BOULDER — I mean, sure, you could start a fight with Jordan Seaton. I’m just not sure you’d finish it.

Not in one piece, at any rate.

“Are the older guys … cool with you?” I asked the best lineman to sign with the Buffs out of high school since Jake Moretti as we kibitzed outside the Champions Center on Monday.

“Yes,” Seaton, CU’s five-star true freshman tackle replied.

“So no hazing?”

He raised an eyebrow.

“Hazing?”

He raised another.

“Like rookies carrying veterans’ pads at camp, stuff like that,” I replied. “It happens everywhere. You’ll find out at the next level. It’s what they do with rookies.”

Rookies! The light went on.

“Oh, like in The League,” Seaton said, referring to the National Football League.

“Yeah, in The League.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he continued, catching the drift and running to daylight.

“We don’t really have that. For me, freshman initiation is just — listening, you know? Just listening to the guys in front of me. They don’t really do the hazing. Or the fighting. No, we don’t do that. This is a brotherhood. Brothers fight. But not to the point where it’s like we don’t like each other.”

Seaton’s easy to like, stellar resume notwithstanding. His arrival gives quarterback Shedeur Sanders a wingman with a 6-foot-10 wingspan, which doesn’t hurt. No. 77 is  6-5, 285 pounds of mess-around-and-find-out, a lineman who ran pass routes at the Under Armour Next All-American Game and reportedly registered a closing speed of 17.7 miles per hour on GPS during another tilt. (Context: The fastest wideouts in the NFL usually max out at roughly 20-21 mph.)

“I feel like the O-line last year (at CU) lacked passion. And right now we’ve got a lot of it,” Seaton continued. “We’ve got a lot of dudes. We’re just going at it … One dude might have a bad day today, next day, it’s ‘Oh, I’m getting back at that guy.’ So I feel like passion is what this offense and defense has the most, and integrity, like, within themselves.”

Like his head coach, Seaton fears neither man nor microphone, regardless of how hot they happen to be at that given moment. The teen from D.C. calls it like he sees it. Even if some truths land harder than others.

“I actually thought this place was going to be really, really bad,” the Buffs’ star blocker said of Boulder, and his first impressions therein.

“This is my opinion. Everybody has their own opinion. But I took a risk. And then me coming in and having Coach Prime and everything he told me that he was going to do, he did.”

While CU sports staffers around us chuckled awkwardly and clutched imaginary pearls, we had to ask the big man to backpedal on that one.

“Bad?” I asked, raising an eyebrow of my own this time. “Define ‘Bad.’”

“Nothing really too crazy,” Seaton continued. “Just as far as ‘bad’ — you don’t know how much money we’re bringing in here. So you go to other universities — the Big Tens, the SECs, they’ve got $10 billion contracts, all (that) crazy stuff.

“So … I thought I was taking a risk. But then coming in here, it exceeded expectations. We actually have a great facility. We actually spend a lot of money on food, as you can see, which I was talking about (earlier). And everything’s exceeded expectations, from the littlest things to the biggest things for me.”

The biggest thing for Seaton this fall? Keeping Shedeur happy and healthy. Accent on the latter.

“His football knowledge, being a freshman, coming in (as) a guy straight out of high school, his knowledge is up there,” new offensive line coach Phil Loadholt said of Seaton earlier this year. “He’s a student of the game. He works hard. He comes up and watches film and does everything he’s supposed to do. So that’s been the most impressive part of him.

“Obviously, physically you can see that he’s advanced, you know what I mean? But his mental part has been impressive to me.”

Seaton is the thinking man’s hammer. Already lean, the freshman has spent roughly two months on a diet of fish in an effort to replace body fat with muscle. Hand him a syllabus, he’ll stick to the plan. It’s no coincidence that coachable stars make a habit of shining the longest. And brightest.

“Not too many people want to go to the … I call (CU) an ‘underdog school,’ you know?” Seaton stressed. “A lot of people want to go to a school that’s built — a school like Georgia (or) Bama where it’s, like, you’re (the) next guy up.

“But here … you never had (any) 5-star offensive linemen come here. You don’t have a Travis Hunter coming here every time. You don’t have a Shedeur Sanders that could be (here) every time. So it (was) a risk in that area. Not like it’s going to be bad or it’s going to be a terrible place to live in … just a risk as far as there’s nobody else to do it. So now it’s, like, ‘You can really be the first.’”

And if Seaton plows dudes from the jump?

The kid might not be the last.

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Originally Published: August 5, 2024 at 8:19 p.m.

EUGENE-Former Oregon Duck and current rookie quarterback for the Denver Broncos is already showing signs of dominance ahead of his debut season in the NFL. Broncos coach Sean Payton compared the 12th overall pick, Bo Nix, to his longtime quarterback with the Saints and potential future Hall of Famer Drew Brees. 

“You see pretty good pocket sense,” Payton said about Nix, on 104.3 The Fan. “Doesn’t take a lot of sacks. I think when he knows when the play’s over, time to go, and then, I think he can make plays when he’s going.” 

Nix’s quick release is one of his key characteristics. At the University of Oregon, Nix was sacked just five times during the 2023 college football season. For comparison, the 2023 Heisman Trophy winner from LSU, Jayden Daniels, was sacked 22 times last season. 

“I used to say this all the time: The sack numbers are a reflection more on the quarterback than the offensive line. Brees was one of those guys, he was a tough sack,” Payton said. “The ball came out, and I think Bo has traits like that.” 

Nix’s ability to avoid punishment from opposing pass rushers is comparable to Brees. During Brees’s 20 years in the NFL, he was only sacked more than 30 times in a season twice. The quarterback was sacked an average of just 22 times per season during his 19 years as a starter. Brees’s average of 22 sacks per season is impressive considering the quickness and athleticism of pass rushers at the collegiate level. 

Another one of Payton’s former quarterbacks, Russell Wilson, was sacked an average of 44 times per season during his first 12 years in the NFL. 

Nix has been compared to Brees multiple times since signing with the Denver Broncos. Back in June, Payton drew another comparison between the two play-callers. 

“I would say mentally, [Nix] wants to know as much and as fast as he can,” Payton said. “I think there’s maybe a maturity level because, again, [Nix] played 61 games [in college] and when [the Saints] got Drew, it was off of his rookie contract and coming off an injury.” 

Since Nix’s arrival in Denver, Payton has been pleased with what he has seen from the rookie quarterback. As the coach who had immense success with Brees in New Orleans, Payton’s comparison carries great weight. Nix’s comparisons to Brees seem to pose a bright future for the former Duck as he looks to take flight in the NFL. 

The Denver Broncos are making a surprise move on Monday morning, as they get ready to release safety Caden Sterns, according to NFL Network.

The 2021 fifth-round pick had a chance to start alongside Brandon Jones at safety and at the very least be the first backup behind Jones and P.J. Locke. Now Denver will move on without the former Texas Longhorn. This seemingly gives the job to Locke.

Sterns had a solid rookie season back in 2021 but has been limited by injuries since. He suffered a d a torn patellar tendon in Week 1 of 2023, and began this training camp on the physically unable to perform list—but had recently rejoined the action.

Locke along with JL Skinner and Delarrin Turner-Yell will no doubt have bigger roles as the Broncos work to replace a group that had been led by Justin Simmons for so long. That veteran was cut earlier in the offseason.

More cuts are coming at Dove Valley with the Broncos having until Aug. 27 to get from 90 men to 53.

The #Broncos have informed safety Caden Sterns of their plans to release him, per source.

A fifth-round pick of the Broncos in 2021, Sterns flashed potential during three seasons in Denver and should have options around the league.

— Tom Pelissero (@TomPelissero) August 5, 2024

Given the report of league interest and George Paton’s past, the Broncos may actually end up trading Sterns for minor draft positioning—it’s happened a few times recently. Speaking of Paton’s past, Sterns is just another draft pick that didn’t stick in Denver.

Broncos will release safety Caden Sterns if they can’t work out a trade today, source confirms. (Release first by @TomPelissero). Sterns was on pace to be a starter as early as 2022 but back to back season-ending injuries (hip then knee) curtailed his progress. #9sports

— MikeKlis9NEWS (@mikeklis9news) August 5, 2024

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