“The Broncos exist solely to torment me,” is what Jay Connor, Senior Editor of Culture and Entertainment here at The Root, said when asked about the Thursday Night Football game between the Denver Broncos and the Indianapolis Colts.
I can’t blame him, since I know exactly how he feels as an Atlanta Falcons fan myself. The only difference is the Falcons didn’t pay a Super Bowl-winning quarterback a quarter of a billion dollars to turn their team around. But the Broncos did.
Two weeks ago, football fans were wondering how Mile High’s team was even 2-1, considering how abysmal their offense looked. Now, they’re confused as to how Russell Wilson looks so cooked.
Despite how atrocious Wilson looked throughout the first four games of the season, he looked even worse Thursday night against the Colts. In his fifth game as a Bronco, Wilson had a 53% completion percentage, two interceptions and a quarterback rating (QBR) of 20.2 out of a possible 100. In short, he was bad.
To make things worse, on the last play of the game in overtime, Wilson missed a wide-open K.J. Hamler and instead threw to Courtland Sutton, which ended in an incomplete pass and an L on the Broncos record. The Colts won 12-9.
Things only got worse postgame, when Wilson’s former teammate, Richard Sherman, absolutely went off on the Broncos for not running the ball at the end of the game—similar to what happened with the Seahawks in Super 49 against the New England Patriots. Then, to make matters worse, pictures came out of teammates giving him the side eye because of how he was playing throughout Thursday night’s game.
Look, I’m not saying Wilson is washed. Hell, I was excited for him after he was first traded to the Broncos in March. Despite the constant accusations that Russell’s demeanor comes off as fake, robotic and rehearsed, I am (or was) a fan of Russ because he is a Black quarterback that was really good at football (and married to Ciara). I have no shame in admitting that. There are so many talented Black QBs that I gotta support all of them when they’re playing well. But, it’s hard to defend a quarterback that’s playing as badly as Wilson is right now. For his sake, I hope he gets it together before Broncos fans leave before the end of every game this season.
At one point, Seahawks fans were begging Pete Carrol to “Let Russ cook.” Now, Broncos fans are claiming that “Russ is cooked.” Is it true? We’ll have to wait for the regular season to play out to know for sure.