The gameplan, Sean Payton emphasized late Thursday night, did not have to be aesthetically pleasing to be effective. It was effective enough. The Broncos beat a shorthanded Chiefs team 20-13 at Arrowhead Stadium, on Christmas. But aesthetics or not, Denver continues to dance with fire, sitting at 13-3 with one game left to control their fate in the AFC.

Here’s The Denver Post’s stock report from a not-so-barnburner. A barn-cooler.

Stock up

Quinn Meinerz, mauling: Meinerz is a Pro Bowler for the first time this season for a reason. His omission in 2024 was a major oversight, and Meinerz hasn’t been quite as good in pass protection in 2025. But the Broncos’ right guard has again been one of the elite run-blockers in the business, and the big man put Chiefs star linebacker Nick Bolton in purgatory for long stretches Thursday.

It begun near-immediately, Meinerz tossing Bolton aside on the second play of the game to open up a first-down carry for RJ Harvey. It carried through for four quarters, Meinerz swatting Bolton aside at the second level to propel Jaleel McLaughlin for a 15-yard pop in the second half. The guard has consistently been the most important run-blocking piece on this Denver front, and he showed why again in an ugly game Thursday.

Bo Nix, using his legs: The Broncos’ second-year quarterback has pivoted strongly away from scrambling to run in his rookie season to scrambling to throw in his sophomore season. It’s often resulted in magic. It’s also resulted in incompletions, when Nix could’ve picked up chunk yardage with his legs. This played out again Thursday, as Nix climbed the pocket on one first-half third down with green grass in front of him — but chose instead to fire a wonky-footed ball to Courtland Sutton on a drag, his laser landing just a hair too long for Sutton’s outstretched fingertips.

Payton said postgame that Nix himself had “made a comment” to him that he could’ve tucked it and ran, and Payton reminded him the same.

“I said, ‘Man,’ ” Payton recalled, “‘you got running room here.’ ”

So Nix adjusted, with a 14-yard scramble and two chunk 8-yard pickups from the second quarter on. He darted in for a third-quarter touchdown, too, on a designed QB draw, the kind of call that Payton has largely saved for special red-zone occasions this season. The combination of Nix’s legs and processing is his greatest asset in this Denver offense, and Thursday’s performance could’ve unlocked more awareness from him to take 8-yard scrambles when they’re available.

P.J. Locke: After a no-questions-about-it rough performance in his first start of the season against the Jaguars on Sunday, Locke leveled up against the Chiefs on Christmas. He was involved in a few defensive miscommunications against Jacksonville, as quarterback Trevor Lawrence looked his way a few times; there were no such obvious occasions against Kansas City on Thursday. Locke allowed just two catches on three targets for a combined total of zero yards to the Chiefs, and came up with a huge third-down tackle for loss in the third quarter.

Yes, the Broncos were taking on a third-string quarterback in Chris Oladokun, who finished with a total of 66 passing yards. But Locke’s performance in Brandon Jones’ stead was still plenty encouraging.

The cleanup crew: Over the past five weeks — a non-insignificant sample size — Broncos reserve outside linebackers have been more productive than their $100-million-plus starting tandem of Nik Bonitto and Jonathon Cooper. It’s a point that production by the star edge duo has slowed — they’ve combined for just 3.5 sacks in that timeframe as late-season wear and tear has taken its toll. More importantly, it’s a point that Jonah Elliss and Dondrea Tillman are playing fresh, a welcome development as the Broncos head into the postseason.

The pair single-handedly shut down one Kansas City third-quarter drive, with all the momentum swinging the Chiefs’ way after a questionable-at-best pass-interference call on Pat Surtain. Elliss and Tillman got in for a split sack on Oladokun on first down, and then Elliss made a ridiculously athletic play in the flat to swallow up a short dump-off to JuJu Smith-Schuster on 3rd-and-long. Inspiring stuff.

After gritting through an injury-plagued season, Elliss has 1.5 sacks, three quarterback hits and two tackles for loss across the past three weeks. Tillman continues to show he’ll play in this league for a while, with four sacks, two interceptions and eight quarterback hits in his past 10 outings. This is a sneaky-important piece to a larger puzzle of Vance Joseph’s defensive success.

Stock down

Nix vs. two-high safety looks: Payton made clear postgame that the Chiefs played heavy doses of soft zone against Nix, an approach by defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo that turned out “differently than you thought going in,” as Payton said. It threw Nix off for long stretches in the first half, before he settled in for a 13-of-16 line in the second half and took a couple more shots.

The NFL is a copycat league, though, and defenses in the coming weeks could look at what Spanguolo did to limit Nix — who finished 26-of-38 for 182 yards, a touchdown and an interception — and throw some guardrails on the Broncos’ offense come playoff time. Nix took what the defense gave him a few too many times in the first half, ignoring some promising deep outs for receivers like Courtland Sutton and Lil’Jordan Humphrey in favor of short dump-offs. Denver needs to self-scout here to avoid getting stuck in the mud.

Hands: That Nix performance, though, was belied by a simple fact: his receivers didn’t much help him out in the first half. Courtland Sutton had two drops on would-be touchdown balls on the same drive in the second quarter. He tightened up in the second half, but this is becoming a worrisome trend for Denver’s offense.

The Broncos now sit at one more game played than most of the rest of the league, and pass it more often than most of the rest of the league, too. Still, Denver’s now tied with Jacksonville for the most drops (36) of any team in the NFL in 2025, according to Pro Football Focus. It’s a symptom of a young receiver room, and occasional timing issues with Nix. But Denver’s offense can’t afford to so consistently leave opportunities on the table.

Nik Bonitto: The Broncos’ star outside linebacker played within himself Thursday night and largely did his job in a cage-rush-heavy gameplan, with three pressures against the Chiefs. The goal was not to get sacks, as Payton said postgame. So Bonitto’s declining sack pace — 4.5 sacks in his last 10 games after 8 in his first six — shouldn’t be much of a concern. What should be a concern is the effort, production, and clear decline in overall explosiveness.