The Broncos are coming home to face the Texans this Monday night after a tough couple of losses. Brock Osweiler will make his long-awaited return to Denver after he decided to sign with the Texans for, what seemed to be, financial reasons.
While the defense doesn’t seem to be performing to their full potential, they are still one of the top defensive units in the league.
“Obviously we’re not performing as well, but we given up 170 passing yards and under 300 total,” T.J. Ward told Eric Goodman and Les Shapiro of Afternoon Drive on Mile High Sports Radio. “That’s pretty good defense. If you ask any football team going into Sunday if they will give up under 300 yards total, I think they would be pretty happy with that. It’s just the first couple of drives. We are giving up more points than we did. To hold those touchdowns to field goals would be good for us. But overall, we’re still playing great defense.”
Losing the last two games may have thrown Denver into a bit of a spiral, but the Broncos are still sitting at 4-2 through the first six games of the NFL season.
“It’s just two games in a season, and we’ll get it fixed,” Ward said. “It’s something where we have to look at ourselves and try to put one finger on what’s going on. Coach Wade, he will figure it out.”
With Osweiler coming back to Denver, some may think there is an advantage for the Broncos defense. Ward feels like there is no advantage. The only advantage you can gain on a quarterback is from watching film to get a better understanding of their game play in certain situations.
“I don’t think we have a bigger advantage over anybody else playing him,” Ward said. “Film is going to tell you everything you need to know. Compared to playing with him while he was here? We never played against Brock in a game, so we don’t know. The film will tell us everything we need to know for this year. He looks like the guy we’ve been playing with for three years.”
The boos from the city of Denver will rain down on Osweiler on Monday night. The way he moved on to Houston left a sour taste in the mouth of the city and the Broncos organization. Although some players have voiced their distaste in Osweiler, Ward has different feelings as to how he left.
“It doesn’t bother me,” Ward said. “I’m completely satisfied and in love with the team we have here. He had to do what he had to do, and that’s cool. But we’re not going to take it light on him. We’re not going to go any extra harder because he used to be here. We’re going to put that same effort we put forward every game. Let the cookies fall where they fall.”
To listen to the whole interview with TJ Ward, including his thoughts on having a longer week to prepare after coming off a short week against the Chargers, click the podcast below…
Catch Afternoon Drive with Goodman and Shapiro Monday-Friday from 4p-6p 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.
