Exposing the Real Culprit in Broncos' Sustained Injury Woes
Over the recent years, the Denver Broncos have dealt with many injuries, with 2022 featuring an extremely high number. That elephant in the room is worth scrutinizing, as well as the specifics of Denver's bad injury luck.
Who's to blame for the Broncos' injury epidemic? The Broncos are poised to miss the playoffs for the seventh straight year, which, as you'll see, is no coincidence.
Let's examine who and what is really at fault for this bad 'luck' with the injury bug.
Baseline
To start this off, let's look at the 2017 season. The Broncos were near the bottom in the NFL in unique injuries that caused a player to miss a game.
So if a player had a broken hand that caused him to miss five games, that counts as one. It isn't how many games missed; it's how many different injuries caused a missed game.
The Broncos were healthy that year compared to their NFL peers. Despite that, Denver made a change at its strength and conditioning coach by hiring Loren Landow, who was popular among many Broncos players on the roster then.
A Sudden Nose-Dive
In 2018, the Broncos were in the top 10 for most unique injuries that caused a player to miss a game. Then in 2019, they were top seven and have been in the top five every year since 2020. So the Broncos were a relatively healthy team, as in not dealing with many unique injuries, to becoming one of the worst.
While ligament tears and others can be freak injuries, the number of soft tissue ailments also increased for the Broncos after the switch was made to Landow in 2018. Compared to the number of soft tissue injuries from 2014-17, they rose by nearly 30% in the 2018-2021 seasons. The 2022 season isn't included as the season is still ongoing, but it's already on track to meet the numbers from 2018-21.
The issue isn't just Landow, however. Not for the injury issues over the past couple of seasons.
Bad Personnel Decisions
Part of the issue is the Broncos' roster is built on players who consistently miss a lot of time, especially the 2022 squad, which has over 58 million salary-cap dollars and nearly $24 million in cash sitting on injured reserve. Over 28% of Denver's 2022 salary cap is sitting on injured reserve.
Outside of the issues of handling soft tissue preparedness by the strength and conditioning coach, how did Denver get here? A big culprit is the front office, and Denver's decision to spend money on 'cheap' signings because of missed action stands out.
Of the players sitting on injured reserve, nine stand out as key players. LT Garett Bolles, CB Ronald Darby, OLB Randy Gregory, WR Tim Patrick, RT Billy Turner, WR KJ Hamler, S Caden Sterns, RB Javonte Williams, and RB Mike Boone.
Those nine players have a combined 48 seasons in the NFL, but among them, the players in question have only played a full slate of games 11 times. So, in 37 combined seasons among the nine players, they've missed an average of 8.1 games per season. So this group has combined to miss half of the season since the switch to 17 games.
For some added context here, some of those missed games in this calculus were for suspensions, in the case of Gregory. So while they weren't injuries, it's still time missed, and yet, the Broncos were willing to hand Gregory a $70 million contract.
In the case of Patrick, Turner, and Boone, some of their missed action, respectively, was due to being lower on the depth chart earlier in their careers. However, taking out those seasons and games actually worsens the numbers.
Paton's Complicity
Seven players were signed, drafted, or extended by current Broncos GM George Paton. While he is expected back for the 2023 season, this issue is part of the reason why his seat is getting hot.
As for other moves made under Paton that have led to the building of this injury-decimated 2022 roster, there are five other signings, draft picks, or extensions worth looking at.
Paton handed a three-year, $30 million contract to DT D.J. Jones, despite him having just one entire season played in his career. In that entire season, Jones played 51% of the defensive snaps and is currently on pace to play 55% of the defensive snaps this season in Denver. Paton did something similar with Darby in the 2021 of-season.
LB Josey Jewell was re-signed relatively cheap after suffering a season-ending injury two weeks into the 2021 campaign. He has missed multiple games this season, and barring another injury, he will play in 16-of-34 games over the last two seasons after missing out on 48 in his first three years.
LB Baron Browning missed a few games as a rookie but has dealt with multiple injuries during the season, which started before training camp. He dealt with four different injuries as a rookie and has had a couple of different knicks and dings so far in his second season. Fortunately, he hasn't missed a lot of time (knock on wood) as a result.
OL Tom Compton was a cheap signing to help the Broncos' offensive line this past offseason, so his ongoing absence hasn't been a huge issue. However, in nine NFL years, Compton has played only two full seasons. While some of that is due to his position on the depth chart, he missed a fair amount of time due to injury, including his lack of play time so far in 2022.
The final player is nickel corner K'Waun Williams, who has been great when he's been on the field. He signed a cheap deal with the Broncos to be the starting nickel, which helps ease the fact he has never played an entire season in his career, primarily due to injuries. He has missed three games so far in 2022. Hopefully, he can remain available for the remainder.
Inviting the Bug
So the Broncos have put a lot of money into players with a rather extensive injury history. Now, rosters can't be built with players who never miss a game; that isn't going to happen in the game of football.
However, when you invest in injury-prone players, you can't be surprised when they get hurt. There's a reason the term 'injury prone' exists. Getting a guy on the relative cheap because he carries that label is more often than not going to be a bust of a signing.
Sure, some can work out, like Jones, who hasn't missed a game and is playing great. Even Jewell, Williams, and Browning have worked out despite missing games because they are playing at a high level when out there on the field and aren't missing too many games, at least so far.
The issue is when you sign three players with a combined 25 seasons in the NFL who have only three full seasons played because they're cheaper than the next guy. There is enough sample size to reasonably project these players will miss a significant amount of time, and it gets worse when you hand those three players over $100 million combined.
Bottom Line
The Broncos' injuries aren't surprising, nor should they be. The team has invested in players with the 'injury prone' label and employs a strength and conditioning coach with a higher rate of soft tissue injuries than any other coach in the NFL. Combined, you end up with over $58 million on injured reserve.
This is also why it doesn't matter how talented the Broncos are when they are healthy. Every NFL team would be better if they didn't suffer injuries.
The difference is, most other teams don't continue to invest in oft-injured players year after year as the Broncos have.
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