to a free pro football games. 2. The fake-punt hangover. Saints at Colts on Sunday. Will the Indy players or fans be looking at this coaching staff with skepticism after the bizarre fake-punt call and the aftermath of problems with it? 3. Adrian Peterson. I don’t know. Twenty carries a game? I guess that’s not really low for a 30-year-old back, but I do know the Vikings had bigger, and more productive, plans for Peterson this season. Big opportunity Sunday at Detroit for the 3-2 Vikes. Detroit’s giving up 121 rushing yards a game. 4. Greg Hardy rushing Eli Manning. After Hardy told Dallas reporters that the best way to contain Manning was to “hit him in the mouth. The best thing for any defense is to make the quarterback feel pain.” Hardy is auditioning for WWE. 5. The E.J. Manuel show in London. Another week off for Tyrod Taylor’s wounded knee. Another week for Manuel to show the rest of the league he can play. Bills believe strongly in Taylor. Bills still not sure what they have in Manuel. 6. The fate of Percy Harvin. Vic Carucci of the Buffalo News reports the wide receiver who has never been himself since tearing a hip labrum after his 2013 trade from Minnesota to Seattle is contemplating retirement. He’s one of those players who has trouble playing unless he feels totally healthy, and whether he can ever get back to total health with his sprinter’s body is up for debate. Strange comment by Rex Ryan on Thursday when asked about Harvin, who was excused from this trip for what the team said were “personal reasons.” Said Ryan: “I don’t know where he is right now.” 7. Brady vs. Revis. I tend to think of this more as Brady vs. Buster Skrine, or Brady vs. Antonio Cromartie, because I can’t see Tom Brady targeting Darrelle Revis more than three or four times Sunday in what should be a surprisingly good game at Foxboro between the 5-0 Patriots and 4-1 Jets. 8. The Landry Jones Show. The Steelers’ third-string passer completed eight of 12 for 168 yards and two touchdowns in less than a half against a good defense (Arizona) in relief of Mike Vick. Now Jones gets a shot against the Chiefs and their talented edge-rush, in a place where it’s pretty hard to hear, Arrowhead Stadium. 9. Philip Rivers continuing to play out of his mind. The Chargers’ quarterback is 355 yards ahead of any other passer in the passing-yardage race (there is such a thing)—Rivers 2,116, Andy Dalton 1,761—and the Raiders are up next. Oakland is 31st in passing yards allowed per game. I sense a day for Rivers at Qualcomm. 10. Valuable byes. Aaron Rodgers hopes his receivers are doing lots of rehabbing this weekend. Peyton Manning hopes his line coalesces, and C.J. Anderson remembers how to gain 4.5 yards per rush. Andy Dalton? He’s ticked off the Bengals have a bye at all. He wants to play someone, anyone, and put up 35.

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Amazing year he’s having, and now he gets to take a breath before the rest of the league comes gunning for him in the last 10 games.

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Going to School on Deflategate By Peter King MMQB.com October 22, 2015 The fall semester class, in the University of New Hampshire course catalog, is called INCO 460. It meets every Wednesday from 5:10-8 p.m., in 240 McConnell Hall, a 154-seat auditorium with plush chairs on this bucolic campus 73 miles north of Boston. Professor Michael McCann brought the class to order earlier this month, and soon, the visiting lecturer opened the floor for questions. At one point, a male student in the front row raised his hand. “Do you think Goodell is a liar,” the student said, “and if you don’t, are you kidding me?” INCO 460, “Deflategate: The intersection of sports, law and journalism,” was in session. In Patriots country. * * * Picking out that question isn’t really fair. There were lots of impartial queries about the NFL’s legal battle with quarterback Tom Brady, even from a class of about 80 students who mostly identify as Patriots fans. The visiting lecturer? Yours truly. I stayed for three hours, but I could have stayed for six—that’s how engaged and interested and clued-in these students are. “One great thing about a class like this is the attendance is always good,” McCann said. “Students don’t want to skip this class.” On this night, the class was laser-focused on all things Roger Goodell, Ted Wells, Tom Brady and those allegedly deflated footballs from last season’s AFC Championship Game. No talking. No leaving early. No one asleep in the comfy chairs. McCann has even allowed four locals to audit the class, and they were at attention for the three hours, too. One of them, Charles McClain, a 72-year-old retired IBM database security analyst from nearby Lee, N.H., sums up the scandal thusly: “It’s basically Game of Thrones with footballs instead of swords.” “I talk about it a lot,” said freshman Colin Greeley, whose notebook is adorned with a FREE BRADY sticker. “And some people when they first hear it are like, ‘Really? That’s a class?’ ” Yes, it’s a class. The syllabus given to students describes its mission: “This class is not about deflated footballs. Instead, it is about the interplay between those footballs—along with numerous other sports “things”—and the legal, regulatory and journalistic systems governing sports. … Students in Deflategate will learn about crucial areas of law that relate to sports and the methodologies used to practice in relevant fields. Contract law, business law, constitutional law, intellectual property law, evidence law, tort law, labor law, antitrust law, and the law of private associations are among the legal regimes that will be closely examined. Students will also gain valuable instruction on core journalism methods and their application to a sports story attracting national headlines.” McCann, a law professor and columnist for SI.com, has lined up an impressive array of guest lecturers, including Adolpho Birch, the NFL’s senior vice president of labor policy; former Patriots counsel Jack Mula; sports attorney Alan Milstein; David Greenspan, a member of Tom Brady’s legal team; and journalists. That’s how I found my way here.

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“It wasn’t even my idea,” McCann told me said after the session. “It was the associate dean at my law school, Margaret McCabe. She came to me in February and said, ‘How about you go over to the undergraduate campus and teach a course on sports law? How about a class on Deflategate? It involves a lot of law, it involves some business issues, it would be a great way for students at the undergraduate level to get introduced to some of the work we are doing over at the law school.’ “This is a class that can be taught not only this year, but in the years ahead. A lot of this is complicated legal material that [students] are finding more accessible because it is in the context of a story they are so passionate about. They are Patriots fans and they are obsessed with the story of Deflategate, and through that obsession they are learning about the law and they are learning about areas of the law that they otherwise wouldn’t.” For McCann, it’s rare to teach a subject that so many students already are so familiar with. “They know the facts,” he said. “It is really breathtaking. Normally when I teach a class, it can be a struggle to get them to do the readings. Here, they’ve already read everything.” “Obviously,” said freshman Nicholas Arena, “we are in New England and we favor the Patriots. But professor McCann did a very good job of explaining the other side of the story and not just being biased. We understand both sides of the story. It’s crazy that my viewpoint has changed. It’s not, ‘Oh Goodell, he screwed over the Pats.’ It’s more, ‘Well, there are some suspicious things and it could go either way.’ I never thought I would say that.” * * * One of the most interesting things on this night was the array of questions I was asked. A sampling: • Was this a makeup call by the NFL for Spygate? (I said I doubt it.) • The Colts’ balls were below normal PSI, which has been under-reported. Why? (I said I agree, and I don’t know why.) • As the issue has picked up steam, the league has had numerous opportunities to minimize it and they’ve doubled down on their position. Why? (I think it’s because Goodell believes Brady was complicit, I said.) • Are there any negotiations to settle this case? (Not that I’m aware of, I said, but it’s unlikely we’d hear of them. Plus, there’s no longer any incentive for Brady to settle. ) • It’s clear how the NFLPA feels about the case, but how do actual players outside New England feel? (I said I thought the majority supported Brady.) • How many more years will Goodell be commissioner? (No idea, I said.) • NBA commissioner Adam Silver immediately tackled the Donald Sterling Clippers situation last year. Silver took care of it with league people. Why did Goodell farm it out? (Excellent question; Goodell obviously felt he needed an investigative team to sort through the layers.) • Look at the power owners of the NFL and the conflict of interest that might exist on the field if one owner goes against the owner of a rival team. How does the commissioner’s office sort that out? (Interesting question, which makes Goodell’s impartiality vital.)

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• If Goodell were to no longer be the commissioner, who would be the most logical replacement? (Chiefs owner Clark Hunt, I said, but I don’t think he wants the job.) • Do you play fantasy football? (Yes. I am in a league run by my daughter, and I stink.) • How credible a news source is ESPN, and why hasn’t Chris Mortensen apologized for getting the story wrong in January? (Very, I said. And I don’t know Mort’s business; I have enough of a problem getting my own stuff right.) A more detailed explanation was needed there. After Mortensen reported that 11 of the 12 Patriots’ footballs were at least two pounds underinflated, I reported that a source whom I trusted confirmed that story to me. When Ted Wells’ report on the deflated footballs came out, however, it told a different story. New England’s footballs had begun the day at 12.5 psi, meaning that if they were at least two pounds underinflated, they’d have measured at 10.5 psi or less. Of the 22 measurements (the 11 balls on two gauges), only one was two pounds under. It measured exactly 10.50 psi. I told the class that I was responsible for my own work, not Mortensen’s. And I told the class I was sick about my mistake, and that I had no one to blame but myself, and that I wouldn’t blame readers/listeners if they had a trust issue with me going forward. I also told them that while I don’t think my source knowingly lied to me, I had become more skeptical. Now I would work to try to regain the trust I had lost. It’s all I can do. * * * Charles McClain, the retiree in a flannel shirt and sweater, had a couple of questions, and then I had some for him. The first: What are you doing here? “I am an ardent Patriots fan,” he said. “To put it bluntly, I think they got screwed. It is the juiciest story of the year. My wife, who is a moderate football fan, really got into this. It became a whole family discussion. My wife works at the university. She encouraged me to audit the class. “To me, it doesn’t make sense that the league is putting so much focus on this. It feels like Brady is getting jobbed. I don’t think [Brady and the Patriots] did it, and I don’t even think there’s a prima facie case they did it. It sounds like an old-fashioned mafia vendetta. I understand it probably isn’t, but it doesn’t pass the smell test, with how they’re pursuing this. “The class covers a lot more than Deflategate. In fact, there’s less of [the footballs] than I thought there would be. There’s a lot about sports law. One of the things that professor McCann can do that all the other people I talk to about this issue can’t is he can tell you what the strategies are, the whys behind the steps the NFL takes, the likelihood of success or failure. The discussion of how the appeal might go is fascinating.” So, I said to him, it sounds like this has been an educational experience. “Sitting in the class with all those kids, as a 72-year-old guy, is very different,” McClain said. “Next semester I may take Italian. I have always wanted to learn Italian.” * * *

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For one segment of the class, I asked McCann if he could arrange for the quarterback of the school’s football team to partake in an experiment. Midway through class, the Wildcats’ junior quarterback, Adam Riese, walked in. I brought three footballs to class. I had inflated one to 13.5 psi, the maximum allowable air pressure for an NFL football. I had inflated another to 12.5 psi, the minimum. And I had inflated the last one to 11.5, one pound below the minimum—and close to the average level that the 11 Patriot footballs measured at halftime of the AFC Championship Game (11.30 psi). I coded each ball with a Sharpie in a way that wouldn’t be obvious to anyone handling them for the first time. I asked Riese to come to the front of the class, where I stood, and to feel the footballs and throw them. One by one, I handed them to the left-handed quarterback. “Take your time, and tell me which you think is which, and how big of a difference you think it feels like,” I said. Riese felt them, and then threw them about 12 yards across the room to Greeley, the student with the FREE BRADY sticker on his notebook. “Not too much of a difference at all,” Riese said. “I think this one [feeling the 13.5-psi ball] is probably pumped up the most and this one [feeling the 11.5 ball] is probably the least, but I really can’t tell too much of a difference. I don’t see how something like this could make that much of a difference when you are throwing and catching, honestly.” I asked Riese about the severity of the league’s attempted punishment of Brady (a four-game ban, overturned by Judge Richard Berman and now on appeal) and taking two draft picks and $1 million from the Patriots. “They are making it seem like he was throwing flat footballs out there,” Riese said. “I wouldn’t even want to throw that, but feeling these footballs, I don’t see how that can make that much of a difference, with balls being rotated and stuff like that. Honestly, when I am in there I don’t even sometimes notice a difference in balls.” Now for the moment of truth: Which ball is inflated to 13.5, which to 12.5, and which to 11.5? “This one is heaviest,” Riese said, singling out the 13.5-psi ball. “This one is the middle.” It was the 12.5 ball. “This one’s the lightest.” It was the 11.5 ball. “You get an A!” I said. He then held two of the balls, the 12.5 and the 11.5, and said, “I don’t see that much of a difference. If either one was tossed into the game, I wouldn’t even notice.” * * * After the class, about a dozen students came up to the front to hold the footballs and try to tell the difference for themselves. All but a couple got the order of 11.5, 12.5 and 13.5 wrong. “They feel the same to me,” one female student said. And, of course, if you’re not handling footballs every day, for hours on end, they’d feel pretty similar to each other. I could barely tell the difference, and I knew the code written on the balls.

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I explained to the students that the NFL, despite appealing the case, wishes this story would quiet down and go away. But how ironic it is that the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals could hear the NFL’s appeal in February, in the incredibly festive week of Super Bowl 50, when the league has plans to throw one of the biggest week-long parties in its history to celebrate the golden year of the Super Bowl. Imagine the Patriots are in Super Bowl 50 and this case is dragged into the public eye again, when the focus should be on nothing else but football. The final chapter of this saga has yet to be written, but even when it’s over, Professor McCann won’t ever lack for students.

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Former Broncos GM: Shanahan Would Have Preferred Drafting QB Other Than Cutler By Staff CBS 4 Denver October 22, 2015 The former general manager of the Denver Broncos says Mike Shanahan didn’t have his heart set on Jay Cutler in the 2006 NFL Draft. It was actually quarterback Matt Leinart who Shanahan really wanted, according to an article by Ted Sundquist, the former GM, in a new article in Bleacher Report titled Why I Drafted Jay Cutler, and What Happened from There. Sundquist reveals in the article that the late Mike Heimerdinger was a big fan of Cutler, who had a long college career at Vanderbilt and was someone Heimerdinger was familiar with because he had been an assistant coach for the Tennessee Titans (the Commodores also play in Nashville). The Broncos had brought in Heimerdinger to be Shanahan’s assistant head coach that offseason, and Sundquist says Heimerdinger quickly had him convinced making a move to draft Cutler was favorable. “I was most impressed by Cutler’s dogged determination, toughness and tenacity,” Sundquist wrote in the article about Cutler coming out of college. Matt Leinart, a Heisman Trophy winner at USC, wound up being picked by the Cardinals at No. 10, and the Broncos made their move up the draft board to nab Cutler at No. 11. Of course, the Broncos already had a starting quarterback by the name of Jake Plummer at the time, but according to Sundquist, everyone at the top of the Broncos organization wanted to pick a quarterback who could replace him and eventually become the new leader of the team. Sundquist then details the very public quarterback drama that played out in the Mile High City. Shanahan wound up getting behind Cutler, and the coach eventually benched the veteran Plummer and gave the rookie the start. He also goes into detail about the fascinating events surrounding the trade of Cutler to the Chicago Bears a few years later. “Cutler’s full development never took place, and though there were many outward signs of improvement, he was essentially sent to Chicago without his degree,” Sundquist writes.

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The Inevitable Decline of Peyton Manning By Robert O’Connell The Atlantic Magazine October 22, 2015 Midway through the fourth quarter of Sunday’s game against the Cleveland Browns, the Denver Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning took a shotgun snap from the Broncos’ own 25-yard line. He shuffled his 39-year-old, six-foot-five-inch frame back a couple steps, then forward, and then let go of a low throw aimed at the right sideline, where the Denver speedster Emmanuel Sanders was presently streaking. The pass was perfect. It snuck just over the turned shoulder of a Cleveland cornerback and arrived before the helping safety could offer any aid, settling into Sanders’s grip as easily as if he’d been tossed a set of keys. In other words, it looked like the type of throw with which Manning was once synonymous, the type made possible by virtuosic skill and foresight bordering on precognition. These throws had turned defenses’ fissures into gaping and exploitable openings and put point totals in the 30s or 40s on scoreboards across the NFL. This latest exhibition was placed so well that Sanders could catch it without decelerating and run the field’s remaining 50 yards for a touchdown. This season, though, such passes are far rarer than they used to be. Manning’s fourth-quarter strike to Sanders on Sunday came minutes after his second interception of the day, returned by the Cleveland defense for a touchdown, and before his third. It was a much needed, dramatic salvo in a close game against a mediocre team that in years past would have played the role of patsy in a Manning-engineered blowout. On Sunday afternoon, as on most of the Broncos’ Sundays so far this season, the response the once-great quarterback inspired wasn’t awe but ambivalence—about his remaining aptitude, his health, his place on his team and within his sport, and the barbarous essence of the sport itself. Manning is old and hurt. He underwent spinal-fusion surgery in 2011, which facilitated the end of his illustrious career with the Indianapolis Colts (featuring a Super Bowl title and four Most Valuable Player awards) and the beginning of his accomplished late-career run with the Broncos (a Super Bowl appearance, another MVP). The operation led to immediate changes in his abilities and tactics—wobblier spirals, shorter passes, a heightened disinclination to take big hits—but those changes have since been magnified to an extreme. Some of his passes this season have been torturously slow or misaimed, and he curls and tumbles at the approach of a defensive lineman as if to protect a skeleton made of chalk. In late summer, near the end of the preseason, Manning admitted that the fingertips of his throwing hand have been numb ever since his return four seasons ago, and in September, ESPN The Magazine ran a profile of the player in which the normal routine of undressing after a game was revealed to be more arduous to him now than throwing an out-route against a top-flight defense once was. From the perspective of pure football, the present situation of Manning and the Broncos is an interesting one. Despite Manning’s struggles, Denver holds a record of 6-0. A league-best defense and a cadre of highly skilled receivers, once considered networks of support to their quarterback’s distinct genius, now do most of the weekly work, with Manning chipping in where he’s able. One effect of this inversion of roles is that the Broncos seem somewhat anachronistic, a low-scoring and hard-hitting team in a league built (owing in no small part to Manning’s own influence) on prodigious passers.

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But because football is a grim and violent game, Manning’s swan song is no harmless experiment. Each of his drop-backs triggers a hint of fear, from the viewer if not from the player himself. The words spine and neck linger, and nightmare scenes of paralysis flash. His slow and lanky limbs seem ready to fall apart at the slightest knock. Manning once stood for a certain kind of football future, chess played with human bodies—hazardous, sure, but fundamentally artful and intellectual. Now he stands for the game’s very real and very dangerous present. * * * In the prime of his career, Manning seemed lab-built to fulfill the needs of the NFL, in regards to both the evolution of the sport itself and its family- and advertiser-friendly, corporate-synergistic sheen. He was a generational talent, and an even rarer character in the ongoing story in which football positions itself as an outlet for American gumption. The old, hard times called for hard heroes, men who hit and scowled and spit out their teeth, but by the end of the 20th century and the start of the 21st, the nature of the country and its appetite for injury as entertainment had changed, however slightly. Football needed a star who could make its virtues—hard work, leadership, sacrifice—more modern, and maybe a little gentler. So in stepped Manning. His ethic challenged that of any icon of yesteryear, but he showed it by logging long hours in the film room instead of by playing through cracked bones or torn muscles. Studio shows filled pregame airtime with stories of his obsessive preparation, and his gesticulating, heavily coded audibles at the line fascinated fans. When one of his passes found its target, it seemed a triumph of a new sort of gridiron archetype, with mental diligence replacing physical toughness as the defining characteristic. Manning had the sort of physique and manner that, were he not a world-renowned superstar, might be called dweeby. He was gangly and seemed to play in borrowed, ill-fitting pads. He had a massive forehead that featured a red, pressure-induced spot whenever he removed his helmet and revealed his Tintin-like haircut. Neither quick nor fluid, he moved about the pocket as if stepping barefoot on summertime blacktop, and even at its best, his throwing motion looked overstudied, even a touch robotic. This inelegant bodily style combined with Manning’s workaholic lore to place him firmly in the camp of the cerebral athlete. He had enviable physical gifts, of course, but he played in a way that made his body itself seem little more than a conduit for his mind. Watching him direct the whirring Colts teams of the 2000s, you couldn’t help but think that a notable portion of the NFL’s quarterbacks could make many of the throws Manning did. What they couldn’t do was see the angles or alleys of space as he saw them or, better yet, foresee what those angles and alleys would look like before they’d even materialized. Now, it’s plain how much physical ability Manning did have in those days, and how much he had to lose. If he once seemed bookish as he played, he now resembles a disembodied brain suspended in a jar, with a rudimentary mechanical arm jerry-rigged outside the glass. An offense stuffed with talent surrounds him, and it’s all he can do to cobble together, via his gifts for prediction and misdirection and some short and shaky throws, enough yards for a first down. The Denver defense, founded on the pass-rushing menaces Von Miller and DeMarcus Ware, works at a feverish clip to make Manning’s slim leads hold or give him time to recover from his mistakes. Set next to high-scoring feats of the nimble and rocket-armed Aaron Rodgers of the Green Bay Packers or the clinical Tom Brady of the New England Patriots, the halting efforts of Manning and the Broncos may seem inadequate. They’ll almost certainly prove to be so as the season wears on, when the stakes

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and levels of competition rise and shortcomings are less easily papered over. For now, though, they also illuminate aspects of the brilliance of team and player alike. The Broncos have demonstrated their ability to win, if not thrive, with a diminished version of their Hall of Fame-bound quarterback. Manning, for his part, has reshaped the meaning of endurance just as he did that of ethic over a decade ago. * * * Any admiration this season produces, though, is undermined by the reality of Manning’s physical condition. A pair of plays from a recent game in Oakland against the Raiders, one that ended in a 16-10 Broncos win, illustrates the queasiness sometimes caused by watching the sunset-riding QB. In the first, Manning was driving the Broncos down the field just before the half in pursuit of a clock-beating score. A play-action pass called for Manning to execute a fake hand-off before targeting a receiver with a throw. It was the kind of common maneuver that usually doesn’t attract much attention, but when Manning did it, it looked exceedingly difficult. He completed the pass, but that minor wrinkle in his usual routine—the pausing of the feet, the rotating of the shoulders to extend the ball and bring it back—rendered his degeneration stark. Among the lineman shoving and batting at one another and the receivers and defensive backs sprinting in tandem, he looked as incongruous as a spectator who’d accidentally wandered onto a speedway in the middle of a race. The second play came just after halftime, when the Raiders had the ball. The Oakland quarterback Derek Carr dropped back to pass, and Miller, the Denver linebacker, shed a blocker and came blazing toward him. Miller reached Carr in a blink and drove him to the ground and wrested the ball from his hands all in one motion. It was fast, efficient, and final. I couldn’t help but wonder, watching this display of dominance so closely following Manning’s stiff and awkward shamble: What would have happened if it had been Manning staring down the unchecked defender? Would he have had time to execute one of his protective rolls? Would he have been able to toss the ball to an unoccupied patch of grass and skip out of the way? Or would his efforts to evade or absorb only have brought a weakened vertebra in line with the crown of the defender’s helmet and led to a gruesome outcome that, in retrospect, would have seemed inevitable? This is the dark undercurrent of Manning’s hanging-on. Manning is, by sight if not by the technicalities of team medical clearance, unfit to be on an NFL field. But tragic as a severe injury would be, it would also be in keeping with a time in which football’s destructive capacity has never been more recognized. The word “concussion” is now spoken during each game, a new hobbled ex-player brings a suit against the NFL in every news cycle, and the league’s attempts to enforce safer tackling regulations read as insubstantial correctives to an inherently perilous sport. Manning was once the blueprint for a kind of football less aesthetically centered on the hard hit, to the delight of its marketers and fans with more insistent consciences. Under his supervision, the game seemed like nothing so much as the anthropomorphization of a playbook, all patterned lines and practiced reactions and timed throws. It looked shiny, slightly unreal, and comparatively painless. Today’s Manning, though, shows the limits of the balletic shift for which he once served as figurehead. Football still resolves in bodies colliding, and so it still inspires fear. In many ways, then, the departing Manning sheds a truer light than he did in his glory days on the conflicted experience of watching our national game. It inspires equal parts joy and guilt, not always easily separable from one another. Where we once watched Manning for his expertise, his peerless stature among the NFL’s players, we now see in him a kind of overview of the sport’s emotional terrain.

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We parse his remaining ability, admire his resolve, and worry over his future. And we hope he gets out in one piece, without that worry hardening into the last and most trying of football’s outputs: mourning.

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Broncos host 10 players for tryouts during bye week By Andrew Mason DenverBroncos.com October 22, 2015 A bye week isn't a complete week off -- at least not for the Broncos' personnel department, because player evaluation never stops. This week, the team hosted 10 players for tryouts, including two who starred at Colorado college programs: WR Paul Browning, Colorado State-Pueblo WR DaVaris Daniels, Notre Dame LB Sage Harold, James Madison TE Matt LaCosse, Illinois QB Seth Lobato, Northern Colorado DB John Lowdermilk, Iowa OT Andrew McDonald, Indiana DB Ryan Murphy, Oregon State TE Harold Spears, New Hampshire LB J.R. Tavai, USC All of them worked in NFL training camps this summer. Lobato and McDonald also have past regular-season experience. Lobato toiled for Miami's practice squad last year, while McDonald played two midseason games for the Seahawks in 2014. The Broncos often draw their reserve-future signings in January from the list of players they host for Tuesday tryouts throughout the regular season. Practice-squad players are also often drawn from the tryouts. In addition to the two players with Colorado ties, Lowdermilk has a Broncos connection; his uncle is Rich Karlis, a placekicker from 1981-88 who hit the game-winning field goal in overtime of the 1986 AFC Championship Game in Cleveland.

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Once a budding hockey prospect, Heuerman finds NFL future after dropping NHL goal By Ben Swanson DenverBroncos.com October 22, 2015 At 13 years old, Jeff Heuerman was almost completely alone. He had left his family in Naples, Fla. to pursue professional hockey dreams and moved into his friend’s grandparents’ house in Manchester, Mich., a town of about 2,000 residents. That friend, Austin Watson, was the only person he knew in town and because Watson was a year older, Heuerman went to middle school and Watson went to high school. By himself in a sleepy rural town, Heuerman boarded the school bus and lay down on the cold vinyl seat to fall asleep before school. That became more difficult in the bitterly cold Michigan winter mornings. Some window latches were broken or stuck, but even with cold drafts creeping through the gaps, he had plenty of time to get in more rest. The 90-minute bus ride weaved through the frosty farmland, resting momentarily to pick up children from stops at the farms’ edges. He was a hockey prodigy with a promising future. Compuware, a youth hockey program with 15 national championships and 34 state championships to its name, had offered him a spot and Heuerman happily accepted. But to take the next step on a possible path to the NHL he would have to move even farther north. Watson was preparing to make that northern jump to the Ontario Hockey League, and Heuerman knew that if he was going to continue toward professional hockey at the highest level, that would have to be his path, too, in a year's time. It had been fun to live in a place and play hockey with other skilled players, but he didn't know if he wanted to move to Canada and keep going with a dream that would draw him further from his family. He missed his family, especially his brothers, who were growing up without their oldest sibling. He had also hurt his ankle in the middle of the season, which made him question the route even more. So Heuerman called his father, discussed the options and the path came to its end. He would return home to Naples. --- About a decade later, Heuerman can't help but feel somewhat out of place again. While other rookies on the roster work to make an impact on the active roster or the practice squad, the rookie tight end is still hard at work rehabbing after offseason surgery to repair a torn ACL. Still, Heuerman is upbeat and though he wishes he could be out there with the rest of the teammates, he's happy knowing he found his way after leaving behind a path to professional hockey. When he returned to Florida, Heuerman's hockey future had been on life support in Florida until he eventually resigned to move on from it to football. But when he started seeing his friends and former teammates -- including Watson -- getting drafted to the NHL and signing big contracts, he couldn't help but feel like he might have made a mistake.

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"Should I have stuck with that?" Heuerman remembers wondering in high school. " Some of the guys I knew growing up playing around, these dudes are getting drafted at 18. Like this dude's making a million bucks at 18 and I'm sitting here living off my dad. "Should I have just bit my tongue and gone to the OHL for a year?" he thought. "Should I have taken that route?" --- In the muggy heat of Florida, ice hockey isn't often the first sport that comes to mind. Regardless, Heuerman immediately connected with it and he quickly became a skilled center. That Heuerman was quick learner and a natural athlete was no surprise given his father's background. Paul Heuerman flirted with a professional sports career after playing four years for the Michigan Wolverines basketball team. A 6-foot-9-inch forward, Heuerman moved into the starting lineup as a junior and became a team co-captain the following year. A second-team Academic All-American in June of 1981, he was drafted by the Phoenix Suns in the fifth round. Unfortunately, Paul's basketball career didn't take off. He went to law school and settled down in Naples, a rapidly-growing city on the Gulf Coast. Paul nurtured his son's love for hockey and Jeff rapidly improved at the sport, so much so that he caught the attention of two key figures, one of whom was Austin Watson, whose parents had recently moved to Florida. "I had gone out for stick-and-puck and you could kind of tell who's a good player and who's not," Watson recalls. "I kind of gravitated a little bit towards him because he was [so good]. He was a good player and down in Florida there's some good players but it's not a huge hockey market, so that was nice for me to meet a kid at 12 or 13 years old playing at the same level as me in Florida and we kind of just hit it off from there." The other person Heuerman stood out to was one of Detroit Compuware's coaches. He would eventually call to offer Heuerman a spot on the team. This, to be sure, was a big deal for a young hockey player. "It's not like they had open tryouts," Heuerman says. " You have to be asked to be on the team, so when they asked, I was like Holy crap! I'm coming from Florida and they want me to come play for them? I'm freaking doing it!" Such a step was massive for Heuerman's future in hockey. To make it to the professional level, you can't really stay in Florida. Generally speaking, a talented player carves their way into playing at a high youth level, declares for the OHL or goes to play at college, and from there they eventually, hopefully get drafted to the NHL. Heuerman was still a good distance from there, but one of the best youth hockey teams had identified him as someone they wanted on their front line. The decision was more or less a no-brainer for Heuerman: "All I wanted to do was play hockey and I just wanted to play on the best team I could."

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--- Watson and his family solved the logistics of moving 1,300 miles when they offered him a room at his grandparents’ house in Manchester, Michigan. Watson, also a Compuware player, already had eight brothers, and now with Heuerman moving into the room across from his, it would feel like he had one more. They even drank their first beers together. "He just wanted to play sports and hang out," Watson says. "We'd go fishing. [He was a] real nice, happy kid, always had a good attitude and always just wanted to be doing something active." But with the two in different schools, Heuerman was alone as he entered a new school. "It's character-building, I'll tell you what," he says. "I showed up to school and didn't know one single person. The only other people I knew were the guys on the hockey team and none of them went to that school. I would go to school, but then I would go home and go to practice. I would always be hanging out with all my buddies on the team. And on the weekends, it would always be the buddies on the team. So I really never met a whole lot of people at the school." Heuerman enjoyed playing hockey at a higher level and living in a new place, but Watson's impending decision to move to Canada to play in the OHL weighed on his mind. He was unsure if he wanted to spend more years following the customary path to possibly go on to the NHL, like Watson would. "I was like Man, I don't want to live in Michigan for another year and then move to Canada," Heuerman said. "That's the route I was headed on if I had followed it. That's kind of what you do. The top guys go play in the OHL for a year and then go to the draft. I didn't really want that." Plus, he missed his brothers. If he took this route placed in front of him, he knew he wouldn't see them much at all. It was a lot for a 13-year-old to figure out. "I was in eighth grade when I moved," he said. "They didn't know me. One was 7 and one was 11. So then I was going to move to Canada in a year? They weren't even going to grow up with me. […] I’m 13 or 14 living here; I really don’t know anything. I’m kind of figuring this all out at the same time and then it starts hitting me one day. "I started to sit back, started talking with my dad. I’m like 'You know what, I don't know if this is for me. I think I want to go home.'" --- Back in Naples, Heuerman tried to continue with hockey, but it just wasn't the same. He had put so much time and effort into hockey and coming back to Florida was like taking a step back. Disinterested and drained, he just didn't want to go on with it anymore. Paul Heuerman was fine with his son moving on to something else, but not quitting altogether. Jeff would have to find a new sport or find a job, and he sure didn’t want to get a job. Originally, Heuerman didn't even want to try football. He had played in the backyard from time to time, but he had no organized football experience. But a combination of a friend's suggestion and his hopes that it would impress girls convinced him to give it a shot.

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Tight end became a natural fit after that. Heuerman was in the middle of a growth spurt that pushed his height to 6 feet 5 inches tall. He had great natural coordination, mobility and vision skills, which were further developed in his hockey days. At that time, he didn't really see football as any kind of future career. He didn't even think he'd play college football. So while he saw friends getting drafted to NHL teams, Heuerman wondered if he could have done the same. But once offers from colleges started to come in, those questions went away. Heuerman committed to play at Ohio State, and after four years initially marked by upheaval and scandal in Columbus, Heuerman and his teammates were national champions. After months of frenzied draft preparation, Heuerman finally got to hear his name called as the Broncos selected him in the third round. Amid the celebration that night, he got a congratulatory text from Watson, just like the one he sent on the night of Watson's NHL Draft. Football wasn't exactly the sport Heuerman had initially expected to turn professional in, he acknowledged. From a young age, he seemed to have a path to the NHL carved for his future but once he left it behind, Heuerman faced a new and more open reality where everything wasn't all planned out and he was able to find the sport that fit him. As for Heuerman's questions about whether he could have or should have stuck with a direction that seemed destined for the NHL, Watson thinks he certainly could have followed in his footsteps. "I’m sure he could have," Watson says. "It was unfortunate when he came and lived with us and had a little bit of a rough year I think with a couple of injuries and that kind of [thing]. It set his mind back a little bit and he kind of wanted to go back home and regroup but I think as you see, he goes back home and he gets drafted to the NFL years later. It’s incredible. He’s just an athlete and I think what he’s done with football, I’m sure he could have done with hockey but I think chose the right route for himself."