With the 2021 NFL Draft nearly here, many are expecting John Elway to make a move away from Drew Lock, finding a different Denver Broncos quarterback in the process.
Perhaps that'll come during the actual draft, but possibly through a trade or weird signing or some other Elwaysian (patent pending) maneuver.
For those unaware, John Elway was an excellent gunslinger back in his day. Arguably the greatest in the history of the sport. His ability at the position hasn't transitioned into the proper skill set to evaluate it from a front office perspective, though. While he gets a lot of the credit for the winning that came in the Peyton Manning era, it was the defense — not the gunslingers — that truly won Denver a Super Bowl.
In fact, Elway brought Manning over to star in his worst seasons in the NFL, which was only masked by the fact that national NFL media love to drool over Peyton even if he's hurling the ball with the same velocity as a toddler. Elway, it's worth noting, is the same man who attempted to give Brock Osweiler all the money in the world, but was saved from himself by a magically more inept Houston Texans franchise.
Still, if we must, let's give John Elway credit for that Super Bowl. Even if we politely hurl all the love on him, after the 2015 season, the Denver quarterback situation has been pretty awful.
2016 was the insanely weird Trevor Siemian and sky-pirate Paxton Lynch era; 2017 was much of the same but also bringing Brock back for some ungodly reason; then in 2018 Elway put a ton of chips on Case Keenum because lord knows Elway loves betting on gunslingers based off small sample sizes; then in 2019 Elway tried to redo the Manning magic by bringing in an incredibly washed Joe Flacco to take over the helm with Drew Lock initially stuck to the bench.
Famously, at the end of Lock's rookie season with the youngster starting, the Broncos won four of their last five, leaving a glimmer of hope that after approximately eleventy-billion quarterback moves, John Elway finally found his guy.
Then the 2020 season happened. Drew Lock was… well… not great. He was underwhelming the majority of the time despite being surrounded by an insane amount of weapons (as well as an insanely overpaid running back… thanks again Elway!).
But context matters. There was, you know, that entire global pandemic happening, it was still only Lock's second season in the league (with minimal experience), and it probably didn't help who he was being coached by.
Does any of this mean that Drew Lock is actually good or great or the Broncos' franchise gunslinger? Heck to the no. There's literally no stats to back this up. There is, at best, flashes of brilliance.
All of that being said, this would be a weird time for John Elway to make yet another drastic move at the position. If he was willing to bet on a sky-pirate, numerous decomposing corpses who were years removed from being still-good quarterbacks, and another guy based off a few games, maybe giving Drew Lock one more year isn't the worst idea in the world — especially if getting a gunslinger in the 2021 NFL Draft could come at a great cost for Denver.
Even with all of that, even if the Denver Broncos absolutely adore some QB in the 2021 NFL Draft and it would cost them literally zero things to snag that young man come the weekend… do you trust John Elway to choose the right one?
Drew Lock might not be the best, but neither is John Elway. Let's hold our horses and just run it back for one more try. Otherwise, the Broncos quarterback situation will continue its never ending cycle of failures due to a single man with far too much power within the organization. Obviously, that's not the best reason to give Lock another go, but fans should have such little trust in Elway that “doing next to nothing” is better than trying anything at all.
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