The Denver Broncos have had some good fortune with a trio of oft-injured players while getting some not-so-good news with a fourth. As they attempt to climb out of the NFL doldrums and improve upon Sean Payton’s eight-win first season, the Broncos need these players to step up.

These are positions that are widely considered a concern for the Broncos, as they need help with each. Those four positions: tight end, safety, linebacker, and wide receiver. Let’s examine each of these four players and why the Broncos are relying on them to get and stay healthy in 2024.

As training camp got underway, there was good news on the Dulcich front. He avoided the physically unable to perform (PUP) list and was ready to go as camp practices got underway. With a few days of practices behind them, it’s been good for the young tight end, but he’s always delivered solid practices when healthy.

As a rookie, Dulcich showed he could affect an offense, and while the time was limited, he also revealed why Payton was calling him the ‘joker’ before the 2023 season — until he got hurt before halftime in the season opener. In the 2023 season-opener against the Las Vegas Raiders, the Broncos’ offense completely shifted after Dulcich went down.

Without Dulcich, the Broncos ran 12 more plays for 11 more yards than when they had him and needed a defensive pass interference to help keep a drive alive. Dulcich was helping create favorable matchups for the Broncos offense, so his two catches for 22 yards don’t fully reflect his impact on that game before he pulled his hamstring. He only saw time in one additional game later on in the season, being sidelined with an additional foot injury.

Dulcich’s promise as a receiver is enticing. But his hamstring injuries date all the way back to his rookie year.

This is why the Broncos are still sticking with Dulcich despite the issue of staying on the field. He could be the guy for them at the tight end position, but he has to remain on the field. There’s no way around it, though; the Broncos are betting on a guy who has played 529 snaps over two seasons when the offense has played 2,208 snaps over that span, or 24% of the offense snaps. 

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Sterns is entering the fourth and final year of his rookie contract. After being a part-time rookie, he has barely played the last two seasons.

In fact, by the start of the 2024 season, Sterns will have played two regular-season snaps in over 700 days. The bad news is that he’s starting out on the PUP list, though he is expected back before the start of the season. 

Sterns was purported to be a part of a three-way battle for a starting safety spot, vying with P.J. Locke and Brandon Jones. The Broncos are looking to replace Justin Simmons, which is a challenging task.

Sterns was once tabbed as a starter, but the injuries have derailed that momentum. The loser of the three-way battle will likely still have a significant role on defense as the third safety, unless JL Skinner can win that spot. If Skinner rises up, the Broncos won’t be so dependent on Sterns snapping his injury bad-luck streak.

In the three years Sterns has been with the team, the Broncos have had roughly 3,370 snaps on defense, and he has played 587 of them, or about 17.5% of the snaps, with 53% coming in his 2021 rookie season. His injuries have been on the severe side, and while they don’t typically linger (like Dulcich’s hamstrings), they do cause the player to miss significant time.

Those injuries can also take a more significant toll on the player’s body than the smaller lingering issues. That said, after the second day of training camp practice, Coach Payton said, “[Sterns] has a long road ahead of him,” as he works back from his knee injury to start last season. 

Griffith is battling for the starting linebacker spot to replace Josey Jewell with Cody Barton. Griffith missed all of the 2023 season but played 591 snaps between 2021 and 2022, slightly better than Sterns.

Griffith, like Sterns, showed flashes of being a quality starter but has needed help staying on the field. Griffith has a chance to be a starter now, but like the others, he has to remain on the field. 

However, out of all the players, no one has had a worse few years than Patrick, who suffered season-ending injuries in 2022 and 2023 training camp, a year apart. He’s back, and based on reports out of minicamp and OTAs, he’s back with a vengeance.

The Broncos have reworked their wide receiver room and even adjusted Courtland Sutton’s contract, but they still need Patrick back at a high level. Before each of the injuries in the last two seasons, some reporters suggested Patrick would be the Broncos’ top receiver. 

There is good and bad news for the injured players the Broncos are betting on. They need each other to step up, but even more importantly, they need each other to get healthy, stay healthy, and be available. That’s the first step to making something of the 2024 season.

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After being traded from the LA Clippers to the Utah Jazz, nine-time NBA All-Star Russell Westbrook was waived by Utah and will sign with the Denver Nuggets as a free agent. In a report from The Athletic’s Shams Charania, it was revealed that Westbrook is joining the Nuggets on a two-year contract worth $6.8M that includes a player option for the second season.

Westbrook will join the Nuggets as a much needed rotation guard after Denver lost both Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and Reggie Jackson this summer. Capable of a lot more of what Denver needs than what Jackson was able to do last season, Westbrook should help the Nuggets in several different ways.

Westbrook appeared in 68 games for the Clippers last season, only missing time due to a fractured left hand that cost him three weeks. Averaging 11.1 PPG, 5.0 APG, and 4.5 APG in just 22.5 minutes per game, Westbrook became the only qualifying player in NBA history to reach those averages in less than 23 minutes per game.

Also one of the NBA’s best on-ball guard defenders last season, Westbrook was often tasked with defending the other team’s best player when on the court. This is a responsibility he will almost certainly see more of next season with the Nuggets losing Caldwell-Pope to the Orlando Magic in free agency.

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Despite being hobby homebrewers and longtime craft beer enthusiasts, Aaron Uhl and Dan Colbourne had never visited Renegade Brewing Co. in Denver before this spring.

For months prior, the two Coloradans had been prospecting locations to open a new brewery. When they heard about Renegade’s plans to close, they decided it was time to pop in for a pint.

The vibe and sense of community in the taproom won them over almost immediately and by July, they had inked a deal with the previous owner to purchase the spot at 925 W 9th Ave., along with the brewery’s recipes, equipment, website and other intellectual property.

“What Aaron and I were looking for was something that had a taproom-centric setup, but did not have distribution. We do not want distribution,” Colbourne said. “As we talked about opening organically, we felt it made much more sense with an established presence, an established clientele, and something that had a brand with history that we could take and build on.”

Renegade Brewing Co., originally founded in 2011, tentatively plans to reopen on Aug. 17 under the same name and new ownership. Uhl has brewed professionally in Colorado since 2018, most recently as the proprietor of Uhl’s Brewing Co., which operated in Boulder from 2020 to 2023. Colbourne currently works as a CFO with a background in business acquisitions.

At first, Renegade’s taps will serve guest beers from popular breweries along the Front Range, including some of Uhl’s previous collaborators like River North Brewery, WestFax Brewing Co. and Goldspot Brewing Co. The owners plan to replace the Renegade brewhouse with a new, 10-barrel brewing system and ditch many of the onsite fermentation vessels so they can expand the taproom’s footprint. While that is in the works, Uhl hopes to create original beers with some of the aforementioned partners to serve at Renegade.

By this fall, drinkers can expect to find house-made beverages, Colbourne said, including some of Renegade’s original staples. The lineup may also include some non-alcoholic options, he added.

Uhl encourages longtime patrons to stop by and let him know which old Renegade recipes they’d like to see on the new menu. “We’re going to let the community pick their top three beers for the core lineup,” he said.

“The idea is we want to take three months to offer beers across a wide spectrum to see what consumer is looking for,” Colbourne added.

Beer drinkers will see Uhl’s signature styles on the menu as it evolves. Uhl estimates he brewed 275 unique beers during the three years that Uhl Brewing Co. was open, but his specialties are barrel-aged beers, strong ales and dank IPAs. He also spent a stint in Brussels last year where he learned to blend lambics from the pros.

“Our new tagline is ‘styles be damned, nothing is sacred,’” Uhl said.

Both Uhl and Colbourne said there are many details of the new operation that will be worked out in the coming months, and they hope local customers will help shape the brewery’s evolution.

“One thing we noticed when we went there is Renegade is really a neighborhood get-together,” Colbourne said. “That sense of community is something we want to rebuild and leverage.”

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