Sean Payton made it clear Monday: The Broncos need to be more assertive in running the football.
He saw the same numbers as everybody else: 14 passes and three runs on Denver’s first 17 snaps against Tennessee. By the end, 43 drop-backs for quarterback Bo Nix.
Payton suggested the discrepancies, which closed some with a bruising, 95-rush-yard fourth quarter, were not a matter of being pass-happy but instead a matter of letting Tennessee’s defense too often set the terms.
“I have to be better there,” he said. “And it’s one of those day-afters where you look back and say, ‘All right, let’s look at how we really wanted to start this game,’ and get those two runners going because we think we’ve really improved in that area.”
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The third-year Denver coach acknowledged that his set of “openers” — plays scripted into the early part of the game — featured more passes than runs, but said the numbers started to get out of whack over the rest of the half.
If Tennessee showed a defensive look, it more often than not had Nix checking out of a run and into a pass. Or throwing the ball on run-pass options.
“Then all of a sudden you’ve thrown the ball 14 times and run the ball three times,” Payton said.
By halftime, the Broncos had 23 drop-backs and nine called runs, including a Nix sneak and kneeldown to end the half.
In the second half, Denver had 20 drop-backs and 19 called runs, including two sneaks and a kneeldown.
Denver only had 56 yards on its first 18 carries but finished with 151 – including 133 combined on 22 carries for top backs RJ Harvey and J.K. Dobbins. The biggest shot of damage came on Harvey’s 50-yard run that flipped the field and set up Dobbins’ 19-yard touchdown scamper.
“We finally got to get a couple called in a row, and our defense gave us the opportunity to stick with the run game late into the game,” right tackle Mike McGlinchey said Monday. “(They) allowed us to stay patient enough to kind of get a rhythm in that area of the offense, and the two backs we have are great players. We have to afford them the opportunity to touch the ball more.”
RJ Harvey (12) of the Denver Broncos runs ahead of Cedric Gray (33) of the Tennessee Titans for a 50-yard run during the fourth quarter of the Broncos' 20-12 win at Empower Field at Mile High on Sunday, Sept. 7, 2025. (Photo by AAron Ontiveroz/The Denver Post)
RJ Harvey (12) of the Denver Broncos runs ahead of Cedric Gray (33) of the Tennessee Titans for a 50-yard run during the fourth quarter of the Broncos’ 20-12 win at Empower Field at Mile High on Sunday, Sept. 7, 2025. (Photo by AAron Ontiveroz/The Denver Post)
One interesting element about that stretch run: Both big plays came on gap runs, as did a 12-yarder for Dobbins when Denver was backed up deep in its own territory with 4:09 remaining.
Among the offseason storylines for the Broncos was the amount of work they’d put into working on outside zone, and the players thought it could add to their run game repertoire.
McGlinchey has done this before.
The Broncos right tackle spent the first five years of his career in San Francisco, where coach Kyle Shanahan oversees an offense rooted in the same principles of his father, Mike, the godfather of outside zone.
Broncos fans of a certain age remember when Mike Shanahan, offensive line coach Alex Gibbs and Denver built offenses in the 1990s that would eventually win Super Bowls on the back of wide zone.
Over the better part of the past decade, it’s again proliferated around the NFL as the Shanahan coaching tree blossomed from San Francisco and Los Angeles to Minneapolis, Green Bay, Miami and more.
But outside zone takes a big time investment to run at all, let alone run well.
“It takes a long while for everybody to get comfortable for what that type of scheme asks you to do as a player,” McGlinchey said. “It’s high-risk run game, right? You’re asking people to stretch landmarks, you’re asking people to believe in the guy behind them, and the combination of somebody moves away from you, that he’s got your back no matter what. You’re asking a lot of the perimeter players of your offense to continue to play hard in the run game.
“It’s a complete marriage of all 11 guys doing the same thing at the same time to get that thing to work. So yeah, it’s going to take time. I think we’ve got to execute a little bit better, but there were some good things on that tape yesterday that are really positive moving forward.”
Payton’s always been a purveyor of a varied run game, more so than most of the direct descendants of the Shanahan tree.
Denver used outside zone principles a handful of times against the Titans, but with modest success. A count by The Post — without, of course, full insight into how the Broncos offense categorizes every running play — tallied five outside zone runs for a total of 12 yards. Three in the first half, two in the second and none in the fourth quarter.
Payton said after the game Sunday night that the staff needed to "look closely at what we’re doing and, as coaches, look closely at what our strengths are."
Whether that means more outside zone, less, different sequencing or some combination remains to be seen. Payton made it clear, though, that he wants to be more aggressive.
McGlinchey, meanwhile, is hoping the outside zone remains a solid part of Denver’s menu.
“Hopefully, we earned the right to do more of it,” he said.
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Originally Published: September 8, 2025 at 4:52 PM MDT