Denver Broncos

The Broncos are on track to be without one of their running backs for Sunday’s game against the Jaguars.

Adam Schefter of ESPN reports that RJ Harvey is not expected to play in Week 2. Harvey missed Wednesday’s practice with a hamstring injury and was listed as questionable after a pair of limited practices to close out the week.

Harvey had three carries for 18 yards and four catches for 23 yards in Denver’s Week 1 loss to the Chiefs.

J.K. Dobbins is the top back for the Broncos with rookie Jonah Coleman and Tyler Badie set to move up the depth chart in Harvey’s absence.

That strange rule no one seemed to know about had a major impact on the Week 1 game between the Saints and Lions. And there’s a reason no one knew about it, beyond the fact that it apparently had not been applied in years, if ever.

A very similar play happened during the AFC Championship. But the rulebook’s get-out-of-backward-pass-free card was never mentioned.

It started with 2:59 to go in the first half. The Broncos, leading the Patriots 7-0, had the ball at their own 33, facing third down and four. Denver quarterback Jarrett Stidham (not Drew Brees) got the snap in shotgun formation. Stidham dropped back, apparently looking to set up a screen pass. Patriots linebacker Christian Ellis gave chase.

Stidham started his throwing motion. Before he got rid of the ball, Ellis made contact with Stidham. The pass, which was initially deemed to have gone forward, ultimately was determined to have been a backward pass, recovered by the Patriots.

The main source of the controversy — and the post-game pool report — was the decision to rule the play dead upon recovery, taking New England’s touchdown off the board.

Said referee Alex Kemp after the game: “I initially ruled it as a forward pass, which was incorrect. I proceeded to go through the administration of an intentional grounding foul. The down judge and the umpire came and talked to me and provided more information. The down judge explained that he extended his right arm to signal that he had a backward pass and at that point we determined that New England had picked up the then backward pass. We awarded possession to New England with no advance, because at that point we are not allowed to permit an advance.”

There was no mention during or after the game about the possibility that Ellis’s contact with Stidham after he started his throwing motion meant that any pass thrown was necessarily a forward pass, even if it went backward. That’s the provision that saved the Lions from a defensive scoop and score by the Saints in Week 1.

Now, it’s possible that a frame-by-frame review of the play would have resulted in a ruling that Stidham started his throwing motion, ended it, and got hit by Ellis before starting it again. But it was close enough that the rule no one knew about should have been mentioned, and arguably fully explained, at some point in the process. Because it would have been a forward pass, even if it went backward, if the final ruling was that Ellis had hit Stidham after he began his throwing motion.

And so, instead of the Patriots getting screwed by the ruling on the field of a forward pass, it’s possible the Broncos got screwed by the failure to apply the rule that worked against the Saints on Sunday. But no one knew about it, because no one knew about the bizarre rule that turns a backward pass into a forward pass.

Bottom line? If that rule had been mentioned, discussed, and/or applied in the AFC Championship, 48.6 million football fans would have become aware of it. And it wouldn’t have been nearly as stunning to first learn about this rulebook quirk in Week 1 of the 2026 season.

The Broncos opened the regular season with a dud against the Chiefs, but they’re not making too much of one result as they prepare for Sunday’s home opener against the Jaguars.

Quarterback Bo Nix threw an interception and lost one of his three fumbles in the 31-10 loss to a divisional rival. He was sacked four times in the game and the Broncos only had 176 total yards of offense, which is the kind of performance that might have some wondering if the offense somehow lost its way on the way into the regular season.

On Thursday, Nix said that’s not the case in Denver and that the team still believes they’re built the right way for success.

“Overall, we’re not going to press the panic button and we’re not freaking out,” Nix said, via the team’s website. “We’re not starting from scratch or anything. We feel like we’re still in a good spot, we just didn’t play great by any means, and we’ve got to play better.”

The Jaguars are coming off a more impressive start, although a home win over the Browns is certainly a different degree of difficulty than a Monday night trip to Arrowhead Stadium. Jacksonville won in Denver last season as well, so the Broncos will have to be much sharper if they’re going to avoid a week of listening to stats about how few teams go from 0-2 to making it to the playoffs.

The Brian Flores litigation has uncovered a potentially significant document through a subpoena issued to the Korn Ferry search firm. And Korn Ferry is trying to keep the document out of public view.

The document has been designated as confidential under a general protective order that allows the parties to claim that certain materials should not be disclosed. Flores’s lawyers have challenged the effort to keep it secret.

Via Daniel Kaplan, Korn Ferry filed paperwork on Thursday in support of the effort to keep the document under seal. Korn Ferry argues, among other things, that “whether the limited information from Exhibit A that Korn Ferry requests remain sealed is purportedly `discriminatory’ or `retaliatory,’ such that it supports and is relevant to Plaintiff’s claims in the Supplemental Complaint, has no bearing on whether Korn Ferry is legally entitled to have Exhibit A remain under seal.”

This statement suggests, as Kaplan notes, that Flores’s lawyers have argued that the document helps prove that he was the victim of discrimination and/or retaliation.

The document in question, which one source called “insane,” was generated by Korn Ferry in connection with a coaching search conducted by the Raiders. The precise Raiders coaching search isn’t specified; the Raiders have hired new coaches in 2026, 2025, 2024, 2022, and 2018.

If the document shows potential retaliation, it means that it came from a coaching search after the filing of Flores’s lawsuit, on February 1, 2022. Because the Raiders hired Josh McDaniels on January 31, 2022, it would limit the potential application of the document to the search that resulted in the hiring of Antonio Pierce in 2024, Pete Carroll in 2025, or Klint Kubiak in 2026.

Two of those searches happened after Tom Brady — who played for the Patriots when Flores served on the coaching staff there — became a minority owner of the team.

Regardless of whether the document comes to light in the short term, it’ll definitely be disclosed and discussed if/when the case goes to trial. If the document is truly bad for the NFL and the various teams that have been sued, it could result in the case being settled before the document ever comes to light.

Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce got away with a hold on Patrick Mahomes’ 15-yard touchdown run on Monday night.

Kelce acknowledged on his New Heights podcast that he could have been called for holding Broncos safety Talanoa Hufanga on the play, which gave the Chiefs a 7-0 lead in a game they would go on to win 31-10.

“It was definitely a questionable play,” Kelce said. “That’s one of those where you get up slowly like, ‘Please don’t be any laundry on the field.’ I had the man up by his neck Can’t do it. Can’t do it. Almost cost us. That would’ve been Patrick Mahomes’ second rushing touchdown called back in two plays, it was the same thing. That would’ve taken us out of the red zone. That was risky business. You know what? Sometimes you’re just living right.”

Kelce’s hold was shown on the TV broadcast, but none of the officials on the field had a good view of it, and holding isn’t reviewable on replay. Kelce got away with one.

The Monday Night Football opener drew a big audience, with the Chiefs’ 31-10 win over the Broncos getting 23.2 million viewers.

That number includes everyone who watched the main broadcast on ESPN and ABC, the ManningCast on ESPN2, the Spanish broadcast on ESPN Deportes and the stream on NFL+. ESPN did not announce how many viewers watched on each platform that showed the game.

It was ESPN’s most-watched Monday Night Football Week 1 game and third-most watched Monday night game ever, although historical comparisons can be misleading because ratings today count out-of-home viewers who previously weren’t counted.

This year’s audience was 5 percent greater than last year’s Week 1 Monday Night Football audience, which was 22.1 million viewers.

The pregame show Monday Night Countdown, had 1.9 million viewers, a 7 percent increase over Week 1 last year. That’s a fairly small increase given that Monday Night Countdown now airs on both NFL Network and ESPN.

The Broncos didn’t practice on Wednesday, but they said they would have been missing a couple of offensive players if they had gotten on the field.

Running back RJ Harvey (hamstring) and wide receiver Marvin Mims (foot) were both listed as non-participants on the team’s injury report. The Broncos played on Monday night and both players took part in the game.

Harvey had three carries for 18 yards and four catches for 23 yards in the 31-10 loss to the Chiefs. Harvey also returned four kickoffs while Mims returned a pair of punts. The next two days should provide hints about whether their status for this Sunday against the Jaguars is up in the air or if the quick turnaround impacted their estimated practice status.

Linebacker Jonah Elliss (shoulder) and wide receiver Troy Franklin (knee) were both listed as full practice participants.

With the Broncos seemingly concerned that their contact with Drew Brees prior to the AFC Championship could put them in a tampering jackpot, we decided to ask the league whether the specific situation runs afoul of the rules.

The NFL declined comment.

It’s not clear what that means. If it’s a nothing burger, the league easily could have said so.

The problem for the Broncos is that the NFL enforces the tampering rules unpredictably and sporadically. More often than not, the league looks the other way. During the days of rampant tampering in and around the Scouting Combine, the NFL rarely does anything about it.

Sometimes, however, the NFL decides to make an example out of someone. In this case, the effort to feed ESPN an interesting story for the first Monday night pregame show of the season has also handed the league enough evidence to take action, if it chooses to do so.

The only question remaining is whether the NFL will choose to do so.

Again, it doesn’t take a complaint from the team that holds a player’s rights. The Dolphins were hammered for tampering with Sean Payton and Tom Brady, based on evidence the NFL tripped over during an unrelated investigation.

Here, the evidence fell into the NFL’s laps. Thanks to a report that pushed the idea that the Broncos contacted Brees at a time when he remained on the Saints’ reserve-retired list.

On Monday, Adam Schefter of ESPN reported that the Broncos talked to quarterback Drew Brees about joining the team for the AFC Championship, without acknowledging that Brees’s status on the Saints’ reserve-retired list made the move impossible.

What is possible, based on Schefter’s report, is a tampering case against the Broncos.

Schefter reported that former Broncos offensive coordinator Joe Lombardi and former Broncos offensive assistant Pete Carmichael spoke to Brees about a potential unretirement. Brees has since told Ed Werder that the former Saints assistants contacted Brees about the possibility. On Tuesday, Broncos coach Sean Payton offered a different version regarding who called whom.

“Drew had reached out, I think, right after the championship or right after the playoff win against Buffalo,” Payton told reporters. “I think he called Pete, probably texted Pete or Joe, those guys. None of it even came to my attention. So, when the story came up in Canton, I kept thinking they were just talking about the COVID season. Even in the COVID season when he and I discussed possibly coming back for a Monday night game, he had trouble throwing it. So, I don’t think really anything really came of it. I think in Drew’s mind, there’s that competitor in him. So, I was kind of out of the loop. I don’t think it’s a big story, but nonetheless, certainly one that once they described it to me, it just never got to my level, I guess. He had reached out to Pete, I think, and then Joe.”

Payton is smart. Very smart. The last thing he needs is the league office thinking the Broncos reached out to a player who is technically under contract with the Saints, without permission from the Saints. Even if the Saints don’t file a tampering complaint, the league can act without one. For example, the NFL whacked the Dolphins in 2022 for tampering after it stumbled over evidence that Miami had tampered with Payton and Tom Brady while investigating an unrelated matter.

And while it technically doesn’t matter if Lombardi and/or Carmichael contacted Brees or Brees contacted them, the situation has a different vibe if someone from the Broncos made the first move without first realizing that Brees wasn’t and isn’t a free agent.

Time will tell if the league does anything about it. The Broncos’ effort to recast the interaction as being initiated by Brees suggests that, at some level, the Broncos are concerned about coming under the inconsistent and unpredictable scrutiny of Big Shield.

After Monday night’s 31-10 loss to the Chiefs, Broncos quarterback Bo Nix called the experience a “nasty wakeup call.” Coach Sean Payton had a different term for it on Tuesday.

“Certainly a slap in the face,” Payton told reporters. “When you come off training camp and your offseason program, it’s one thing to lose in a hard-fought game where you feel like you played well. I don’t feel like we played up to our standard, and certainly that starts with us as coaches, myself. So yes, it’s disappointing. That would be a great way to describe it.”

A loss in Week 1 — especially to a division rival — has to be difficult to stomach. For months, it’s officially been the next game. There’s been extra time to prepare. And to basically serve up a no-show makes it even worse.

Especially for a team that won the top seed in the conference last year, and that hopes to take it to the next level with a Super Bowl appearance.

There’s no time to sulk, however. The Jaguars, who ended Denver’s 11-game winning streak last December, are up next. Then the Rams. Then the 49ers. Then the Chargers. Then the Seahawks.

Denver lost only three games in 2025. They could match that number by Week 6.

If they play like they did last night, they’ll beat it.