By 
There is an ongoing celebration in Denver and rightfully so. After a couple of weeks of meetings and speculation, Peyton Manning, the NFL’s biggest free agent ever, chose the Denver Broncos. Denver was already a good team. They won the AFC West and advanced to the Divisional round of the playoffs with Tim Tebow at the helm. Now, with one of the best quarterbacks of all time running the show in Denver, the Broncos are now one of the teams to beat in the AFC. The kind of opportunity that was in front of the Broncos doesn’t come around very often and they couldn’t let it pass them by. John Fox has never before had a quarterback the caliber of Manning before and the expectations in Denver are now a “mile high” so to speak.John Fox joined 102.3 the Ticket in Denver with Les and JoJo to talk about having a quarterback the caliber of Manning for the first time ever, how this changes his offensive approach having a QB like him, and how much Manning helps every other area of the team.
On having a quarterback the caliber of Manning for the first time ever:
“There’s no doubt. I think anytime you can acquire a quarterback like Peyton Manning, who in my opinion is going to be a first ballot Hall-Of-Famer, hopefully not any time soon though, that’s crazy. When that whole process started even about the possible availability of him we talked about it and to be standing here two weeks later and he’s going to be a Denver Bronco probably is one of the more exciting things that has happened to me in my coaching career.”
How this changes his offensive approach having a QB like Manning:
“I think at the end of the day, offensive football and having been a defensive coach for 23 years in the National Football League, you know balance is the key. When you have the ability to do both you can drive defensive coordinators crazy. I’ve never had the guy maybe that I could have true balance with. We accomplished a lot and as I told Peyton in the process, in 14 years he averaged 26 points per game and games that I have been involved with as head coach in ten years where we scored 26 points or more were 39-3. I think having that quarterback is really a huge weapon, it’s a really quarterback dominated league, has turned into that more lately so this is a great opportunity and were very excited.”
How much Manning helps every other area of the team:
“I think you really hire people to do a job. We’ve had a change of defensive coordinator, we’re very, very fortunate to have Jack Del Rio heading up the defense now, and I hired Jack knowing that he is excellent at doing that. As I told you guys when I came here and kept Mike McCoy, I know him better than you do. Mike has a great football mind, knows how to adjust, knows how to take advantage of the weapons and personnel he has, and the difference is at quarterback is that guy has to know what everybody is doing. That’s why it’s so hard when you’re young to do, it’s so hard to draft a guy and have him have immediate success because there’s so much experience involved in playing quarterback and this guy may be the best in the game.”
Comments