“All I needed was an opportunity, whether it came from a draft or came through an undrafted free agent,” Broncos rookie Kalif Raymond told Nate Lundy and Shawn Drotar.

Raymond opened up to Lundy and Drotar Wednesday morning on Mile High Sports Radio about life as an undrafted rookie trying to make it with the Super Bowl champions. Raymond spoke about coming out of FCS school Holy Cross and now having the chance to play for the best NFL team in the country.

“This is my dream. I want to make this a lifestyle,” he said. “I want to be an NFL football player, so any pass I have to go through to take that I’m willing to take that route. I’m in it for the long haul. If I have the opportunity to play on a practice squad and work my way up, then I’m sure willing able to do that. That will be a great opportunity in itself. Whatever way I can show this Broncos organization I can play, I want to do it.”

Dwayne Norman, another undrafted rookie for the Broncos, shared a similar view on the situation with Lundy and Drotar earlier in the week.

“I just take it one day at a time,” Norman told Lundy and Drotar, “and try to learn as much as I can from the guys that are already on the team…I just try to learn as much as can from each and every one of them and try to let them prepare me to be the best NFL linebacker that I can be.”

Despite the challenge of being undrafted free agents, both Raymond and Norman know their chance for success now rests on them. The two try to take comfort in knowing that other great players on the Broncos like C.J. Anderson and Chris Harris were once upon a time in their shoes.

No matter the outcome, both players know they will owe any success they have, in Denver or elsewhere, to the Broncos.

“You have to know the Broncos have helped you get wherever you are because you learned so much from this organization,” Norman says.

Hear more about how Kalif Raymond and Dwayne Norman truly feel in the respective podcasts below…

Catch Nate Lundy and Shawn Drotar weekdays from 7a-9a on Mile High Sports AM 1340 | FM 104.7 or stream live any time for the best local coverage of Colorado sports from Denver’s biggest sports talk lineup.