Can Denver Learn From Detroit's Grit Lesson as Broncos Chart Course for 2026 Contention?

There is something happening in the NFL right now that should concern every fan sitting in the upper deck at Empower Field at Mile High, and conversely, it should also inspire hope. The Detroit Lions, after a disappointing 2025 campaign that saw them take a considerable step backward from their prior year's expectations, have made a very deliberate and very public pivot. They are embracing a return to the foundational elements of roster construction that had made them competitive in the first place. They are, in essence, going back to grit. They are going back to toughness. They are going back to physical football played by physical people. And as a Denver Broncos organization that finds itself at a critical juncture, with a young quarterback in Bo Nix who showed genuine promise as a rookie but needs a supporting cast that can elevate his game, we should be paying close attention to what Detroit is doing and more importantly, asking ourselves whether we have the courage to do something similar.

Let me be abundantly clear about what I mean by this. The 2025 Denver Broncos season was not a failure. It was not a disaster. But it was, by any reasonable measure, a season that fell short of expectations. We came into this year with optimism about Nix's development, about the potential of a defense that had been substantially rebuilt, and about the possibility that the organization had finally found its footing after years of carousel quarterbacking and directional uncertainty. We had reasons to believe. The offense showed flashes. The defense, for stretches, looked like it could be something special. But we did not sustain it. We did not put together complete games with regularity. We did not finish games the way champions finish games. We did not, frankly, look like a team that understood what it took to win in January.

Now, here comes Detroit with a very clear message about what went wrong with their season and what they intend to do to fix it. They are not going to be enamored with skill position talent alone. They are not going to fall in love with the guy who runs the fastest forty-yard dash or jumps the highest at the combine. They are going to be very intentional about finding players who understand that football is played in the trenches. Football is won and lost between the tackles. Football belongs to the physical teams, the teams that can impose their will on opposing defenses and offenses, the teams that refuse to be moved backward, that understand pain tolerance and willingness to compete every single play.

This is a lesson that the Denver Broncos organization should embrace with both arms and a full-throated commitment. Because if we are honest with ourselves, we have drifted away from that identity over the past few years. We have, in some ways, become enamored with potential and pedigree rather than temperament and toughness. We have drafted players based on what they could become rather than who they actually are as competitors. And while there are certainly exceptions to this rule, and certainly players on our roster who embody everything we should want, there is a noticeable gap between our current identity as a football team and the identity we need to have if we are serious about contending for championships.

Think about the great Denver Broncos teams. Think about the Orange Crush defenses of the seventies. Think about the teams that John Elway led to back-to-back Super Bowl victories in the late nineties. Think about the 2015 defense that was fundamentally transformed by a coaching staff that believed in establishing a clear physical identity and then finding players who fit that identity rather than trying to retrofit players into a system. What did all of those teams have in common? They were uncomfortable to play against. They hit you. They moved you. They made you work for every yard. They understood that football, at its core, is about physical dominance. Yes, talent matters. Yes, schemes matter. Yes, coaching matters tremendously. But nothing matters more than this: Do your players want it more than the other team's players? Are your guys willing to be tougher, nastier, more physical than the opposition?

The Detroit Lions learned a very hard lesson in 2025. They learned that you cannot simply collect talent and expect it to coalesce into a football team that can win when the stakes are highest. They learned that the intangibles matter. The way players carry themselves, the way they approach practice, the way they prepare themselves mentally and physically for the rigors of a sixteen-game season and potentially a playoff run, those things are absolutely crucial. And now, as they prepare for the 2026 season and beyond, they are committing to a specific type of player. They are committing to the sandwich linebacker. They are committing to the defensive lineman who is going to eat snaps and disrupt in the backfield. They are committing to offensive linemen who are going to show up to work every single day ready to maim somebody in a legal and sanctioned fashion. They are committing to a physical football identity.

Now, the Denver Broncos find ourselves in a position where we need to have a similar conversation internally. We have Bo Nix at quarterback, a young man who, despite his rookie struggles, showed us enough to believe he could be our franchise quarterback. We have pieces on defense. We have a coaching staff that is capable. What we need to do is make sure that every single person we add to this roster, every single player we bring into the building, every single draft pick we make, aligns with a very clear and very specific identity. We need guys who understand that playing for the Denver Broncos means accepting a responsibility to represent excellence and toughness in equal measure.

This does not mean we ignore talent evaluation. This does not mean we suddenly start drafting interior linemen in the second round when there is a star receiver sitting there waiting to be selected. It means that talent becomes a threshold qualification, not the sole determinant of whether we bring a player into our organization. It means we ask harder questions about character. It means we spend more time understanding how a player approaches the game mentally and emotionally. It means we prioritize the combine drills that tell us something about a player's competitiveness and willingness to work, not just the ones that tell us how fast or how strong they are.

The Lions understood that their 2025 season went off the rails because they lost focus on what makes them special, what makes them different, what makes them difficult to play against. Now, as we survey the landscape of the 2026 offseason, with free agency approaching and the draft on the horizon, the Denver Broncos organization needs to ask itself the same question: Do we know who we are? Do we have a clear identity? Are we willing to commit to finding players who embody that identity, even if it means passing on some talented guys who do not fit?

This is the moment for clarity. This is the moment for direction. Detroit is pointing the way forward, and we would be foolish not to follow.