The strength of the Denver Broncos’ offense during the Sean Payton era has been and will continue to be the offensive line.
That said, the Broncos have some serious questions surrounding each of their starting and reserve spots along the interior of their line. What’s next for Quinn Meinerz? Can Ben Powers live up to his massive contract? Is Alex Forsyth worth the hype? Let’s find out in today’s edition of our position preview series.
Position Preview article series so far:
Grading The QBs and OL Podcast Episode:
Starter (RG): Quinn Meinerz
Will He Make The Roster? Yeah. He’s the Denver Broncos’ second-best player overall and best player on offense, one of the best guards in the league, and he hasn’t even hit his prime yet.
The real question now is whether or not the Broncos can work out a deal with Meinerz before some team leaps at the chance to make him the league’s highest-paid interior lineman.
What Will His Projected Role Be? Starting right guard and anchor of the offensive line.
Quinn Meinerz is emerging as one of the best young offensive linemen in the league, and he’s on the trajectory to quickly remove that ‘young’ qualifier. He should be a featured piece in the ground game much how some of the game’s exciting new receivers are focused points in their team’s passing attacks.
Whether you want him anchoring in pass protection against the league’s best interior pass rusher, or pulling to clear the way on a run play, Meinerz reliably excels at fulfilling his task on a given play.
What Would Define A Successful Season? Making an All-Pro team.
This is absolutely a lofty bar, especially considering how much the Denver Broncos are likely to lose this season and especially considering how little All-Pro voters pay attention to the interior offensive play of losing teams.
Nonetheless, Meinerz has already proven so much in his career, it only feels right to set expectations this high, even while the deck is stacked against him. Meinerz’s name has gotten more and more praise throughout the offseason, and he’s likely to be consistently highlighted during Denver Broncos broadcasts this 2024 season.
For it to be a truly successful season though, the Wisconsin-Whitewater product has to turn his cult following among NFL tape-heads and offseason buzz into high-end national accolades.
What Questions Does He Still Have To Answer? How much better can he get?
Between his developmental trajectory and rare physical profile, it certainly feels like the sky is the limit for Quinn Meinerz. But how much of that potential will be realized ultimately? That’s really the only question Meinerz has left to answer.
Starter (LG): Ben Powers
Will He Make The Roster? Absolutely. Not only is he a highly talented lineman, but the Denver Broncos would also be forced to eat an additional dead cap hit of $15 million with a cut and $14 million with a trade.
He might not have quite lived up to expectations last season, but he should be in Denver for the long haul.
What Will His Projected Role Be? Starting guard opposite Quinn Meinerz.
Hopefully he’ll utilized more as a puller — a role in which he thrives — more than he was last season.
What Would Define A Successful Season? For 2024 to be a successful season for Powers, he needs to come much closer to living up to his contract value. Fortunately for him, that demand is made more tolerable by the skyrocketing value of guards we’ve seen since he signed.
The Broncos are on the hook for him for the next two seasons, during which he’s set to have the 17th and 10th-highest cap hits in the league, and those numbers are reduced by two void years tacked on to the back of his deal.
To be a value add, Powers needs to be a top-10 guard in the league, and he was far from that in 2023.
He was alright in pass protection, but without being used as a puller as much as he was in Baltimore, he wasn’t able to showcase the skillset that got him all that money in the first place.
With a new quarterback, more offensive line continuity, and a more clearly defined offensive identity, that should hopefully change in 2024.
What Questions Does He Still Have To Answer? Was he just a product of the Baltimore Ravens’ hyper-friendly ecosystem?
The Ravens have been getting mediocre players paid high-end money on both sides of the line for years now.
Just this offseason, the New York Jets paid $12 million over two years to poach John Simpson from Baltimore. Meanwhile, the Ravens signed Simpson off the scrap heap, shortly after he was cut by the OL-needy Las Vegas Raiders, on a deal that cost them slightly more than $1 million over two years.
Was Powers just a product of Baltimore’s system who was bound for regression once he left? He’ll likely provide us an answer by season’s end.
Starter (C): Alex Forsyth
Will He Make The Roster? Almost certainly.
The Denver Broncos have so little invested in Alex Forsyth that they could cut him without shedding a tear, but all of their public comments and offseason positioning points to them genuinely having a high opinion of the second-year seventh-round selection, so he’ll very likely stick around.
What Will His Projected Role Be? Considering the decision makers’ apparent enfatuation with him, Forsyth should be expected to win the starting job this season.
Now, he’s going to face a legitimate challenge from Luke Wattenberg and Nick Gargiulo, but right now, Forsyth appears to be the most likely choice for the Week 1 starting center job.
What Would Define A Successful Season? Winning the starting job.
For most seventh-round picks who didn’t see the field during their rookie campaign, merely making the roster would be a success. However, with Forsyth, that seems like enough of a foregone conclusion that merely surviving the cutdown wouldn’t qualify as a successful season. Plus, if we’re being honest, the expectations for Forsyth are much higher than merely making the roster.
The expectation is he fills the shoes of Lloyd Cushenberry III — who is now one of the league’s highest-paid centers. Only time will tell if he’s up to the task.
What Questions Does He Still Have To Answer? Alex Forsyth has so many questions to answer as a relative unknown quantity.
Is he a starting-caliber NFL center? Can he measure up to the expectations left by Cushenberry? How will his game project to the next level? How will he mesh with the line’s four entrenched starters?
Again, only time will tell.
First Man Off Bench: Luke Wattenberg
Will He Make The Roster? It would be a massive surprise if he didn’t. Last season Luke Wattenberg was the Denver Broncos’ best reserve player on the interior, and it’s hard to see anyone who will steal that claim from him this season.
Wattenberg is also the likely starting center option, if the job doesn’t go to Forsyth, further bolstering his job security.
What Will His Projected Role Be? Wattenberg will either fulfill the same role he did last year — first man off the bench if someone on the interior of the line gets hurt — or he’ll take over the starting center job by beating out Forsyth.
It’s hard to imagine any other role for Wattenberg this season.
What Would Define A Successful Season? With Wattenberg reaching a fork in the road with the options ‘starter’ and ‘backup’, it’s safe to say that a successful season would see him win the starting job and take the next step in his professional arc.
What Questions Does He Still Have To Answer? Can he be a better fit for the mauling ground-and-pound offensive identity the Denver Broncos are attempting to build than Alex Forsyth?
The answer to that question likely determines Denver’s Week 1 starting center.
Bench: Nick Gargiulo
Will He Make The Roster? Nick Gargiulo was a good value pick for the Denver Broncos, and, given Denver’s current status as a rebuilding team in desperate need of affordable and intriguing young talent, it wouldn’t be wise to choose either Sam Mustipher or Calvin Throckmorton over him if there isn’t a notable gap in play.
His odds of making the roster are likely slightly better than a coin flip.
What Will His Projected Role Be? If he makes the roster, Gargiulo would almost certainly be a deep backup who would only see the following a series of injuries on the interior in rapid succession.
What Would Define A Successful Season? Speaking of succession, the Denver Broncos have set the table for a succession plan at guard in the coming years.
Meinerz will soon be very expensive, and the Broncos likely won’t want two pricey guards, which means they’ll likely move on from Powers after the 2025 season. That same offseason, Wattenberg’s deal will expire, meaning Denver will be down either one or two of their top four guards.
Gargiulo, who will still have two years left on his rookie deal at that point, will likely be tasked with either becoming Wattenberg’s replacement, as the next man off the bench, or potentially even the starter.
For Gargiulo’s 2024 season to be a success, he has to demonstrate something — whether that be in camp, during the preseason, or during the regular season — that makes Broncos Country believe that’s a viable strategy for 2026.
What Questions Does He Still Have To Answer? Is he a worthwhile NFL player, or is he the type of late seventh-round selection who is quickly jettisoned from the roster and forgot about almost as fast?
Cut: Calvin Throckmorton and Sam Mustipher
Will They Make The Roster? Calvin Throckmorton and Sam Mustipher are the cheap veteran insurance plans brought in to cover the Broncos in case some of the young talent they’re betting on doesn’t pan out.
Throckmorton and Mustipher both have a healthy amount of starting experience, with Throckmorton playing about 2,000 snaps over the last three seasons, and Mustipher starting extended periods of time for the Chicago Bears and Baltimore Ravens over that same span.
What Will Their Projected Roles Be? If they manage to stick on the roster, they’ll be veteran depth pieces. If they don’t make the cut, they’ll likely be scooped up by a different needy team.
What Would Define A Successful Season? Making someone’s NFL roster to maximize earning value. Maybe Mustipher could cement himself as the Broncos’ starting center long-term, but that seems far-fetched.
What Questions Do They Still Have To Answer? Is their relative reliability worth their relative lack of upside, when compared to Denver’s other options on the interior of the line.
