Every NFL season has its dark horse stories. The players who arrive at training camp under the radar and exit December as full-fledged contributors.
Last season, Ja’Quan McMillian filled that role for the Broncos, emerging as one of the more impactful players on a defense that finished the year in the AFC Championship game. The question heading into 2026 is who steps into that lane next.
On a recent edition of “Stokley and Evans, with Mark Schlereth” on 104.3 The Fan, Brandon Stokley didn’t take long to settle on his pick.
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“I’m going (Evan) Engram,” Stokley said, when asked for his prediction.
It’s a name that comes with mixed baggage in Denver. Engram arrived last offseason with significant expectations. A veteran tight end with Pro Bowl pedigree and a reputation for being a matchup nightmare in the middle of the field. The production didn’t quite live up to the hype. Engram finished his first season with the Broncos posting 50 catches for 461 yards and just one touchdown. Solid numbers, but not the breakout impact most expected when he signed.
For some fans, that line was enough to lower expectations heading into year two. Stokley sees it differently. He believes the conditions for a much bigger season are now in place.
“Second year in the offense, more comfortable. Davis Webb (is) gonna open this thing up,” Stokley explained.
Familiarity with a Sean Payton offense, even one now being called by Davis Webb, tends to translate into real production gains in Engram’s second season. The mental processing speeds up. The route nuances become second nature. The chemistry with the quarterback deepens through hundreds of additional reps that no rookie offseason can replicate. For a player like Engram, whose value lives in subtle separation and post-snap creativity, that kind of comfort can be the difference between an average season and a Pro Bowl one.
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Stokley also pointed to the broader offensive context that makes Engram’s path easier this year.
“You got (Jaylen) Waddle to take pressure off of him. So I think he gets highlighted more this year,” Stokley said.
That’s the structural piece that gets overlooked. The addition of Waddle to the receiving corps fundamentally changes how defenses have to align against the Broncos. Courtland Sutton continues to demand top-coverage attention. Waddle pulls a safety with his speed. Marvin Mims and Troy Franklin both stretch the field in their own ways.
The result is a defense that simply cannot allocate the kind of resources to Engram that it could last season. He’s going to see more single coverage. He’s going to see more favorable looks across the middle. And against the kind of mismatches he typically draws, linebackers and slot defenders, Engram has historically been one of the more reliable separators in the league.
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Add in a new play caller in Davis Webb who is likely to look for ways to weaponize his tight end early and often, and Stokley’s bet starts to look less like a long shot and more like an informed projection.
The dark horse label fits because the expectations have been reset. But Stokley is convinced that by the end of the year, no one in Denver is going to be calling Evan Engram underrated anymore.