DENVER, CO - JANUARY 25: Luke Wattenberg #60 of the Denver Broncos lines up before the snap during the AFC Championship NFL football game against the New England Patriots at Empower Field At Mile High on January 25, 2026 in Denver, Colorado. (Photo by Cooper Neill/Getty Images) | Getty Images
We’re almost a week removed from Denver’s first AFC Championship game in 10 years, and before we get into the breakdown, I just want to reiterate how happy I am with how the season went, with what this team was able to accomplish given their circumstances, and just how consistently well the offensive line played all year.
They were riddled with injuries and had to play their third stringers a handful of times and, for the most part, they hardly even skipped a beat. That means that the offensive line room and Zach Strief and his staff deserve a massive amount of credit for what they did this season.
But with that being said, Sunday’s game was ugly. That’s not to say that the Broncos didn’t have any success on offense, but outside of a couple plays, they couldn’t string much together. There were too many three-and-outs and their one long drive ended with a turnover on downs. But why did all of this happen? Was the offensive line playing poorly? Were the running backs not doing their jobs? Was this game too much for Jarrett Stidham? Let’s try and find some answers and give ourselves some closure.
Stat crunch
The Broncos ran 57 offensive plays on Sunday. 22 of them were designed run plays and 35 of them were designed pass plays. The starting five offensive linemen played every one of these snaps.
RJ Harvey had the most carries on the team with 13. He managed just 37 rushing yards with a long of nine yards. Nine of his carries managed just two yards or less, the shortest of those going for -3 yards. Jaleel McLaughlin got the second-most carries with four and managed 11 yards with a long of five yards. Jarrett Stidham had one carry when he kept the ball on a read-option and gained eight yards.
Denver was lined up in the Gun formation 34 times, which is the most they’ve used that formation in any game this season. They didn’t run one snap out of Pistol and they used their Singleback look just 15 times, which is near the least amount of times they’ve used that look in any game this year.
11 personnel was, like all year, their most common personnel package.
The Patriots showed a 6-man box 31 times, a 7-man box 18 times, and an 8-man box five times.
The offensive line had zero penalties. They also recorded five blown blocks (Ben Powers with three and Quinn Meinerz with two), one TFL (Luke Wattenberg), eight pressures (Powers with three, Garett Bolles and Meinerz with two, Mike McGlinchey with one), two QB hits (McGlinchey with both), and one sack (Meinerz).
20 times in the game did every member of the offensive line receive a “Good” grade on their blocks. Four times that happened on a run play and 16 times that happened on a pass play. Those run plays resulted in gains of one, two, three, and two yards. The pass plays resulted in five incompletions, nine completions, and two scrambles. The completions netted an average of seven yards. One scramble gained five yards and the other resulted in a -2 yard sack when Stidham ran out of bounds.
The offensive line averaged 3.8 “Bad” blocks, 3.2 “Meh” blocks, 3.8 “Alright” blocks, and 46.2 “Good” blocks. McGlinchey had the most “Bad” blocks with five, Wattenberg had the most “Meh” blocks with seven, McGlinchey had the most “Alright” blocks with 6, and Powers and Meinerz had the most “Good” blocks with 48.
Grade-wise, Garett Bolles finished with the best grade at 87.3%. Wattenberg was next with 86%, then Meinerz with 85.1%, then Powers with 84.2%, and then McGlinchey with 82.5%.
Meinerz, Powers, and McGlinchey all recorded their worst RGS scores of the season on Sunday.
In general
On first watch, this game looked pretty rough from an offensive line perspective, and after further review, it wasn’t great but I don’t think it was as bad as I previously thought. There were a few other reasons as to why the run game didn’t get going on Sunday, including poor blocking from tight ends or the receivers, or the running backs not making the right reads. But the offensive line does have their faults.
And in the passing game, on Stidham’s three sacks, I’m only crediting the offensive line with one of them. One sack was due to Stidham’s chest-backwards-pass attempt and another was him leaving a clean pocket and running out of bounds while behind the line of scrimmage.
Let’s start by assessing the twenty group “Good” blocks as that can paint the picture of why there was a lack of success even when the offensive line was doing their job. On the four run plays where they only managed to gain an average of two yards, one play was blown up from a poor block by Adam Trautman, one play failed due to RJ Harvey hesitating in the hole (he gained two yards when he likely could’ve gained 4-5), another was due to Jaleel McLaughlin not following his blocks on a Power play, and the last one failed due to the extra lineman Frank Crum not getting any vertical movement on his block.
So technically we can blame the offensive line for one of these.
On the 16 pass plays from this category of plays there were only nine completions and half of these were check downs. A few of the incompletions were bad misses or throw-aways. And, of course, there was the poor decision to run out of bounds rather than throwing the ball away.
Stidham had the bad habit of being a bit like Russell Wilson in the pocket. He would just keep dropping backwards rather than stepping up into the pocket and that would allow the edge rushers to get some heat on him. He didn’t really help his line out much. You could really see the difference Bo Nix makes when it comes to the pocket the offensive line creates.
But now that we took a look at why it was the offensive line’s fault, let’s look at reasons why it was.
A fact of the matter is that Powers, Meinerz, Wattenberg, and McGlinchey just did not play well. Meinerz was getting worked by inside moves in pass protection. McGlinchey was getting beat by speed rushes to the outside and also failed to secure a DE on a reach block on one outside zone play. Powers was also susceptible to inside moves in pass protection and whiffed on a couple of run blocks. And then Wattenberg’s old habit of not being able to get any vertical movement on blocks in the run game came back.
At least there was Garett Bolles who lead the way in quality of play, even with the two pressures he gave up.
I think the biggest fault of the offensive line is one they’ve struggled with all season, which is a lack of vertical movement in the run game, particularly on one-on-one blocks. They can get movement on their double teams but don’t dominate the individual blocks like they need to.
The line was put into a difficult spot though, considering the Patriots were able to exploit their lack of a consistent pass game, paired with a running back room who just aren’t able to run the ball well enough between the tackles. It’s easy for an offense to get exposed when this is the case.
Even on the plays were the whole offensive line didn’t execute their assignments, there were yards left on the field that a better running back (J.K. Dobbins) could have picked up. It’s unusual for productive run plays to require the entire unit up front to execute their blocks, and it’s not common that that happens, even on the best running teams. Usually three or four of the five linemen do a good job and the back is able to find the hole from those blocks.
And all of this is not to say that Denver had zero success against the Patriots, specifically while running the ball. RJ Harvey had three carries that went for nine yards and Stidham had one carry that went for eight, and then there were a handful of five yard rushes by the team as well.
On one of the nine-yard rushes, it took four of the five to do their job well. On another it was the same thing. And on the last nine-yard carry three of the five did their job well. Two of these plays featured Harvey finding the seam that the line was able to open up and one of them was him finding the proper cutback lane and bouncing the ball outside.
Maybe it’s an obvious answer, but the film shows that the Broncos were productive in running the ball when most of the linemen made their blocks and the backs hit the hole with speed and identified the rushing lane quickly. They failed when the backs hesitated or made the wrong read. Only one play went for a TFL and that was when Wattenberg just got his teeth kicked in.
Shocking, right? So what’s the takeaway?
The offensive line is a good unit. A one of the best units in the league. Even when three of their five guys have their worst game of the season they can find success and leave a good bit of yards out on the field. The running backs can be good but are not consistently making good reads or hitting the rushing lane with speed. And their quarterback played like a backup. Maybe it makes everything I’ve written up to this point useless, but I don’t think there is anything the film revealed that most of us didn’t already know. Denver absolutely has to get a running back, Dobbins or other, that can run in-between the tackles. Their offense sputters without that. But with it, the Broncos are one of the better offenses in the league.
The specifics
Run play – Inside Zone Lead – Gain of 2
Inside zone plays can be killed from the beginning if the playside offensive linemen cannot get vertical movement on their blocks. It muddies the look for the backs and can make it harder for them to find a rushing lane. When Ben Powers gets driven back a yard, I think in part by Wattenberg getting up to linebacker too soon, that just makes an obstacle for Harvey to have to navigate.
But when Harvey does get to the line of scrimmage, it’s brief, but he hesitates just enough where the defender is able to get in there and make the play. I think a hinderance to Harvey is his desire to bounce the ball outside, but when he does try to stay inside, he really wants to see this obvious rushing lane for him to take. The fact is that those lanes are just smaller in the NFL compared to the college game. Harvey needs to just hit this ball behind the lead block and get what he can. He should be able to manage an extra yard or so on this play.
Prentice also does not throw the best block here as he gets stuck in the hole he’s trying to create.
Run play – Inside Zone – Gain of 5
I don’t mind the play that McLaughlin is trying to make and I can see what he saw, but I really wish he just decided to stick with the blocks longer and let things develop. He likely would’ve seen Meinerz get the inside leverage on his block. There was a massive rushing lane behind Meinerz and Wattenberg on this play. Maybe even a 10-yard carry or more.
When your offensive line is getting this sort of lateral movement on the defense, that gives you a bit more time to stay behind them and wait for a lane to open up. One did but McLaughlin already decided to bounce it behind all of the blocks and into the heart of the defense.
Pass play – Drop back – Gain of 6
This was probably the best play of pass blocking all game from this unit.
The Patriots rush six and the Broncos have the numbers to match with Even Engram and Tyler Badie. The offensive line does a great job picking up their man, and Powers even has his hands on two rushers here. And I do think both Engram and Badie make good blocks here too (Badie usually is really smart in his pass protection and rarely has problems).
Nonetheless, Stidham gets the ball out quick and picks up a decent gain to set up third down and medium.
Run play – Power Lead – Gain of 2
This play hurts to watch.
When it comes to plays like the Power or Counter concepts, the playside down blocks are absolutely vital to the success of the play. It’s those blocks that create the space for the pullers to come behind and then make their blocks. The wall that Trautman, Bolles, and Powers form here is great. It’s really well done.
But issues arise when both Prentice and Meinerz go to block the same defender, leaving one unblocked man in the hole. Meinerz, since he’s the second one there, should be going outside of Prentice to pick up that man. And it appears that McLaughlin sees that unblocked defender in the hole and decides to attempt to bounce the ball outside.
This is a massive mistake. He would have been much better off just following his pullers and putting his shoulder into that defender. The blocks alone almost guarantee him a four-yard carry on this play.
Run play – Power Lead – Gain of 2
This is an example of the offensive line all doing a pretty good job on their assignments, but the play still doesn’t work out. And that’s because it’s not just the offensive linemen that block. You can the tight ends, wide receivers, and in this case, the fullbacks that need to execute for anything to happen.
The way that the linemen block up this Power suggests that a four or five yard carry should be possible. But Prentice whiffs on his kick-out block and that absolutely kills the play. When a player just lunges out at a defender and puts their eyes to the ground, bad things usually happen.
Final thoughts
There’s just a handful of details, and a big need, that is holding back this Denver offense. One fact is that they’ll never be good if they have to rely on Jarrett Stidham, but hopefully that will never happen again, especially in the playoffs. Another is that the offensive line usually puts up effective blocks but the team doesn’t have the kind of running back that can exploit these blocks. And then you have your auxiliary blockers making a mistake at inopportune times.
All of these shortcomings add up.
This would have been a much different game if the Broncos were able to pick up for or five yards a carry, rather than being limited to a handful of big runs that were surrounded by zero, one, or two-yard carries. This team could not stay ahead of the sticks and that cost them the game.
Am I worried about the future? No. Do they need to make some upgrades at the offensive line? Probably not, but they should be planning for the near future. Do they need to improve their running back room? Absolutely.
This should be a fun offseason. I can’t wait to see the offensive playmakers that they (hopefully) bring in.
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