Broncos Fall Two Games Back With Three to Go
Perhaps it’s a good thing that the 10-and-3 Kansas City Chiefs have 9 days from their last game until they play the 7-and-6 Tennessee Titans Sunday, noon at Arrowhead Stadium because the Titans have won three out of their last four games and have moved into a tie for first in the AFC South. Tennessee is looking sharp these days and they held off last year’s Super Bowl champions, the Denver Broncos, 13-to-10 after going up 13-to-0 in the first half. The game included some of the Broncos own brand of dirty tactics which included fisticuffs which will most certainly include some fines from the league. Titans seldom used WR, Harry Douglas, cut-blocked the Broncos DB Chris Harris Jr. and the very next play another Broncos DB, Aquib Talib, went after Douglas punching him out of bounds which brought on a brawl which was broken up quickly.
In the meantime, Denver finds themselves two full games in back of the Chiefs in he AFC West with three more games to play in the season. If the Broncos are to win the AFC West outright, they will have to sweep their last three games, at home against New England, at Kansas City and home against Oakland. Impossible? No, but, highly, improbable. The Broncos appear to have problems that can;t be fixed during this season. Against the Titans, QB Trevor Simien threw the ball 51 times — you heard that right, 51 times — for 334 yards and while that sounds amazing, they could only muster 18 yards total rushing. 9 carries for 18 yards and a, 2.0 yards-per-carry average. The Titans made the Broncos offense one dimensional… and once that happened the game was essentially on the shoulders of the defense and we can see now how that worked out.
To catch up the remaining schedules for Oakland and K.C:
Oakland: @ San Diego, home vs. Indianapolis and @ Denver
Kansas City: home vs. Tennessee, home vs. Denver and @ San Diego.
I would say Oakland has the easiest schedule except that they play two away games out of three and K.C. has only one remaining away game. In any event, I would say the Denver Broncos appear to be out of the running for the AFC Championship… if not mathematically, then with great probability.