News
12/30/23
7 min read
What's Next for Russell Wilson, Denver Broncos?
The Russell Wilson era in Denver has effectively ended. Sean Payton announced the Denver Broncos plan to start Jarrett Stidham at quarterback in Week 17 and Wilson expects to be released in March.
By sitting Wilson for the final two games of the regular season, the Broncos will avoid potentially triggering an injury guarantee for his $37 million 2025 salary. If Wilson is on the Denver roster on March 21, that guarantee triggers anyway, which is why a release is expected before that date.
When Wilson was traded to the Broncos, the two sides agreed on a contract extension with two years remaining on his deal. The first new year of that deal would be 2024, a season Wilson is not expected to be on the roster to see. We start with the financial ramifications because it’s often about the money on a move like this.
Denver would likely have to designate Wilson as a post-June 1 release to split his would-be record $85 million in dead money over the 2024 and 2025 seasons. The Broncos would take a projected $53 million hit in 2024 and a $32 million hit in 2025 with that structure, per OverTheCap. As difficult a pill as that would be to swallow, it’s harder to imagine keeping Wilson around for another two guaranteed years.
That 2025 guarantee is the sticking point because $37 million guaranteed for a would-be 37-year-old quarterback would be quite risky. If there were no adjustments to the contract, Wilson would have a $55.4 million cap hit for the 2025 season.
Given Wilson’s level of play, it’s clear why Denver would choose to get out of that deal now for $85 million and not run the risk of being tied down for another two years and $122 million with the entire contract in effect, including another $4 million in 2026 guarantees that would trigger in 2025.
Reason To Hope
The Broncos had high hopes when Wilson was acquired, but Year 1 was a disaster under Nate Hackett, and there has been no magical fix with Payton. Over Wilson’s 30 starts with Denver, the Broncos are 19-31 with a minus-124 point differential.
Wilson has been better in 2023 than he was in 2022, and there could have been some justification for keeping him around for another year if that 2025 guarantee didn’t loom over that decision — something the Broncos tried to get Wilson to waive.
But Wilson will now find himself in a strange spot as a 36-year-old quarterback who still believes he can be what he was at his peak but hasn’t proven that physically over the past two seasons.
One of the biggest problems in figuring out what the future holds for Wilson is getting a grasp on the kind of quarterback he is or isn’t at the moment. The Hackett experience was a flop because Wilson got an outsized influence on the offense. Denver went heavy in shotgun and took deep shots out of empty. Wilson wanted to air it out.
Only Marcus Mariota had a higher rate of throws travel at least 20 air yards than Wilson in 2022. He was 13th in EPA per play on those attempts but just 23rd in success rate, per TruMedia. Wilson also averaged the eighth-longest time to throw among quarterbacks with at least 100 drop backs. He was often still in creation mode, trying to extend plays out of structure.
That was a high-risk/high-reward strategy that didn’t mesh well with the underneath game not working out. The Broncos punted on 48.2 percent of drives last season, the highest rate in the league.
Change with Sean Payton
With Payton, the hope was Wilson could settle into a more structured offense and play on time, which would, in theory, spark more down-to-down consistency that could open up areas for those splash plays. That hasn’t been the case this season.
Wilson has the second-longest average time to throw this season, behind only Justin Fields, and the production on those extended plays just hasn’t been there. Seven quarterbacks have at least 100 dropbacks that lasted over four seconds. Wilson is seventh in both EPA per play and success rate in that group.
On more in-structure plays under three seconds, Wilson is 25th in EPA per play but easily has the lowest ADOT among quarterbacks at just 3.9 yards past the line of scrimmage. 21.5 percent of Wilson’s attempts under three seconds have come on screens, the highest rate among quarterbacks this season, according to TruMedia.
On non-screen passes under three seconds, Wilson is 24th in EPA per play, with a league-high 30.1 percent of his attempts targeting running backs.
There has yet to be a happy medium between getting Wilson to play in structure and allowing him to create plays on his own. What makes that a bigger issue — and likely a frustrating one for a coach like Payton — is many of the traits that made Wilson special in his time with the Seahawks have diminishing returns as Wilson has aged.
The spirited scrambler and improviser can’t move like he used to, which has sapped the effectiveness of his instincts to get outside the pocket. Only Fields has a higher rate of dropbacks that finished outside the pocket than Wilson this season, per TruMedia. But on those snaps, Wilson is just 34th in EPA per play and 41st in success rate among 47 quarterbacks with at least 100 dropbacks on the season.
This isn’t to say Wilson has been one of the worst quarterbacks in the league this season. He’s still had some flashes in high-level play, but they’re not at the same rate during his peak years with the Seahawks. Wilson’s internal clock and physical abilities remain at odds, which presents a struggle for the kind of offense that can be run with him behind center.
It wouldn’t be unprecedented for a quarterback to learn how to play in rhythm and get more out of the structured plays. Take Baker Mayfield, a smaller quarterback like Wilson, who often fled the pocket in an attempt to make a play. This year, under Dave Canales, who was Wilson’s quarterback coach and passing game coordinator during his final years in Seattle, Mayfield has played better and more inside the structure of the play.
Mayfield is third among quarterbacks in EPA per play on dropbacks under three seconds this season and has the third-highest ADOT. There can be a compromise between getting the ball out quickly and pushing the ball down the field. The question is if Wilson is too far into his career to truly make a change in play style.
What Does The Future Hold?
At his age, Wilson likely won’t command an expensive multi-year deal and might have to settle as a short-term stopgap either with a rookie quarterback behind him or for a team figuring out the next move at quarterback. Several teams will be looking for new quarterbacks this offseason, and Wilson won’t be the worst available option, especially if he comes on an affordable contract.
But in his current state, Wilson’s future might have to look more like his past with the type of low-volume, play-action-heavy offense he went to Denver to get away from. He might have to be the ideal version of what the Falcons hoped they were getting in Marcus Mariota for the 2022 season.
It’s quite the drop-off from what Wilson was at his peak and what the Broncos thought they were getting with the massive trade last offseason. Wilson can still have some value, but his time as a franchise quarterback to build around is likely up as his time in Denver comes to an end.
