Good Luck, John Elway !!

The Duke of Denver has returned!!  John Elway is officially the newly anointed savior of a crumbling, but once-proud franchise.  He's got a lot of work to get done.  There's been a lot of talk about the Broncos' needs, their mistakes and their storied past.  The Denver Broncos are an original American Football League franchise.  The AFL (the more recent one, not the one that existed in 1926, briefly) was begat in the late 1950's when a number of rich guys all attempted to buy a struggling Chicago professional football team in the National Football League.  That would be the Chicago Cardinals, not the Bears.  When first Lamar Hunt, then Bud Adams, Bob Howsam and Max Winter were rebuffed in their attempts to buy controlling interest in the Cardinals, they met and approached the commissioner of the NFL to discuss obtaining expansion franchises.  When the Commish, Bert Bell, said "No, we're fine, no expansion for you!", Hunt and Adams decided to start their own social network, with a geographically-friendly natural rivalry, Hunt's team in Dallas, Adams' franchise in Houston.  Howsam was invited, so Denver became an original, the Winters and his partner agreed to field a team in Minneapolis, so the Original Four were the Dallas Texans, Houston Oilers, Denver Broncos and the Minnesota Vikings.  Word spread, and then, a whole bunch of rich guys jumped on the bandwagon, and at the first charter meeting, franchises were awarded to the original four, plus New York and Los Angeles.  That was 1959.  Then, the NFL, to undermine the fledgling league, offered a real NFL expansion bid to the Minnesota guys, who then jumped ship.  Further, NFL expansion franchises were awarded to Dallas and Houston, though the Houston NFL gig never got off the ground.

The American Football League began play in September 1960 with eight teams in the league — the Boston Patriots, Buffalo Bills, Dallas Texans, Denver Broncos, Houston Oilers, Los Angeles Chargers, New York Titans, and Oakland Raiders.  In the first pre-season contest (they actually called them exhibition games back then) the Boston Patriots (without Bill Belichick) defeated the Buffalo Bills.  The very first regular season tilt featured our very own Denver Broncos beating the Boston Patriots, 13-10.  The very first touchdown pass in the history of the AFL was a 59-yard toss from Frank Tripucka to Al Carmichael.  But, the Broncos were not very good for a long time, and it took drafting and signing their very first superstar, Floyd Little in 1967, to even be able to keep the franchise in Denver.  Our Broncs were the only original AFL team to never play in a championship game in the AFL's history.  The first league title went to the Houston Oilers who beat the Los Angeles Chargers 24-16 on New Year's Day 1961.  The Chargers moved to San Diego, Buffalo Bills owner Ralph Wilson loaned money to the Oakland franchise to keep it afloat and the league survived its first year.  Then, to build up interest, the AFL decided to challenge the Canadian Football League to an exhibition game.  The first big embarassment for the Buffalo Bills, they lost to the Hamilton Tiger-Cats in August of 1961.  Competition and confrontation between the NFL and the AFL escalated through the years, when draft choices and quarterbacks coveted by both leagues began to inhabit AFL rosters and popularity grew for the fledgling league.  Then, the first exhibition game ever to be played between two teams from the rival leagues was held at the old Denver University Stadium on August 5th, 1967.  Alex Karras, star defensive end for the Detroit Lions, vowed before the game that, "if them fuckin' Broncos beat us, I'll fuckin' walk back to Detroit."  Well, Denver won the tilt 13-7, but Mongo walked only as far as the team plane when it returned to Michigan.

The Broncos never really enjoyed any team success until the Orange Crush years, after the team mutinied and had coach John Ralston ousted in favor of Red Miller.  His first year, the Broncos went all the way to Super Bowl, losing to the Dallas Cowboys 27-10.  Denver had only 8 pass completions that game, with 8 turnovers, but passion had been ignited in Denver and the entire Front Range.  The Orange Crush Defense, Edgar Kaiser, Pat Bowlen, Terrell Davis and John Elway escalated the fever to dizzying heights over the next 30+ years culminating in back-to-back Super Bowl victories in 1998 and 1999.  In the subsequent dozen years, the franchise has suffered from bad decisions, bad drafts, bad quarterbacking and bad coaching.  John Elway has got his hands full, for the future of Pat Bowlen's legacy rests on his shoulders.  The next head coaching position will be a tough one, one that requires a tough-minded coach, one that can create and attract a strong defensive philosophy.  The personnel decisions will be critical to long-term success, even short-term to establish a tough mentality.  With a handy (and deserving) scapegoat out of the way (Josh McDaniels), the pressure's on Brian Xanders and Joe Ellis to assist and enable Elway in getting the right coaches and players here in Denver.  I have my doubts, who are the real football minds here in this organization?  Is John really astute in the player evaluation department?  The men who were around, maybe not totally responsible for, but around in positions of authority, Xanders and Ellis, are the only ones still around.  Is that a good thing?  I guess we shall see.  At least Mr. Elway's hiring has breathed fresh enthusiasm into Bronco Nation.  Good luck to him and all of us Bronco fans.

Spring Training starts in 40 days!