Are these Sean Payton rumors smoke? Or is there some fire at the base of this story?
Since the Denver Broncos' impressive season ended, speculation surrounding Sean Payton's play-calling future has run rampant. The biggest reason it's suddenly become a viral rumor is that Payton reportedly wanted to hire Joe Brady as his new offensive coordinator and give him play-calling duties before the Buffalo Bills hired him as their new head coach.
two days after losing the AFC championship game to the New England Patriots. Payton's eye, initially, may have been on luring Brady to Denver, but when the Bills took him off the market, the offensive coordinator vacuum was Webb has been a hot commodity in the past two NFL hiring cycles, but this time he was in consideration for several head-coaching vacancies. None of them came to fruition, and Webb also withdrew his name from consideration for the Las Vegas Raiders' job. Vegas pivoted to Seattle Seahawks OC Klint Kubiak. After interviewing a couple of outside candidates, Payton made it official, naming Webb as the Broncos' new OC. And since that point, rumors have swirled that the Broncos' head coach is going to relinquish play-calling duties to Webb.dropped some information on the subject. Making the rounds at the Super Bowl in Santa Clara, CA, Fowler's intel points toward Payton passing the play-calling baton to Webb. "Davis Webb taking over as the Broncos' offensive coordinator is significant beyond the title. I've talked to several people in the league who believe that coach Sean Payton will eventually relinquish playcalling to Webb, a fast riser who had multiple head coaching interviews this cycle. Nothing has been decided as far as I understand. And the decision will be up to Payton, who has called plays at a high level for decades. But it wouldn't be shocking if this happened gradually," Fowler wrote.DENVER, CO - JANUARY 04: Denver Head Coach, Sean Payton and Bo Nix 10 of the Denver Broncos, discuss a play during a game between the Los Angeles Chargers and the Denver Broncos at Empower Field at Mile High in Denver, CO on January 04, 2026. | Kevin Langley / IMAGO / Icon Sportswire Frankly, I'd be shocked if Payton ever gives up play-calling. Not while he's still the top decision-maker on the coaching staff. As Fowler writes, Payton has been a high-level play-caller in the NFL for the better part of the past quarter-century. He's widely viewed as one of the most creative and innovative offensive minds in football.recently pointed out, the Broncos' offense has been fairly basic since Payton arrived in Denver. Could that be due to the constraints of developing a young quarterback? Bo Nix has been one of the NFL's most statistically productive and winningest quarterbacks since joining Payton in Denver, but the Broncos' offense hasn't looked anything close to the juggernaut he maintained for so many years in New Orleans with Drew Brees. I mean, you can see the basic similarities, but it's worth asking why Payton has kept a lid of sorts on his Broncos' offense.. "He's one of the greatest offensive minds in the history of the sport. Now, where I do like it? I do think their offense was—for a Sean Payton offense—rather basic this year. I mean, if you really looked at it. And we watched film of the Broncos, and then I said, 'All right. Let's go watch the Bears, or the 49ers, or McVay, or McDaniels, and go look at some of the things they're doing. You'd go, Woah. They're doing a lot of stuff here.'" Two of those teams that Simms referenced have quarterbacks drafted in 2024, just like Nix. But the Chicago Bears, with Caleb Williams, and the New England Patriots, with Drake Maye, have run a much more creative and sophisticated offense compared to the Broncos and Nix. Keep in mind, though, it's not as if the Broncos' offense has been bad. They finished as a top-10 scoring offense in 2024 with Nix as a rookie, and top-10 in total yards this past season. My educated guess is that Payton has structured it this way for a reason, and that's to protect Nix and put him in the best position to succeed early on in his young career. It could also be a personnel issue, although that one is harder for me to believe, simply because Payton has had three years to remake the offense in his image. The players Denver has are exactly the guys Payton has targeted and wanted, with the exception of pre-2023 incumbents like wide receiver Courtland Sutton, left tackle Garett Bolles, and right guard Quinn Meinerz, all of whom earned Pro Bowl honors this year and were retained for a reason.What nobody is asking is this: How could you expect Webb — an NFL coach of only three seasons without play-calling experience — to step in and suddenly be a better play-caller than Payton, who has not only been doing it for a long time, but at the very highest levels? That doesn't make much sense to me. And yet, the rumors persist. We know Payton was at least open to giving the play-calling to Brady, but the big difference is that he has been proven as one of the NFL's best over the past several years in Buffalo.outside of the preseason. So, if Payton were to take a step back and pass the baton to Webb, I agree with Fowler that it would be a gradual process. It wouldn't happen overnight, and it would be done with no small amount of oversight. If this is all smoke and no fire, there's still every reason to believe that Webb will help spice things up for the Broncos' offense and inspire Payton. As offensive coordinator, Webb will contribute even more to the in-week game-planning and will have some influence on which plays get earmarked for gameday. Some of them will be Webb's plays, though Payton would be the one calling them into Nix on gameday. That's honestly the more realistic way this thing will shake out. Then again, there's been an awful lot of smoke on the subject for nearly two weeks, and in the NFL, where there's smoke, there's usually fire. This storyline isn't going anywhere. Until and unless Payton opts to address it — perhaps at the NFL Combine later this month — we're unlikely to get any definitive answers to this question until the summer.Chad Jensen is the Publisher of Denver Broncos On SI, the Founder of Mile High Huddle, and creator of the popular Mile High Huddle Podcast. Chad has been on the Denver Broncos beat since 2012 and is a member of the Pro Football Writers of America.
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