There’s a long history of coaches making players carry a football with them at all times in order to address a problem holding onto it during a game and the Broncos are working on a variation of it this spring.
Quarterback Peyton Manning was carrying a football wrapped in green Lycra when he met with reporters on Wednesday and wide receiver Demaryius Thomas was also spotted with one during practice. Manning was asked about why he was lugging it around and responded with the kind of elementary school wit that one usually has to find on bumper stickers.
“Like I said, that’s official Denver Broncos offensive business, right? It’s kind of an A and B conversation and you can C your way out of it,” Manning said, via Lindsay Jones of USA Today.
While Manning wasn’t willing to be forthcoming about the reason for his new companion, coach John Fox resisted the urge to reply to the same questions by saying “I know you are, but what am I?” Fox confirmed that the idea was to get the Broncos focused on ball security after they led the league with 16 fumbles last season.
“We’re making an emphasis from Day One on ball security,” Fox said, via the Denver Post. “We started with two of our better players in Demaryius and Peyton. What better guys to start with?”
Should the attempt fail and Broncos players still struggle to hold onto the ball, Denver will have to hope that their opponents are rubber while the Broncos are glue so that the fumbles bounce off them and return to the offense’s hands.