The Denver Broncos are walking into one of the most demanding early slates in the league in 2026, and that makes September more than just another month on the schedule. It could wind up being the difference between another AFC West run and spending the rest of the season trying to make up ground.
Denver has seven regular-season games packed into September and October, and five of those come against playoff teams from a year ago that won double-digit games. The Kansas City Chiefs are also part of that stretch. Then, starting in Week 7, the schedule eases up a bit with games against the Arizona Cardinals, Chiefs at home, Carolina Panthers, Las Vegas Raiders, and Pittsburgh Steelers.
That tougher opening stretch matters even more because the Broncos have repeatedly started slow under Sean Payton. For whatever reason, Payton-coached teams have not been September machines. They tend to find their rhythm later, usually in October and November, but the first month of the season has been a real problem.
Here’s how Denver has handled September during the Payton era:
2023: 0-3
2024: 2-2
2025: 2-2
Across 11 September games, the Broncos are 4-7, which comes out to a 36.4 percent winning rate in that month. But once September ends, the picture changes fast.
After those starts, Denver has finished the season like this:
2023: 8-6
2024: 8-5
Overall after September, the Broncos have gone 28-12, a .70 winning percentage. In other words, this team has played like a 70 percent winner in every month that is not September during the Payton era.
That’s why the opportunity in 2026 is so obvious. The Broncos only have three games in September, so even a 2-1 start would be a major step forward from where they’ve been.
If Denver opened 2-1 and then kept playing at that .700 clip the rest of the way, it would point to a 12-5 season. That would be a step back from 2025, but it would still almost certainly be enough to put the Broncos back on top of the AFC West.
There’s even a path beyond that if Denver catches another hot streak. A 12-5 finish could easily turn into 13-4 or better if the wins stack up the way they did last season.
And last year made the stakes clear. The Broncos needed 14 wins to secure the AFC’s top seed, because one fewer would have sent that honor to the New England Patriots and dropped Denver all the way to the third seed after losing the tiebreaker to the Jacksonville Jaguars.
So while 14-3 may not be the most likely outcome in 2026, the big picture is simple: if the Broncos can start fast and avoid another sluggish September, they give themselves a real chance to turn the season in their favor early.
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