ENGLEWOOD, Colo. — No NFL team leaned on its offensive line reserves less often last season than the Denver Broncos. Out of 80 combined starts, the top five of left tackle Garett Bolles, left guard Ben Powers, center Lloyd Cushenberry, right guard Quinn Meinerz and right tackle Mike McGlinchey made 79. The only absence that deprived the group of perfect attendance came when McGlinchey missed the final game with a rib injury.
Two games into a new season, the Broncos have already received a harsh reminder that the relative health they enjoyed last season doesn’t come standard in a long, brutal NFL campaign.
Late in the fourth quarter of the Broncos’ loss Sunday to the Pittsburgh Steelers, Bolles and McGlinchey were trying to keep the fierce pass-rushing duo of Alex Highsmith and T.J. Watt away from quarterback Bo Nix. At the top of the pocket, after Nix stepped up into open space, Bolles and McGlinchey collided. Both were injured on the third-down play. Bolles returned for Denver’s final drive minutes later, but McGlinchey got his leg stuck under the pile and suffered an MCL strain that will keep him out for at least the next four games. McGlinchey was placed on injured reserve Wednesday. He was replaced on the 53-man roster by outside linebacker Dondrea Tillman, who was promoted from the practice squad.
“Look, it’s part of our league,” Broncos coach Sean Payton said, adding that second-year player Alex Palczewski will start in McGlinchey’s place when the Broncos play Sunday at Tampa Bay. “Alex has played in a lot of football games, and I know he’ll be excited about his first start.”
It was the second straight game Bolles left early after suffering a calf injury in the second half against the Seattle Seahawks in Week 1. Luke Wattenberg, Cushenberry’s replacement at center this season, suffered an ankle injury against the Seahawks and was limited in practice last week before starting against the Steelers. The injuries are contributing to an overall product from the offensive line that has been underwhelming during the first two weeks of the season.
Broncos running backs have averaged 0.17 yards per rush before contact through two games, according to TruMedia, the lowest average in the NFL. That has resulted from, at times, backs not hitting the right hole, causing an immediate traffic collision. The Broncos also blew a protection check on a third-and-1 play in the third quarter Sunday, with Javonte Williams being dropped 4 yards in the backfield. But the stat also reflects that Denver’s offensive linemen — and the receivers and tight ends who play a role in the run game — have not been getting enough of a push against the heavy boxes defenses are routinely throwing at the Broncos.
The numbers in the passing game attributed to the offensive line haven’t been much better. Denver has allowed a pressure rate of 44.3 percent, the second-highest mark in the league. That’s despite a) Denver being blitzed 21.6 percent of the time, the 10th-lowest rate in the league; and b) Nix delivering passes in 2.93 seconds, right at the league average. As with the paltry run numbers, the offensive line isn’t solely to blame for the pressure problem contributing to the rookie quarterback’s struggles. But the offensive line is where the Broncos have invested most heavily since Payton took over the team in 2023. The Broncos are paying $60.4 million to their offensive line this season, according to Spotrac, the sixth-highest total in the league for the position group.
“I would say we were inconsistent,” Payton said after reviewing the film from Sunday’s loss. “There are times we’d do a pretty good job and there are times we’re either allowing penetration or getting beat right at the snap. We’ve got to be more consistent. That’s the one thing that you’d definitely take away from it.”
McGlinchey may have been playing as well as any of Denver’s offensive linemen when he went down Sunday. Though Watt did sack Nix once Sunday, McGlinchey largely kept the former NFL Defensive Player of the Year from wreaking havoc like he did during Pittsburgh’s season-opening victory in Atlanta. Overall, McGlinchey surrendered only five pressures across 88 pass-block snaps to start the season.
“He played really well on Sunday,” Nix said Wednesday. “I thought he did a really good job against a great edge player. That’s going to affect us, but it’s next man up, and we feel really strong about (Palczewski) and what he’ll do for us.”
Broncos a little banged-up to start the work week. https://t.co/kiG3WcxS2T
— Nick Kosmider (@NickKosmider) September 18, 2024
The two snaps Palczewski played after McGlinchey went down against the Steelers were the first of his career, but he doesn’t lack football experience. He spent six seasons at the University of Illinois, starting a Football Bowl Subdivision-record 65 games. He didn’t allow a sack during his final season in 2022 and joined the Broncos as an undrafted free agent in 2023. He made the initial 53-man roster out of training camp but spent most of the season rehabbing an injury he suffered in late August. Palczewski was activated from IR and practiced the final two weeks of the season, which he said helped launch him into a strong offseason.
“It was awesome to steal a couple weeks there at the end of the season to just keep improving,” Palczewski said. “This whole offseason has been awesome. I spent most my time here and I was working with Mike McGlinchey, just picking his brain, see how he lives and just learn. That’s been a blessing to get all the knowledge he has. Our strength staff has been unbelievable, too — Dan Dalrymple, Shaun Snee, Korey Jones. They’ve helped me tenfold with strength since I got here.”
The good news for the Broncos is that McGlinchey’s injury did not require surgery. The MCL is typically only operated on if other ligaments are also being repaired, said Dr. Clint Soppe, an orthopedic surgeon at the Cedars-Sinai Kerlan-Jobe Institute in Los Angeles.
“The good thing is it heals really well,” Soppe said, “which is good because it’s the most commonly injured ligament in the knee, especially with offensive lineman getting rolled up on. It’s usually somewhere between three and six weeks (depending) on how bad the tear is. The initial recovery is rest, getting some early healing of the tissue, icing, compression. … Then, you start getting a range of motion and start the strengthening that gets the player back and ready to play again. With the higher-grade tears, it’s usually around six weeks.”
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Denver’s offensive line faced a critical stretch even before McGlinchey went down. Payton likes to use the term “dirty hands” to explain broken plays in which multiple parties share blame. Everybody’s palms have been soiled on offense during the first two weeks of the season, from the coaching staff to Nix to the receivers and running backs. But cleansing starts with the offensive line. It’s the group that at the start of training camp said it would set the tone.
“We have to continue, on the front five, pointing the thumbs (inward),” Meinerz said. “We have to fix this s—.”
(Photo: Brooke Sutton / Getty Images)
