Broncos' confident defense cements standing in win against Vikings
DENVER – Von Miller put his arms behind his head and gyrated his pelvis in a dance move that is only safe for mature audiences – and that was only in pregame introductions, before the Denver Broncos' three first-quarter sacks in a 23-20 win against the Minnesota Vikings.
This is a Denver defense that is unabashed in its swagger. This is a swarming, smashing, stifling defense that has, in just a quarter of a season, transformed the identity of the Broncos. Sorry, Peyton Manning: Miller and Co. are the real stars here, silly sack dances at all.
Four games into this season – the 17th for the 39-year-old Broncos quarterback – the Broncos have had to change. And yet this much of a transformation, from an offensive team to a defensive one, and so quickly, is stunning.
It wasn’t so much changes in personnel, though the return of starting inside linebackers Danny Trevathan and Brandon Marshall, who both missed significant time last year with injuries, has helped. It’s that this is a group that thrives on pressure – with 18 sacks in four games – and now forced a turnover late in the fourth quarter to close out each of Denver’s four wins.
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This time, safety T.J. Ward played the hero.
He sacked Vikings quarterback Teddy Bridgewater near midfield with less than a minute remaining and stripped the ball from Bridgewater’s grasp. Miller pounced on the football to kill the Vikings’ comeback bid.
For it to happen once, as it did in Week 1 with safety Darian Stewart’s interception against the Baltimore Ravens, could be considered luck. That it has happened four weeks in a row, with a forced fumble by Marshall against the Kansas City Chiefs, and an interception by safety David Bruton against the Detroit Lions, is something that takes planning and skill. And maybe, defensive end Antonio Smith said, it requires some super powers.
For weeks, Smith said, Miller has been preaching the virtues of mind control. Sure, Denver’s opponents might think they’re going to win – and the Vikings likely did after Manning’s second interception and Bridgewater’s second fourth-quarter scoring drive to tie the game – but Denver’s defense believes differently.
“Faith is blind at first. Somebody can say, we're going to be the best defense in the NFL. But if he believes it the whole year, and then at the end of the year you see the stats, he becomes a prophet at the end. But the whole time, he believed. I think that's kind of what Von's talking about,” Smith said. “We keep doing it, we're going to make Von a prophet, because it's exactly what he says. We've got mind control.”
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Of course there too is talent, depth and an aggressive scheme called by new defensive coordinator Wade Phillips. Seven different Broncos had at least a half sack Sunday against Minnesota, as Phillips is confident in rotating in different pass rushers to keep Ware and Miller fresh. He also calls a variety of creative blitzes, including two that led to sacks from Ward.
“It’s attitude,” linebacker Danny Trevathan said. “We want to play with a frenzy.”
There were vulnerable moments for the Broncos defense Sunday, including a 48-yard touchdown run from Vikings running back Adrian Peterson, who burst through the line on fourth-and-inches and ran untouched to the end zone. Peterson had just 34 rushing yards before that play, and finished the game with 81 yards.
After Manning’s second interception (his fifth of the season) and a game-tying field goal from the Vikings’ Blair Walsh, it was time for what Broncos defensive end Malik Jackson described as a “gut check.”
It was Ware who led the huddle.
“It was a lot of cussing,” Ware said. “The speech that says who we are.”
Now after four games, that identity is quite clear.
And that sort of dominating defense is changing things for Manning and the Broncos offense, something that was clear in a goal line sequence early in the third quarter.
The Broncos took the third-quarter kickoff and quickly moved down the field, thanks in part to a 43-yard pass from Manning to Emmanuel Sanders, along with a personal foul penalty on Minnesota that set Denver up with a first-and-goal at the 3-yard line. When two runs from running back Ronnie Hillman came up short of the end zone, the Broncos could have made the conservative choice of a short field goal.
Instead, head coach Gary Kubiak called a fourth-and-1 play the Broncos added to their game plan during Saturday’s walk-through practice. Manning, in one of his rare times he was lined up under center, faked a handoff to Hillman, took a couple steps back and lofted a pass to his left, where tight end Owen Daniels was alone in the end zone for an easy touchdown catch.
“We’ve got to be aggressive,” Kubiak said. “Our defense, the way they’re playing, we end up with somebody pinned. I don’t know you make that decision every day, but it worked out this time.”
Follow Lindsay H. Jones on Twitter @bylindsayhjones.
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