Dre Greenlaw’s time with the Denver Broncos was supposed to be a story of resilience and revival for a big-time linebacker joining a team on the rise. Instead, it ended as more of an incomplete.
Greenlaw appeared on former NFL offensive tackle Terron Armstead’s podcast “The Set” and offered a candid look at everything that led him to Denver, what went wrong once he got there, and how the whole experience left him questioning his place in the league for the first time in his career.
Long before Greenlaw ever set foot in a Broncos facility, he was already fighting an uphill battle physically. Still recovering from a torn Achilles suffered during Super Bowl LVIII, he revealed that his injury woes compounded at the worst possible time heading into free agency.
“As we ended that 2024 season, after I had that Rams game, I ended up tearing my right plantaris muscle,” Greenlaw said. “Most people don’t know it’s a small muscle that’s in your calf. I was basically overusing my right side. I only played a half a game, playing like four plays, because I tore my right calf.”
Greenlaw made clear he knew he wasn’t fully himself heading into that final stretch of the 2024 season with San Francisco.
“I knew my team needed me,” he said. “We win that game, it puts us in a position where we could be in the playoffs… But I knew I wasn’t 100% myself.”
Greenlaw’s recruitment by the Broncos was, by his own account, a complicated and at times frustrating process. He had spent his entire career to that point with the 49ers and always imagined staying there. But the Broncos pushed hard.
Eventually the numbers came together, Denver made an offer, and San Francisco’s response was brief and final.
“I got the message sent to my phone,” Greenlaw said. “‘Congrats to Dre, but we’re not gonna match it. We appreciate you. We just wish him the best of luck for the rest of his career.’ And I’m like, ‘Damn.’ So I ended up committing to the Broncos.”
His one season in Denver produced just eight games, seven starts and 43 tackles. The issues weren’t effort or attitude — they were physical. Greenlaw acknowledged he never found the extra gear that had made him one of the more disruptive linebackers in the NFC just a few years earlier, which created an uncomfortable rotation at the position.
“It makes it tough when you pay a guy $11 million and he’s only on the field 50 percent of the time,” Greenlaw told Armstead. “The linebackers were playing really, really good at the time, so now I’m just taking reps from this guy. One week it’s this, one week it’s that, and it’s like, I’ve never been in that position before. Yeah, I just wasn’t happy. That’s really what it boiled down to at the end of the day.”
Despite the disappointment, Greenlaw expressed genuine appreciation for the Broncos organization, praising the training staff, his teammates and head coach Sean Payton. When Denver released him this spring, he returned to San Francisco on a one-year deal.
“Everything works out for a reason,” he said. “I don’t regret none of it. I’m thankful for it all, for Sean and everybody that accepted me into that organization. But yeah — I’m excited to be a Niner.”
Dre Greenlaw discusses signing with the Broncos in 2025 and how badly he wanted to re-sign with the 49ers. He said he had his agent call the 49ers repeatedly during that offseason, and that he had made a couple of phone calls to the team without his agent knowing to see if he… pic.twitter.com/nCCEmyGWhu
— Coach Yac 🗣 (@Coach_Yac) March 31, 2026