After the Denver Broncos bowed out of the wild card round of last year’s AFC playoff bracket, head coach Sean Payton posed a tantalizing ‘what if’ — what if the Broncos faced off against the Kansas City Chiefs, the two-time reigning Super Bowl champions in the playoffs?
“There was a lot of confidence in this team that if we could get past (the Bills in the wild card round), the next game we had to play, we felt real good about,” Payton said at his season-ending press conference.
As the seventh seed in the AFC, the Broncos would have traveled east to Kansas City to take on the top-seeded Chiefs if they had succeeded in upsetting the Bills in the first round. Instead, the Bills routed Denver 31-7 in Buffalo, rendering Payton’s ideal matchup a mere hypothetical.
The Chiefs have won five of the past six AFC titles, a staggering statistic that underscores their dominance not only in their division but the league as a whole. And yet Payton has a strong point — the Broncos have won two of their past three contests against Kansas City, though the most recent contest, a Week 18 blowout in which the Chiefs rested their starters, obviously did not feature both teams at full strength. The only Denver loss of the three came down to the final seconds and ended with a blocked Broncos field goal that would have secured an impressive road victory. Denver’s defense has caught up to, if not surpassed, Kansas City’s (the Chiefs haven’t scored 20 points on Denver since New Year’s Day 2023), and both head coaches have Super Bowl experience.
Even if the Broncos’ confidence in a prospective playoff matchup against one of the best postseason teams of this century seems premature, their eagerness to take it to a division rival is admirable. Denver plays in the best division in the AFC, one that features three 2024 playoff contestants in the Chiefs, Chargers and Broncos and a fourth squad, the Raiders, that has massively upgraded its quarterback, running back and head coach positions.
“We’re not looking backwards,” Payton said at that press conference. “We’re looking ahead, and it starts with the division.”
The Broncos jumped from eight wins in 2023 to 10 and a playoff berth in 2024, and roster additions, a promising draft class and another year in Payton’s system bode well for another jump this season. An AFC West division title — which would be Denver’s first since the Super Bowl season of 2015 — would be a major accomplishment. But is that goal realistic in a division with this decade’s dynasty and two other playoff contenders?
After the Broncos’ progress last season and aggressive offseason, the answer is an emphatic yes. Denver was active in free agency, plugging roster holes by signing proven veterans in running back J.K. Dobbins, tight end Evan Engram, linebacker Dre Greenlaw and safety Talanoa Hufanaga, and selecting two immediate difference makers in the draft in cornerback Jahdae Barron and running back RJ Harvey. But entering the season, the Broncos sit behind the Chiefs in the ESPN and NFL season projections and are neck-and-neck with last year’s second place team in the division, the Chargers.
These are the Broncos’ keys to running away with the AFC West in 2025.
Good health in 2025
Every NFL team needs good health to remain in contention, so this objective may seem obvious. But if the Broncos’ free agent class falls short of expectations, injuries will likely be a culprit. Engram, Hufanaga and Greenlaw all come to Denver with significant injury histories — none of the three players played in at least 10 of their team’s 17 games in 2024 — and the absences of any of those three players would be a staggering blow to their position groups. Dobbins, a key signing that joined the Broncos later in the offseason, has played in 22 games across the past four seasons and has never reached the 1,000-yard mark, despite an impressive career average of 5.2 yards per rush. Linebacker Alex Singleton also returns from injury after spending Denver’s final 14 games on the injured reserve. In 2024, the Broncos were one of the healthiest teams in the NFL (Denver ranked in the top five in Sports Info Solutions’ metric of total points missed per game on injured reserve), and a clean bill of health in the upcoming season would ensure the talented Broncos are playoff contenders once again.
Strong performances from offensive skill positions
The biggest question marks for the Broncos are in what I’d consider the prime fantasy football positions: running back, wide receiver and tight end. Quarterback Bo Nix is coming off a third-place finish in Offensive Rookie of the Year voting and is in a terrific spot heading into year two, with more experience in Sean Payton’s offensive system, an improved running back room to keep defenses guessing and elite offensive line and defensive units to support him. A Mac Jones-like sophomore slump feels unlikely, given Nix’s development to date and support system.
The bigger question marks are in the running back, wide receiver and tight end groups. The Broncos did not have a single player rush for more than 550 yards, and the running back trio of Javonte Williams, Jaleel McLaughlin and Audric Estime failed to post a single rush of 22 yards or more across the entire season. No Bronco has run for 100 yards or more in a game since the 2022 season. Denver certainly addressed the position group in the offseason with the addition of Dobbins and the draft selection of UCF’s RJ Harvey, and getting both acclimated to the offense and contributing immediately would be a boon for Nix and the offense as a whole. At wide receiver, Courtland Sutton enjoyed a career year in 2024 but enters his eighth season in the Mile High City with an uncertain contract situation and a lack of a reliable no. 2 receiver to pressure defenses. Marvin Mims Jr., Devaughn Vele, Pat Bryant and Troy Franklin are options to take a big step forward this year, but tight end Evan Engram (114 receptions in 2023) might be the favorite to fill that role if he can stay on the field. The Broncos ranked 19th in yards per game in 2024, and to catch the Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes and the Chargers’ Justin Herbert, they’ll need answers in the backfield and on the perimeter.
Improved record against playoff-worthy teams and division rivals
The criticism that the Broncos only made the playoffs because they beat up on bad teams feels unfair — Denver didn’t control its 2024 opponents and handled business when needed. But after losing all three games against Mahomes and Herbert, finishing 2-6 against eventual playoff teams and wiping out in the playoffs, the Broncos have a lot to prove against the AFC’s more established Super Bowl contenders. And those high-stakes games will be hugely important to the Broncos’ efforts to win their division and capture home-field advantage for a playoff game. Case in point: the Chiefs, winners of every AFC West title since 2016, have posted a winning division record in each of those years and won all six division games in 2016, 2019 and 2022.
Looking at the Broncos’ 2025 schedule, two stretches stand out as opportunities for the Broncos to forge their run at a division title. In weeks 3 through 5, the Broncos travel to Los Angeles to play the Chargers, host the Bengals for Monday Night Football and then fly out to Philadelphia for a road contest against the reigning Super Bowl champion Eagles. Escaping that stretch with a winning record on the season would help keep those AFC West hopes alive and help avoid last season’s slow start. The other key stretch will be the final six regular season games after the bye week. The sequence includes four games against four different playoff teams (the Commanders, Packers, Chiefs and Chargers) and two tricky games against improved Raiders and Jaguars squads. A primetime Christmas matchup in Kansas City against the Chiefs could very well decide the division and offer the Broncos the opportunity to avenge last season’s most devastating loss.
The Broncos enter training camp with their most optimistic outlook on their season in years. Armed with one of the league’s best defenses, a future Hall of Fame head coach, a talented quarterback on a rookie contract and a strong class of offseason acquisitions, Denver is well-positioned to return to the playoffs in 2025. But the Broncos have understandably set their sights higher — to end the Chiefs’ reign over the AFC West and to host a playoff game at Empower Field. Denver has quite the challenge on its hands in attempting to leapfrog the Chiefs and Chargers (and holding off Pete Carroll’s Raiders), but the Broncos enter 2025 with the pieces and infrastructure in place to make a real run at a division title — something the franchise hasn’t been able to claim in almost a decade.
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