ENGLEWOOD, Colo. -- After weeks and months of the football routine, many of the Denver Broncos' hopefuls have reached the bottom line.
Thursday's preseason finale in Arizona is the last chance for many on the Broncos roster, who may not by there by the time the weekend is out. Rosters league-wide must go from the 75 to 53 players by 4 p.m. ET Saturday.
"It's not tough, it's miserable," coach Gary Kubiak said. "There you go: It's miserable. … Sometimes they can't quite see the future. I tell them, don't worry about it, just come out every day, have a good time and play hard. You never know what's going to happen. We'll probably have two or three guys make our team from this game on Thursday night. There might be two or three guys that think they might be here that may go out there and not make the team. That's part of this business."
And with only a handful of roster spots still in play for the defending Super Bowl champions, here some things to watch for in Thursday night's game:
Paxton Lynch. The rookie, who was a first-round pick in this year's draft, will start, and Kubiak said, play the entire game. The Broncos need to determine if they believe he can be the No. 2 quarterback behind Trevor Siemian. Lynch has looked far more comfortable in the shotgun, where he lined up exclusively in the University of Memphis offense, than he has under center, both in practice and in the three preseason games. Kubiak said the coaches have tried to make it 50-50 in practices and games, as far as putting Lynch in the shotgun and under center. If Lynch shows the Broncos enough to be named the backup, Denver will enter the season with two quarterbacks -- Siemian and Lynch -- who have yet to throw a pass in a regular-season game.
More Lynch. But even in the shotgun, Lynch has shown he has work to do on his footwork. At 6-foot-7, Lynch often gets too deep into the backfield when he receives the ball, making it more difficult for the Broncos to protect the edges of the formation because of the angles it creates for the outside rushers. Kubiak said the coaches are working with Lynch to manage those distances. "When you're dealing with a guy that is that tall and that long, you worry about him getting too deep in certain situations," Kubiak said. "What you have to do is adjust him on the front end, not the back end. We try to move him up a little bit. It's something for him to get used to. It's a little different."
Whither Mark Sanchez. Sanchez is the guy who opened training camp with a slight lead in the competition for the starting quarterback slot. But Siemian won the job, and now there may not even be room on the roster for Sanchez if Lynch is the No. 2 quarterback. Sanchez won't play against the Cardinals unless Lynch has to leave the field. Given that Sanchez is scheduled to be an unrestricted free agent at season's end, so would likely want to play somewhere else to maximize his earning potential in the open market, and given that the Broncos would not have to surrender a draft pick to the Eagles if he is not on the roster to open the season, it's difficult to see a scenario in which Sanchez isn't released.
Tight races. The Broncos have difficult choices to make at running back, wide receiver and linebacker. And those choices could all be impacted by injuries on the offensive line. Three guards -- Darrion Weems (concussion), Ty Sambrailo (elbow) and James Ferentz (knee) -- have all missed significant practice time of late. Weems was cleared to return to practice Tuesday, and for the first time since he injured his right elbow early in training camp, Sambrailo worked with strength and conditioning coaches without a brace on his arm. Ferentz will miss several weeks after having arthroscopic surgery on his knee. It all means the Broncos could decide to keep an extra offensive lineman, at least initially, which could cost a roster spot at wide receiver or running back. So the fate of players like wide receiver Jordan Taylor or running backs Ronnie Hillman and Kapri Bibbs could rest on how healthy the Broncos believe they will be on the offensive line within the next week.
