The Denver Broncos are back in the playoffs for the second consecutive year, but this season expectations have grown considerably. A year removed from a 10-7 record and Wild Card Round exit against the Buffalo Bills, the Broncos are back with a 14-3 record and the No. 1 seed in the AFC bracket.
The No. 1 seed brings a first round bye, which means they have an extra week to get healthy for their first playoff game. This will be of particular help to their defense, which was without linebacker Dre Greenlaw and defensive end John Franklin-Myers at the close of the regular season. Franklin-Myers seemed closer to a return, but even Greenlaw has a shot at returning.
Denver Broncos’ next playoff opponent
The NFL re-seeds the bracket after the first round of games. That means that we won’t immediately know the specific team the Broncos will face in the Divisional Round. Instead, Denver will face the worst remaining seed when the Wild Card Round concludes on Monday. If all the higher seeds win this first weekend, the Broncos would play the No. 4 seeded Pittsburgh Steelers. If all the lower seeds won upsets, Denver would play the No. 7 seeded Los Angeles Chargers. The No. 5 Houston and No. 6 Buffalo Bills are also in the mix as Divisional Round opponents depending on how the higher seeds perform.
The earliest the Broncos will know their opponent is the end of Sunday after the Patriots-Chargers 2/7 matchup. If LA wins, they would travel to Denver in the Divisional Round. Otherwise it depends on the results of Bills-Jaguars and Texans-Steelers.
History vs. potential opponents
vs. Pittsburgh Steelers: 15-11-1 regular season, 5-3 postseason all-time — They last played in 2024, with the Steelers winning 13-3 in Denver. Pittsburgh has won three straight in this regular season series. They last played a playoff game in 2016, with the Broncos beating the Steelers 23-16 in the Divisional Round.
vs. Houston Texans:7-4 regular season all-time — Denver beat Houston 18-15 in Week 9 this season. The Broncos came back from an eight point deficit, winning the game on a Wil Lutz field goal as time expired. They have never faced each other in the playoffs.
vs. Buffalo Bills: 17-22-1 regular season, 0-2 postseason all-time — The last time these two teams met was in last year’s Wild Card Round. The Bills thumped the Broncos 31-7. it was their first meeting since the Broncos won a 2023 Monday Night Football game, and their first playoff meeting since the Bills won the 1992 AFC Championship.
vs. Jacksonville Jaguars: 7-7 regular season, 1-1 postseason all-time — The Jaguars won the last meeting between these two in impressive fashion. They won 34-20 in Denver in Week 16. They last met in the playoffs in 1997 when the Broncos thumped them 42-17 in the Wild Card round. They had met the previous year in the Divisional Round when the Jaguars shocked them in Denver in only their second season in existence.
Early Divisional Round odds
FanDuel has posted hypothetical odds for the various potential Divisional Round matchups.
Chargers @ Broncos
Spread: Broncos -3
Total: 41.5
Moneyline: Broncos -178, Chargers +150
Bills @ Broncos
Spread: Bills -1.5
Total: 47.5
Moneyline: Bills -130, Broncos +110
Texans @ Broncos
Spread: Broncos -1.5
Total: 38.5
Moneyline: Broncos -120, Texans +102
Steekers @ Broncos
Spread: Broncos -4.5
Total: 41.5
Moneyline: Broncos -240, Steelers +198
Denver Broncos playoff history
The Broncos reached the playoffs as a wild card team last season and lost to the Bills in the first round. The last time they reached the playoffs prior to that was in 2015, when Peyton Manning led them to a Super Bowl victory. Coincidentally, that Super Bowl was in Levi’s Stadium, which is the site of this year’s Super Bowl. That was the close of a five-year run of playoff appearances.
That Super Bowl year was also the last time the Broncos were a No. 1 seed in the AFC playoff bracket. This year marks their AFC record ninth time as the top seed in the conference. Two of their three Super Bowl victories have come as the No. 1 seed, and they’ve advanced to the Super Bowl in six of the eight previous seasons in which they were the No. 1 seed.
Source link
#Breaking #Broncos #play #Divisional #NFL #Playoffs
![Weather the big story at the F1 Miami Grand Prix Formula 1 is finally back after an extended absence, with this weekend’s Miami Grand Prix.But it is shaping up to be a rather soggy return to the track.Weather was the dominant story during Thursday’s media day sessions, as current forecasts call for thunderstorms and heavy rain on Sunday during the main event. That forecast has all the drivers talking about what they might encounter, and even has the sport considering changing the schedule for the weekend.“It’ll be interesting. I don’t think many of us have driven these cars in the rain before, maybe a couple of people in Barcelona at the shakedown,“ said Oscar Piastri during Thursday’s FIA Press Conference. ”But I think they’re going to be challenging cars to drive in the rain just because of some of the quirks that they have. And obviously the weather, normally if it rains in Miami, it does it properly, so we’ll wait and see. But it’ll be interesting one way or another.““I understand that there is a meeting later on with the FIA to double-check the scenario for Sunday because apparently, it’s looking really bad. So, we’ll see if there are any changes on the schedule for the weekend,” added Cadillac’s Sergio Pérez.The sport’s governing body, the FIA, issued a statement on Thursday.“We are closely monitoring the weather forecast for this weekend,” an FIA spokesperson said. “Having faced a similar situation last year in Miami with threats of thunderstorms, we have a contingency plan in place and will activate it if needed to minimise disruption to the on-track [program].”Last year, wet weather on Saturday forced the cancellation of the second F1 Academy race at the Miami Grand Prix, and the F1 Sprint race began in tricky conditions. Charles Leclerc crashed in those conditions ahead of the F1 Sprint race, and did not make the start.As of Friday morning, forecasts are calling for showers in the morning with heavy thunderstorms on Sunday afternoon, with an 85% chance of rain and up to a half-inch of precipitation during the afternoon:Complicating matters is the fact that few drivers have operated this year’s machinery in wet conditions, as noted by Piastri. Drivers are still coming to grips with the impact of the new regulations, which were tweaked during the extended break.Mercedes driver Kimi Antonelli, the current championship leader, is one of the few drivers who has experienced the new cars in wet conditions. He described that experience as “tricky” on Thursday.“Yeah, I drove the car when we did the shakedown in Silverstone in the wet and definitely it was very tricky,” said Antonelli.“Although now with the changes, they clipped the power to 250 kilowatts for the wet and no boost, so that’s already a step forward in that regard. And definitely I think it’s going to be tricky because there will be a lot of unknown, and obviously we’re also going to be racing if the wet weather presents. But I think also another big topic is that we will need to increase tire blanket [temperatures] for the wet because I think as they are now, probably they will be a bit too low for the conditions.“So yeah, it’s going to be interesting to see, tricky, but let’s see. If it’s thunderstorms, like they say, we probably also won’t get under way for quite a bit of time. So, let’s see how that goes,” added Antonelli. “But definitely it’s going to be very interesting because there’s so much unknown in the wet at the moment, especially no one really used the inter tires, so we don’t know how it’s going to feel, how much grip there will be, especially with the new regulation. And I think also one thing with this year’s cars, it’s a bit harder to build temperature with the tyres, so in the wet they might be tricky and that’s why we probably would need to increase tire blanket [temps] in order to make it a bit better and a bit easier on that side. But yeah, let’s see what’s going to happen.”As Antonelli pointed out, ahead of the Miami Grand Prix, the FIA announced that the new boost mode would not be accessible for drivers in wet conditions, like we may see on Sunday.Regarding what F1 could do to the schedule, the 2024 São Paulo Grand Prix may be a guide. Ahead of that race, qualifying for the Grand Prix was moved from Saturday to Sunday morning due to severe weather, and the start time of the Grand Prix on Sunday was pushed up by 90 minutes as well.With these forecasts, we could see something similar in Miami this weekend. #Weather #big #story #Miami #Grand #Prix](https://i3.wp.com/platform.sbnation.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2026/05/Screenshot-2026-05-01-at-6.52.47AM.png?quality=90&strip=all&crop=0%2C0%2C100%2C100&w=2400&ssl=1 "Weather the big story at the F1 Miami Grand Prix Formula 1 is finally back after an extended absence, with this weekend’s Miami Grand Prix.But it is shaping up to be a rather soggy return to the track.Weather was the dominant story during Thursday’s media day sessions, as current forecasts call for thunderstorms and heavy rain on Sunday during the main event. That forecast has all the drivers talking about what they might encounter, and even has the sport considering changing the schedule for the weekend.“It’ll be interesting. I don’t think many of us have driven these cars in the rain before, maybe a couple of people in Barcelona at the shakedown,“ said Oscar Piastri during Thursday’s FIA Press Conference. ”But I think they’re going to be challenging cars to drive in the rain just because of some of the quirks that they have. And obviously the weather, normally if it rains in Miami, it does it properly, so we’ll wait and see. But it’ll be interesting one way or another.““I understand that there is a meeting later on with the FIA to double-check the scenario for Sunday because apparently, it’s looking really bad. So, we’ll see if there are any changes on the schedule for the weekend,” added Cadillac’s Sergio Pérez.The sport’s governing body, the FIA, issued a statement on Thursday.“We are closely monitoring the weather forecast for this weekend,” an FIA spokesperson said. “Having faced a similar situation last year in Miami with threats of thunderstorms, we have a contingency plan in place and will activate it if needed to minimise disruption to the on-track [program].”Last year, wet weather on Saturday forced the cancellation of the second F1 Academy race at the Miami Grand Prix, and the F1 Sprint race began in tricky conditions. Charles Leclerc crashed in those conditions ahead of the F1 Sprint race, and did not make the start.As of Friday morning, forecasts are calling for showers in the morning with heavy thunderstorms on Sunday afternoon, with an 85% chance of rain and up to a half-inch of precipitation during the afternoon:Complicating matters is the fact that few drivers have operated this year’s machinery in wet conditions, as noted by Piastri. Drivers are still coming to grips with the impact of the new regulations, which were tweaked during the extended break.Mercedes driver Kimi Antonelli, the current championship leader, is one of the few drivers who has experienced the new cars in wet conditions. He described that experience as “tricky” on Thursday.“Yeah, I drove the car when we did the shakedown in Silverstone in the wet and definitely it was very tricky,” said Antonelli.“Although now with the changes, they clipped the power to 250 kilowatts for the wet and no boost, so that’s already a step forward in that regard. And definitely I think it’s going to be tricky because there will be a lot of unknown, and obviously we’re also going to be racing if the wet weather presents. But I think also another big topic is that we will need to increase tire blanket [temperatures] for the wet because I think as they are now, probably they will be a bit too low for the conditions.“So yeah, it’s going to be interesting to see, tricky, but let’s see. If it’s thunderstorms, like they say, we probably also won’t get under way for quite a bit of time. So, let’s see how that goes,” added Antonelli. “But definitely it’s going to be very interesting because there’s so much unknown in the wet at the moment, especially no one really used the inter tires, so we don’t know how it’s going to feel, how much grip there will be, especially with the new regulation. And I think also one thing with this year’s cars, it’s a bit harder to build temperature with the tyres, so in the wet they might be tricky and that’s why we probably would need to increase tire blanket [temps] in order to make it a bit better and a bit easier on that side. But yeah, let’s see what’s going to happen.”As Antonelli pointed out, ahead of the Miami Grand Prix, the FIA announced that the new boost mode would not be accessible for drivers in wet conditions, like we may see on Sunday.Regarding what F1 could do to the schedule, the 2024 São Paulo Grand Prix may be a guide. Ahead of that race, qualifying for the Grand Prix was moved from Saturday to Sunday morning due to severe weather, and the start time of the Grand Prix on Sunday was pushed up by 90 minutes as well.With these forecasts, we could see something similar in Miami this weekend. #Weather #big #story #Miami #Grand #Prix")
Post Comment