Throwing Guru Tom House Reveals a Bo Nix Breakthrough Entering Year 2

When an NFL quarterback opts to work with a coach outside of the team during the offseason, not all head coaches are willing to endorse it. These days, good nutrition, rest, and recovery have replaced studying the playbook in the wee hours, but a quarterback's choice of quarterback gurus can still ruffle coaching feathers.

Not so for Denver Broncos head coach Sean Payton, who gave Bo Nix his blessing to work with renowned throwing expert and former major league pitcher Tom House as his offseason fine-tuner. House brings a wealth of experience to the table, including working with New Orleans Saints legend Drew Brees and Tom Brady, among others.

The evaluations House made of Nix are intriguing, but they also pull back the curtain on how far along the Broncos' quarterback is in his career trajectory.

"He's not Drew and he's not Tom Brady, but he has characteristics of both," House told Chris Tomasson of The Denver Gazette. "Not just mechanically and physically but mentally, emotionally and nutritionally. (Nix is) unique unto his own. He's got longer arms than Drew but he's not as tall as Tom (6-foot-2 to 6-4). He strides more like Tom than he does Drew, but the teachings are similar to all three."

You might have previously been under the impression that House simply makes sure Nix is releasing the ball correctly, but he also makes sure everything is squared away when it comes to the finer points of nutrition.

"Bo's nutrition was pretty good but there were some subtle things to change that help his recovery," House told Tomasson. "Sugar or complex (carbohydrates) are really bad for you, and so we're trying to get away from a carbohydrate-oriented diet to a protein-oriented diet... We're also making some subtle changes in the way he hydrates, and it's all designed to help his blood chemistry and his ability to recover quicker."

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Injecting just the right fuel into Nix's finely tuned engine sounds complex on the face of it, but House is aware that the bulk of his job is to identify the forensic details the quarterback needs to work on. That the process will inevitably get around to refining the mechanics of throwing the ball.

"He's a pretty complete product right now," House told Tomasson. "The things that I help Bo with are all small things that can make him more efficient and consistent and able to recover quicker. But he's a very good quarterback.

"His delivery is very solid. Maybe the only thing and this is no secret, but quarterbacks throw with their feet and the quicker their feet, the quicker their delivery time is going to be. Bo had a tendency to be a little long in his stride and a little long with his arm, so all we did basically is speed his feet up a little bit and that caused his stroke, his arm action, to also be a little quicker."

Now aged 78, House certainly has a 'been there, done that' type of aura about him, which makes it unsurprising to learn that it was he who caught Hank Aaron's record-breaking 715th home run from the confines of the Atlanta Braves bullpen back in 1974. When House speaks, his clients listen, and they also come away with four crucial bullet points to refer back to.

"There's four things that every one of these athletes, especially quarterbacks, have to have a really good command of," House said. "That's biomechanical efficiency, functional strength, mental emotion management and nutrition, sleep and recovery."

Nix reaching out to House could hint at how determined he is to make improvements to his overall game entering Year 2. That's music to the ears of any head coach.

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