Scouting Report
1 - Denver Broncos
Having finally won the big game, the Broncos
faced a big question. The answer they got
augurs well for another successful season
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Elway's eyes are open
to the fact that final season or no, it will be business as
usual for his
opponents.
(Al Tielemans)
| Having been
around the block a few times—not to mention under the pile,
in the grasp and on the turf—John Elway knows a little
something about the stark realities of pro football. Others
may regard his 16th and final NFL season as a victory tour,
but Elway isn't playing
along.
"Everyone is saying I can go out now and have fun and
relax, and that's the biggest pile of b.s. I've ever
heard," he says. "A farewell tour? I don't think
so. Like I'm going to go to other stadiums and they'll
cheer for me? It'll be, 'Let's all join
together and kill him one more
time.'"
When the legendary quarterback announced on June 1 that he
had elected to subject himself to a final season of
punishment, the air pressure over the Rocky Mountains eased
as if a major storm had blown over. That sigh of relief you
heard above all others emanated from Broncos coach Mike Shanahan, who had just
been spared the prospect of defending a
Super Bowl title with Bubby Brister as his
quarterback.
Elway did his share of exhaling as well. From the moment
the Broncos defeated the Packers 31-24 to win Super Bowl
XXXII last January, Elway was asked the Question by
reporters, teammates, friends, family members, an endless
stream of well-meaning Denver
fans and, not least, Shanahan, whose plans for free agency
and the draft were more than a little dependent on Elway's
answer.
When Elway agreed to come back, it changed everything for a
Broncos team that also kept the rest of its championship
roster virtually intact—and, as a result, should be
very much in the title hunt this season. Previous Super
Bowl winners of the
salary-cap era were decimated by free-agency defectors, but only two
Denver starters went elsewhere: guard Brian Habib (to
Seattle) and linebacker Allen Aldridge (to Detroit). Left
tackle Gary Zimmerman, one of the NFL's elite players over
the last 12 seasons,
announced his retirement for the second straight year but was
reportedly coaxed back into the fold by
Elway.
As ambivalent as Elway himself was about returning, he
swears his last hurrah will not be halfhearted. "I
thought about whether quitting would be in the back of my mind," he says. "I said to myself, 'If you're gonna make the decision, make it 100
percent, because it's not like you can coast through an NFL
season.'"
From all indications this summer, Elway's hyper-competitive
drive has not waned. "No, because he's put the John
Elway mystique at such a high level, and he doesn't want it
to slip," All-Pro tight end Shannon Sharpe says.
"He doesn't want to be like
another quarterback who came into the league when he did—I
won't name names, but he's a guy in the south part of the
United States—who's no longer the player that he
was." (That comment just might find its way onto the
locker room wall of Dan Marino's
Dolphins, who host Denver on Dec.
21.)
The Broncos' major upheaval will come next year, when, for
the first time since 1982, they will look to someone other
than Elway to provide stability at quarterback. Following a
legend has its headaches—just ask Steve Young—but
with Shanahan's inventive
game plans and All-Pro halfback Terrell Davis signed
through the 2006 season, this is one of the plum jobs in
sports.
| Schedule |
| Sept. | 7 NEW ENGLAND (Mon.) |
| 13 DALLAS |
| 20 at Oakland |
| 27 at Washington |
| Oct. | 4 PHILADELPHIA |
| 11 at Seattle |
| 18 OPEN DATE |
| 25 JACKSONVILLE |
| Nov. | 1 at Cincinnati |
| 8 SAN DIEGO |
| 16 at Kansas City (Mon.) |
| 22 OAKLAND |
| 29 at San Diego |
| Dec. | 6 KANSAS CITY |
| 13 at N.Y. Giants |
| 21 at Miami (Mon.) |
| 27 SEATTLE |
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Right now there are two young candidates to succeed Elway
in '99: third-round draft pick Brian Griese, who wowed
coaches in training camp with his quick grasp of Shanahan's
offense, and '96 fourth-round selection Jeff Lewis, who
suffered a torn anterior
cruciate ligament in his left knee in a February pickup
basketball game, then damaged his stock by telling his
coaches he had sustained the injury while
jogging.
It's also possible that the 36-year-old Brister could take
over as a short-term starter, but if neither Griese nor
Lewis emerges with haste, Shanahan is likely to go shopping
for a free-agent
signal-caller.
"It's unusual how quickly Brian has picked up our
system, and I've been impressed with the way he has handled
himself and with the way he has thrown," Shanahan
says. "But this is a year-by-year game now, and you
really don't know what you have at
quarterback until he's thrown into a situation where there's some
pressure."
Speaking of pressure, Shanahan hasn't given up hope of
persuading the 38-year-old Elway to return in '99.
"He's already trying," Elway says, "but it's
not gonna work this
time." —Michael
Silver
By the Numbers | Inside Slant | Lineup
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