Good news, Broncos! Quarterback Brock Osweiler looks like he can play the position at a high level!
Bad news, Broncos! Copy and paste the above here!
In the fourth year of his rookie contract, Osweiler is now only five regular-season games away from becoming eligible for unrestricted free agency. And if he hits the open market after with last night’s snow-globe takedown of the Patriots on his resume, one of the handful of teams with horrible quarterback situations (you know who you are) will gladly pay Osweiler big money to take the reins.
Meanwhile, Broncos linebacker Von Miller is also rocketing toward unrestricted free agency, and the Broncos (like every NFL franchise) have only one franchise tag to use. So at least one of those two guys will need to be signed to a long-term deal before the deadline comes and goes for applying the tag to the other.
Meanwhile to the meanwhile, quarterback Peyton Manning has a $19 million base salary for 2016.
The easiest decision will be to move on from Manning. The harder decision will be to determine how much of Manning’s $19 million should go to Osweiler. If Osweiler decides to push for the open market (and his agents at CAA surely will know what the market will bear for him), the Broncos may need the full $19 million and then some in order to tag the quarterback — and they’ll also need to break the bank for Miller in order to keep him off the market, too.
Some would say it’s a good problem to have. Others would say the only good problem is no problem. Either way, 2016 has plenty of challenges for the Broncos. It’ll be here the moment the 2015 postseason concludes.