Von Miller walked into Broncos training camp with the all-time sack record on his mind.
But new coach Vic Fangio also has him focusing on all the other non-sack things he can do for the team, and how that can make him even better than piling up stats.
Miller told Peter King of NBC’s Football Morning in America that he appreciated the work Fangio and outside linebackers coach Brandon Staley were putting in to make him a more complete player by stressing the fundamentals of things like pass coverage.
“I got a great coach here, one of the best coaches I’ve ever had in my life,” Miller said. “We have great leadership here but he’s an outside linebacker guy. He’s coached a lot of great ones. I wanna be his greatest product yet. It’s the little things, like coach Fangio says. When you really focus on the little things it turns into a change of game. It turns into a whole different athlete. I bought into that. I bought into my outside linebackers coach as well, coach Staley. He stays up super late thinking about how to make me better . . . I can really appreciate that. I bought into whatever those coaching points that they give me.”
Staley came with Fangio from Chicago, where the linebackers had 51 sacks the last two seasons, the third-most in the league.
But working with Miller on footwork and drops — and having him buy into it _ should have a carryover effect, as all the non-Von Millers on the Broncos roster see their best player going to new lengths to improve.