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Tag: john franklin-myers

  • After dominant Week 18, Broncos’ Eyioma Uwazurike feels ‘100%’ ready to earn starting DL role in 2026

    The first thing Broncos defensive lineman Eyioma Uwazurike usually sees, lining up on any given Sunday, is the opposing quarterback.

    The second thing he usually sees is the large frame of John Franklin-Myers running from the sidelines to replace him.

    “We’re toe-to-toe with each other at that position,” Uwazurike tells The Denver Post in the locker room Sunday. “Whenever he need, I got my eyes on him, whenever he come in and out.”

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    Has there been an interior defensive-line competition in Denver, across this now-complete regular season? No, Uwazurike smiles. Not in the slightest. One is a 27-year-old reserve who has a total of 3.5 sacks across four seasons in the NFL. The other is — well, “John Franklin-Myers,” as Uwazurike enunciated. A superstar. A superstar who’s about to get paid.

    But on Sunday, Franklin-Myers missed his first game of the season and the final game of the season with a hip issue. And Uwazurike’s four-year journey in Denver took center stage, from a toolsy fourth-round pick in 2022 to a year-long gambling suspension in 2023 to an indispensable part of this Denver defensive line in 2025.

    “Today, I’m just really holding it down for him,” Uwazurike said postgame. “Waiting for him to get back, let him rest up, and for him to be fresh, so when my time come to officially start — whenever that comes, I’ll be ready for it.”

    He was ready on Sunday, Uwazurike capping off a quiet breakout season in a 19-3 win over the Chargers. It was the first start of that tumultuous four-year career. That meant something, Uwazurike nodded, lips spreading for a toothy grin. The 27-year-old racked up two quarterback hits, four tackles and a tackle for loss, a final showcase of a season spent helping fortify Denver in the trenches against opposing run games. And in the fourth quarter, with Denver trying to slam the door, Uwazurike tossed his blocker aside and swallowed up Chargers quarterback Trey Lance to finish with 3.5 sacks on the year.

    In three months, Franklin-Myers will likely be in another zip code. Denver has shelled out to keep most of its defensive line. It’s held off on Franklin-Myers, who has a career-best 7.5 sacks in 16 games. Uwazurike’s start Sunday not only helped the Broncos secure the No. 1 seed; it also could be a direct window into the future.

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    “I don’t know what his situation is,” Uwazurike told The Post, asked on replacing Franklin-Myers if he signs elsewhere. “But if he’s not here? Yes. 100%. I feel like I should be able to take over that role completely. Perform similar to this, and hopefully better.”

    To note: there is no bad blood here. Uwazurike described Franklin-Myers, who’s only two years older, as a “big brother.” The two study together every week, filling similar roles in a widespread five-man rotation in the Broncos’ defense. Franklin-Myers just happens to be the starter. Uwazurike, though, has filled the middle on a variety of key downs this season, and has played a career-high 36% of Denver’s defensive snaps in 2025.

    “As long as he here, shoot, we rockin’ together, preparing together, all of that,” Uwazurike said of Franklin-Myers. “So, big shoutout to him. Because if it weren’t for him, wouldn’t have this successful game.”

    Uwazurike’s emergence in 2025 — now finishing the year with 39 tackles, five tackles for loss and five quarterback hits — has helped ease pressure on workload on starting defensive linemen Franklin-Myers and Zach Allen. Theirs is a sort of symbiotic rotation up front, and both Franklin-Myers and Allen finished their 2025 regular seasons with fewer reps than they played the previous season.

    Uwazurike is “the reason” why Allen’s played roughly 15% fewer defensive snaps in 2025 as compared to 2024, as Allen told The Post on Sunday.

    “He now sees what could come,” Allen told The Post, “if he just keeps on going.”

    What exactly could come is still uncertain. There’s still months left for Denver to decide to move some money around and find $20 million a year for Franklin-Myers. He has a uniquely “symbiotic” relationship with Allen, as rookie Jordan Miller told The Post a few weeks back.

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    Allen told The Post that he hadn’t had conversations with Franklin-Myers on a possible extension for him, and the two were simply focused on winning.

    “He’s been awesome through the whole process. Obviously, it’s tough. But like — I was in his shoes when I was in Arizona and we weren’t close to winning,” Allen said, referring to his final year in Arizona in 2022 before hitting free agency.

    “There’s just so much that goes into getting ready week-to-week that the stat stuff, it’s kinda hard to focus on. And J’s the ultimate professional.”

    Luca Evans

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  • How many coverage breakdowns have Broncos had recently? ‘Too many,’ Sean Payton says.

    The first sign of trouble came with a not-so-heated discussion, before the floodgates truly opened. A simple 9-yard out from Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence hit to Brian Thomas Jr. to further set up an end-of-half field goal, and he fell out of bounds, easy. Too easy. Broncos cornerback Pat Surtain II came over to discuss with safety P.J. Locke. Surtain’s hands splayed out. Something was amiss.

    The second sign of trouble came with a punch to the mouth, with Denver already on the ropes. Jaguars wideout Parker Washington took another quick out in the third quarter, made Riley Moss miss, made Talanoa Hufanga miss, and strolled 63 yards down Mile High Lane. A touchdown later, and defensive end John Franklin-Myers trudged past a sideline of slouched shoulders, tugging off his helmet and going to chuck it. He thought better of it.

    The third sign of trouble came with the finishing blow. Moss had Washington contained on a third-down grab in the fourth quarter, until he didn’t.  Washington spun away again for a 24-yard gain. Moss lingered on his knees for a beat. Then took his palm and smacked the ground in front of him.

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    How many passing-game breakdowns have there been in recent weeks, for these Broncos?

    “Too many,” head coach Sean Payton said, postgame.

    Defensive players largely shrugged this off, after the Broncos’ three-month win streak was snapped Sunday night in a 34-20 loss to the Jaguars. Because what else is them for there to do? Denver’s still a 12-win team, as linebacker Alex Singleton pointed out postgame

    “I’m not going to sit here and let you guys (expletive) on our parade,” Singleton chuckled. He grinned. His eyes didn’t really grin. “We have two games to go to be the number-one seed in the AFC.”

    There’s no mistaking it, though: these Broncos have issues on the back-end to fix across those next two games and beyond, to play as deep as they’d like to. Lawrence picked defensive coordinator’s Vance Joseph scheme apart for four quarters, often sniffing out third-down blitzes and smoothly depositing the ball to his playmakers in a 23-of-36, 279-yard, three-touchdown performance. Payton said postgame that such a porous defensive performance “better be” an anomaly, and there’s plenty of reason to believe so.

    Broncos’ 11-game winning streak snapped by Jaguars, AFC playoff race tightens

    Look deeper, though, and Sunday was not as much an anomaly as an eruption of bubbling issues. In the last four weeks, quarterbacks have combined for an 89.7 rating against Denver’s defense. The Commanders’ Marcus Mariota freewheeled his way on some zone-read concepts against the Broncos a few weeks back. The Packers’ Jordan Love dinked and dunked with abandon in the first half in Week 15. Lawrence blew the top off on Sunday.

    They’ve all exploited the same nagging issues that haunted Joseph’s unit down the stretch of 2024 — as teams have targeted Bronco linebackers and safeties in advantageous matchups for a solid month. Here’s a quick roundup of tight-end performances against Denver’s defense in the last five weeks:

    — Chiefs’ Travis Kelce in Week 11: 9 catches, 91 yards, touchdown.

    — Commanders’ Zach Ertz in Week 13: 10 catches, 106 yards.

    — Raiders’ Brock Bowers in Week 14: 4 catches, 46 yards, touchdown.

    — Packers’ Luke Musgrave in Week 15: 4 catches, 52 yards.

    Another matchup-problem gadget weapon reared his head Sunday, as the Jaguars’ Brenton Strange went for five catches for 39 yards. He ran away from Broncos linebacker Dre Greenlaw for a 23-yard gain midway through the second quarter. A few plays later, he boxed out Locke — with a bit of an obvious push-off — for a short touchdown.

    “They scheme up plays pretty nicely,” Locke said, asked about problems containing tight ends and running backs in the passing game. “That’s it.

    “I don’t think it’s problems. I don’t think it’s problems. That’s stuff we just gotta handle.”

    Jacksonville head coach Liam Coen, though, repeatedly and obviously aimed at Bronco holes in coverage Sunday with a variety of targets. Greenlaw has been a step slow on a couple routes in recent weeks. Locke was effective against the run in his first start of the season at safety, but was picked on on a late-first-half field-goal drive by Jacksonville. Communication errors abounded, too, as Jacksonville went eight-of-15 on third downs.

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    On a short week before travelling to Kansas City for a Christmas Day game, the defense will gather to watch film Monday, Singleton said. They have overcome some early-season missed handoffs in match coverage before. And Singleton, for one, wants his unit to feel it, as he said.

    Luca Evans

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  • Broncos’ Jonathon Cooper not fazed by Giants rookie QB Jaxson Dart: ‘Ain’t nothing we haven’t seen’

    The kings of New York are here, and they are 22 and 23 years old. In the span of three short weeks, a rookie quarterback and a rookie running back have revitalized the downtrodden Big Blue with sheer frat-bro energy. They exchange vibrational communication by touching heads like baby elephants, and the quarterback sports a diamond necklace, and the running back does flips in the end zone after touchdowns.

    Their names are Jaxson Dart and Cam Skattebo, and this New York Giants duo appears to fear nothing. Certainly not head trauma. Dart flung himself noggin-first into an Eagles defender in Week 5, and has been evaluated for a concussion three times in four games. Skattebo got himself ready for games at Arizona State by pounding his helmet against a brick wall. They have infused Jersey with a little Gen-Z flair, and their swagger was enough to bury the reigning Super Bowl champion Eagles on Thursday Night Football last week.

    But a stable of Broncos await in Denver on Sunday, ready to kick. This is confidence on confidence. Denver’s locker room has “our Skattebo,” as defensive lineman John Franklin-Myers pointed, in Jonathon Cooper — a muscled-up 27-year-old former seventh-rounder who came out from the locker room at every training camp practice roaring at nobody in particular. And who just won the AFC Defensive Player of the Week. And is part of a Broncos pass-rush that fears nothing, either.

    Certainly not the Giants’ 22-year-old rookie quarterback with his reckless legs and golden flow.

    “I mean, he’s a young guy,” Cooper said of Dart, his nose curling up in a sneer. “He’s feeling himself a lil’ bit. He’s out there running around. He’s got the chain on. He’s dancing. I feel like everybody needs something, you know.

    “But we’ve went against QBs who have ran around in the pocket and who’ve tried to do stuff with their legs,” Cooper said. “So, ain’t nothing we haven’t seen.”

    Skattebo and Dart will bring a heap of earned chutzpah on the plane with them to Denver Sunday. But this Broncos’ defense’s own confidence at every level — and its play-caller’s — is as high as it’s been all season, after sacking Jets quarterback Justin Fields nine times last Sunday. The stat-sheet from London is still burning: -10 net passing yards for the Jets, a fact that prompted a hat-tip from Giants head coach Brian Daboll on Wednesday.

    “They’re just really good,” Daboll said. “They play good coverage, complement it with the front. They disguise well. I mean, they’re as good as it gets right now.”

    Since taking over from former Bronco Russell Wilson in Week 3, Dart has played largely excellent football in a 2-1 stretch, with wins over the Chargers and Eagles. The former Ole Miss QB’s legs have become a major engine to New York’s offense, with 167 rushing yards in that span. He’s escaped pressure with aplomb.

    The Broncos’ pass-rush, however, has seen two of the league’s best scrambling quarterbacks the past two weeks. They turned the Eagles’ Jalen Hurts into a thrower in Week 5 — two carries for three yards — and turned Philadelphia’s offense one-dimensional because of it. Then they turned the Jets’ Fields into, frankly, a shell of an NFL quarterback in Week 6.

    It’s one of head coach Sean Payton’s favorite sayings: Confidence is born from demonstrated ability. This Broncos front has it.

    “We play one of the best quarterbacks twice a year, every single year,” Cooper said Wednesday, likely referring to the Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes. “So once you go against that, you kinda get a feel of the game. And, you know what you need to do. You gotta make ‘em feel uncomfortable in the pocket.

    “So, you can’t let ‘em get that confidence and that ego going.”

    Their ego’s going, plenty. And deservedly so. The ability of the Broncos’ core four pass-rushers up front to win one-on-ones — Cooper, NFL sack leader Nik Bonitto, Zach Allen, Franklin-Myers — and the secondary’s ability to win in man coverage on the back-end has given coordinator Vance Joseph the ingredients and the gall of a mad scientist.

    With Denver backed up in their own territory and up two late in the fourth quarter against New York, at the short end of the stick relative to the clock, Joseph sent the house on three of the Jets’ last four downs. Sack. Incompletion. Seven-yard completion. Sack. Ballgame.

    Luca Evans

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  • Bo Nix shoulders blame for Broncos’ Week 1 offensive struggles: ‘I have to do a much better job’

    They went one by one at the Broncos captains’ dinner on Monday, veterans of this league who have climbed the mountaintop and know the footing the trek requires. Wil Lutz. Talanoa Hufanga. D.J. Jones. Each gave their speech. Each bared their hearts.

    Last of all came Bo Nix, the 25-year-old anointed one who’s never met anyone who expects more of him than he expects of himself.

    He spoke and set a bar for a group of men who respected him enough to not only listen to his words but feel them. John Franklin-Myers and Marvin Mims Jr. recounted his words separately in the days to come.

    “We have this team that’s been put together. Each one of us are hand-picked,” Franklin-Myers recalled Nix saying. “But our goal should be to go out there and win every game.”

    There are three kinds of teams in this league, Nix continued, as Mims remembered. The team that wants to go out and simply compete. The team that wants to go out and win. And the team that wants to go out and dominate.

    These Broncos, Nix emphasized, needed to be the team that dominates.

    “Shoot, something like that is powerful from a quarterback, a younger guy,” Franklin-Myers said Friday. “And you see that type of fire from him, and it kinda gets you going.”

    Nix did not dominate in Sunday afternoon’s win over Tennessee, his first start since a rookie campaign that cratered and then skyrocketed. Far from it. He threw a bad cross-body interception in the first quarter on a ball that sailed to Courtland Sutton. He threw a worse one in the third quarter on a ball to a double-covered Troy Franklin that had no business even being thrown. He ran directly into a strip-sack in the second quarter for the first lost fumble he’s had since he played at Auburn. He finished 25-of-40 passing for 176 yards, a touchdown, and a passer rating of 60, the third-worst game of his NFL career.

    And still, new safety Hufanga came strolling to a podium postgame wearing a beaming smile and a grey T-shirt that had a giant decal of Nix.

    “I got a lot of confidence,” Hufanga said. “I wouldn’t be wearing this shirt if I didn’t have confidence in my guy. He’s a Christian man that just goes out there and leads us.

    “So, regardless of what kind of day he has, I know I got his back, and he got mine.”

    Luca Evans

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  • Broncos DL John Franklin-Myers focused on season after no extension: ‘We all just want to feel wanted’

    NEW ORLEANS — John Franklin-Myers may not be thrilled, but he’s ready for regular-season football.

    The Broncos defensive tackle is entering the final year of a two-year, $15 million contract he signed after getting traded to Denver last spring.

    There’s been little sign of movement toward a deal, and sources told The Denver Post the sides did not negotiate this summer. That stands in contrast to veterans Courtland Sutton (four years, $92 million) and Zach Allen (four years, $102 million), who landed major long-term agreements. Fourth-year outside linebacker Nik Bonitto doesn’t have a new deal yet, but he said recently his team and the Broncos have had productive talks and that he thinks a deal “will get done.”

    Not so for Franklin-Myers, though he said any feelings he may have about his current status are now sidelined for the next several months.

    “We all just want to feel wanted, and I think when it’s time to play football, obviously money and stuff aside, I’m under contract,” Franklin-Myers said after Denver’s preseason finale. “So football is football. Obviously, we all want what we’re worth, but until then, shoot, I’m going to play football. It is what it is.”

    Franklin-Myers’ addition last year helped turn what was one of the NFL’s worst defensive fronts in 2023 into one of its best in 2024. His ability to rush the passer not only gave offenses fits, but it also kept them from being able to turn double teams toward Allen on a regular basis.

    Allen broke out with an 8.5-sack season and led all NFL defensive tackles with 67 pressures and 40 hits.

    “Zach’s my dawg. I said it from the jump,” Franklin-Myers said. “Man, (Jets defensive lineman) Quinnen Williams was a good friend of mine, played with him for a long time, and I was happier when he got paid than when I got paid. Zach Allen is no different. You talk about somebody who shows up every day. He earned the money.

    “He makes me better, makes the team better. He deserves his money. I’m all for it, and Zach deserves all of it.”

    Now, Franklin-Myers and Malcolm Roach appear poised to enter Week 1 without contractual security beyond this year. Roach laid out a straightforward approach earlier in camp in saying that if everybody plays well, everybody’s going to get paid. It’s just a matter of whether that’s in Denver or elsewhere.

    In the meantime, the defensive line has big goals.

    Parker Gabriel

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