Broncos Mailbag: Pondering trade deadline rumors, contract extensions and the long-term outlook for Denver at OLB

Denver Post Broncos writer Parker Gabriel posts his Broncos Mailbag weekly during the season and periodically during the offseason. Click here to submit a question.

Do you think we’ll lock in new contracts for both Nik Bonitto and Jonathon Cooper? I’m a big fan of both guys and they’re due for bigger deals.

— Mike, Denver

Hey Mike, great question.

Bonitto and Cooper should be in the long-term picture, but the timelines for dealing with their respective contracts differ. Cooper’s a free agent after this year, while 2025 is the final year of Bonitto’s four-year rookie deal.

Cooper’s done nothing but improve his standing and make himself money so far this year.

In fact, what he’s done is really impressive going back further than that. The 2021 seventh-round draft pick has now played in 37 straight games for Denver going back to 2022 and he’s started 34 of the past 35. He’s got 5.5 sacks so far this year, putting him on an 11.5-sack pace that would comfortably eclipse last year’s career-best 8.5.

Edge players in the NFL get paid. There are 20 players listed as edge rushers with average annual contract values at $15 million or more per year, according to OvertheCap, and 35 that have AAVs of $10 million per year or more.

Right now OTC’s contract valuation is really high on Cooper and pegs his value north of $19 million. Whether he gets that kind of deal remains to be seen, but he’s going to get paid. Jonathan Greenard had somewhat similar early-career stats and pressure rates for Houston, broke out with 12.5 sacks in his contract season last year and then got four years and $76 million ($42 million guaranteed) from Minnesota this spring

Cooper would seem like a natural candidate for the ol’ bye week extension, but the Broncos haven’t handed any of those out since Courtland Sutton and Tim Patrick in 2021. Plus, there’s a complicating factor: Denver has very little cap space to work with.

OvertheCap has Denver at $1.77 million in space and the latest NFLPA data has them at $1.66 million. They could create some (more on that below) but they’ve already moved a lot of money around in the past year.

They cleared a bunch of space so they could work in free agency despite having $53 million of Russell Wilson’s cap charges on this year’s books. They pushed more into the future to sign Pat Surtain II to that extension before the season.

So it’s not impossible Cooper (or Baron Browning or any of the Broncos’ other players on expiring contracts) gets an in-season extension, but it would not be surprising if that work waited until after the season.

As for Bonitto, there’s time. Maybe they decide it makes sense to do in the offseason, but they could wait all the way until mid- or post-2025 season, too.

It’s a timely moment for this conversation. NFL Network recently reported that Cooper and Browning could each draw interest from other teams at the trade deadline. Also, at some point in the coming weeks the Broncos could re-integrate Drew Sanders into the mix as he rehabs from a spring Achilles tear. Teams covet depth on the edge, so the Broncos can be picky about even considering moving somebody while they’re in contention.

With Josh Reynolds out for the foreseeable future, do you see the Broncos making a move for another receiver? If we don’t make a trade, how about kicking the tires on Michael Thomas?

— Mark, Arvada

Hey Mark, never say never but, let’s start with two quick points about the receiver room specifically.

Reynolds has to miss at least one more game on injured reserve due to the finger injury he sustained against Las Vegas, but that’s not expected to keep him out long term. And though we don’t know the extent of the injuries he sustained when he was shot earlier this month, we do know they’ve been called “minor” by the team and that he’s been around practice the past week without any visible signs of injury.

Now, the physical fallout from that incident is only one part of the equation and maybe he will need several weeks, but it’s possible he’s back in the mix before too long.

Second, regardless of if Reynolds is available or not, the Broncos have young players they want to develop in Troy Franklin, Devaughn Vele and Marvin Mims Jr.

Then there’s the other considerations.

As with the conversation Cooper and Bonitto up top, the Broncos’ salary cap position currently does not lend itself to adding a receiver (or really anybody else) via trade. They don’t have a ton of natural ways to make space unless they move on from a player.

Could Denver decide that a buy-and-sell approach works best? Sure. They could create space by moving, say, Browning or Cooper or a quarterback or somebody else at the deadline and then using that space by acquiring a player they feel fills a need at another position.

Does that seem likely? Not particularly. Payton’s said repeatedly that he likes this team.

The short story is basically this: If they do want to add, it’s probably not as simple as just finding a player and a willing trade partner.

Please be honest and candid with this: In your estimation, was it necessary for Sean Payton to pull a fake field goal play when up by 21 points in the fourth quarter against the lowly Panthers?

— Ed Helinski, Auburn, N.Y.

Necessary? No, Ed, it wasn’t necessary. Obviously the Broncos had a big lead and they could have just punted or tried the 60-yard field goal instead of faking it.

I do wonder if they had the fake on before the false start that bumped the field goal unit from 55 yards back to 60.

Regardless, if the Broncos wanted to go for it, they could have just put the offense on the field. That one to me felt like a chance to put something on tape that they hadn’t shown so far this season or, actually, since this coaching staff has been in Denver. Coordinator Ben Kotwica and senior assistant Mike Westhoff have built one of the best special teams units in football and along the way they’ve shown a bunch of stuff. But never a fake field goal. So it felt in the moment like a “put it on tape and make future opponents prepare for it” type of situation.

You might even wonder if that was down the list of their fake field goal plays and perhaps the one they roll out when they actually need a spark is a wrinkle off of that one.

Does that make it the polite thing to do? Not necessarily. Panthers players were clearly frustrated, but not just about that. It was the fourth-and-2 wide receiver pass and even the timeout and the slant to Courtland Sutton near the 2-minute warning that bothered them, too.

You got a clear sense this week about how much Sean Payton cares. It’s zero. And that’s fine, too.

With the tight end position struggling so badly, why hasn’t Donald Parham been activated from the practice squad? Lucas Krull and Adam Trautman aren’t it and (Greg) Dulcich can’t even get on the field!

— Tim, Kalispell, Mont.

Hey Tim, good questions, although the tight ends broke out with a big day Sunday against the Panthers. They entered the game with 136 yards and no touchdowns on the season collectively and against Carolina alone had 106 and two touchdowns.

Of course, it’s still a group that has a long way to go to prove it can be a productive one in the passing game.

With any group, but probably tight ends especially, it always helps to keep the variety of roles in mind. Parham is indeed an interesting option, mostly as a pass-catcher. That’s the role that Dulcich started the year with and then lost in favor of Krull. One interesting question would be if Krull had to miss time, would Payton go back to Dulcich or would Parham get a look?

Trautman plays as much as he does because the Broncos trust him as a blocker, too.

Nate Adkins can block, too, and his playing time has trended up generally since the beginning of the season. He’s stepped into quite a bit bigger role in his second year as a pro overall. Last year he never played more than eight offensive snaps in a game. This year he’s averaging 22.5 and has played around 50% of the offensive snaps in three of the past five games.

All of that said, there’s still every chance that Parham gets a chance at some point, especially if the pass-catching contributions continue to lag. He’s a guy who’s produced in the red zone previously and he has an enormous catch radius.

There’s actually a comparison to Krull to be made in terms of timeline. Remember, Parham wasn’t in Denver for any of training camp. He got signed at the roster cutdown before Week 1. Once the season starts, practice is all about game-planning, so there just aren’t a ton of reps to work in guys who are new or not definitively in the plan for that week.

Krull was in the same boat last year and he and Russell Wilson would work on extra throws after practice for several weeks as he tried to get up to speed. Krull appeared for the first time in Week 9 and then was up Weeks 12 through 17.

Parker, does it seem like Bo Nix is adjusting to the speed of the NFL game? He’s been looking more confident and decisive while putting up strong numbers (granted I know the Broncos haven’t played against the strongest opponents in the last two weeks).

— Adam, Thornton

Yeah, Adam, he’s done a nice job. It’s probably a combination of a bunch of factors. A non-complete list: Nix himself getting settled into being a pro, guys around him making more plays, some young players developing in parallel with Nix, the coaching staff learning more about what he’s most comfortable doing and, yes, the fact that they’ve played two of the worst defenses in football the last two times out.

We’ve seen Nix make plays with his legs throughout the season and then against Carolina he really played mostly from the pocket, a promising sign. The question we don’t yet know the answer to is if he can continue to play that way and be settled in there when facing rushes better than the Panthers. The offensive line deserves credit, too. In each of the Broncos’ five wins, Nix was pressured 23% of his drop-backs or fewer (season-low 15% vs. Carolina). The three losses: 48.8% vs. the Chargers, 35.9% vs. Pittsburgh and 36.7% at Seattle.

People always want to rush to judgment on players, particularly quarterbacks. The stretches where Nix has struggled don’t mean he’s doomed to be a bust and the game against Carolina doesn’t mean he’s the next great one at quarterback. He’s playing his first NFL season, seeing things for the first time and trying to figure his way through it. And the fact that he’s handled the struggles so far, that his teammates appear to love the way he competes and the fact that Denver has won five of its first eight games are all good signs.

He’s going to go through more rough patches this year, without a doubt. But the Broncos have also found a way to put themselves in the mix while he learns through his rookie season and that’s a good sign both for this year and beyond.

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