Home Loss Completes Denver Meltdown

After seven weeks, the Denver Broncos were the toast of the NFL. They were watching Week 7 from home, on their bye week, with a 6-0 record. They had a new head coach (Josh McDaniels) and new quarterback (Kyle Orton). Because of the way things were conducted in the offseason, they were seriously maligned at every turn before the season started -- which had to have made their 6-0 start even more satisfying.

Fast-forward to Sunday, and you have pretty much the same thing Denver fans witnessed last season. The Broncos had blown a significant division lead. This time around they actually blew a huge Wild Card lead as well. In their final 10 games, the Broncos won just two. They lost to the 4-12 Redskins, the 5-11 Raiders and the 4-12 Chiefs. The latter two were at home. The Chiefs loss was an embarrassing 44-24 bloodbath Sunday.

Judging from the way many Broncos fans talk about Jay Cutler, they must have thought they were watching him again on Sunday. Orton lit up the stat sheet to the tune of a whopping 431 yards passing (easily a career high, and he'd only previously topped 300 yards twice), but he also threw three interceptions. Two of them were taken all the way back for touchdowns by the Chiefs defense.

Orton wasn't alone in stinking up the joint. The defense -- hailed by many during the 6-0 start -- was obliterated by second-year running back Jamaal Charles. The Texas product gained 259 yards and a pair a touchdowns on just 25 carries. The Denver offensive line and Knowshon Moreno only played well enough to average 3.8 yards per carry against the second-worst run defense in the NFL. And we'd be remiss to leave McDaniels out of the futility conversation.

He virtually suspended tight end Tony Scheffler and wide receiver Brandon Marshall (easily the Broncos' best offensive player) this week. With Scheffler, we were given the cryptic "attitude problems" as a reason. With Marshall, McDaniels accused him of not playing through his injury enough during practice and benched him. It's a little odd to proclaim you know how hurt a player is and whether or not he should be playing. It's even more odd to take away two key pieces of the passing game before throwing the ball 56 times against an awful run defense.

Nevertheless, the Broncos completed an amazingly abysmal collapse. When you start 6-0, it's pretty tough to go 2-8 the rest of the way and miss the playoffs. Rookie head coach McDaniels has done so. Last year, Mike Shanahan was fired after losing three straight to close the season. It's doubtful McDaniels suffers the same fate, but he certainly outdid Shanahan in terms of blowing what should have been a playoff berth.

Want a bright spot for Denver? Jabar Gaffney caught 14 passes for 213 yards, as both figures shattered previous career highs for the eight-year veteran.

As for Kansas City, they closed the season strong with a big win. They played Cincy tough on the road last week as well. They'll head into next season knowing they have a strong young running back in place and a much improved defense. As much as the Broncos gave this one away, you have to give the Chiefs credit for their hard-fought victory.