After the Denver Broncos were eliminated from playoff contention Sunday night, there is reason to believe that rookie Paxton Lynch will earn his third NFL start in the season finale against Oakland on Jan. 1. But head coach Gary Kubiak isn’t quite ready to pull the trigger on that call just yet.
“As far as playing, I’d like to sit here and say that we’ll play everybody,” Kubiak said at his Monday press conference when asked if Lynch would start. “I’ll make a decision on Paxton. We’ll see. We got home at 3:30 in the morning, so I haven’t made any decisions today. I’ll make those in the next couple of days.”
Lynch is 1-1 as a starter, guiding Denver to a Week 13 win over Jacksonville. The Broncos have since lost three games in a row with Trevor Siemian at the helm. Between Lynch and Siemian, the Broncos have scored just three offensive touchdowns over those four games – two of which were set up by defensive turnovers, including a 6-yard scoring drive in Sunday’s loss.
The calls for Denver to start Lynch have been coming from many fans and media, as Lynch was a first-round pick and has lost a year of potential game-time experience at the expense of Siemian.
When asked if there are any drawbacks to starting Lynch in a meaningless game, Kubiak said, “There’s no drawbacks to anything. I think what I have to do is sit down here and see where we’re at as a team and get some good direction. That direction is going to come from some of the health of this football team. We’ll see. We’ll see what happens. I just don’t want to sit here and try to talk that one way or another today. It’s been a quick, short night. I’ll address that.”
Lynch will certainly play against Oakland. How much? We’ll know on Wednesday.
The team is off on Tuesday and will return Wednesday to begin preparation for the finale against Oakland. Kubiak will likely announce his starter at that time.
