The Broncos may get Riley Moss back on Thursday night, but that shouldn’t turn into a detour for Jahdae Barron. If Denver really believes in the corner it drafted in the first round, this is the kind of stage where he needs real work against a top receiver.
That stage is a big one: the Broncos are hosting the reigning Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks, and Seattle brings the reigning NFL Offensive Player of the Year in Jaxon Smith-Njigba. With Pat Surtain II sidelined by an ankle injury, the spotlight naturally shifts to the rest of Denver’s secondary.
And that’s exactly why Moss’s possible return shouldn’t lead to the Broncos treating Smith-Njigba like a one-man assignment for anyone. The idea here isn’t to hand out a Surtain-style shadow job to another corner. It’s to let Denver’s corners compete, adjust and share the burden against a receiver who is going to get his chances no matter who lines up across from him.
Smith-Njigba is the kind of player who forces a defense to keep solving the same problem over and over. He’s going to be featured heavily by Seattle, and Denver will have to respond in-game the same way it did when it made second-half adjustments against Davante Adams in the matchup with the Los Angeles Rams.
Even if Surtain were active, Seattle would still find ways to put the ball in Smith-Njigba’s hands.
For Barron, though, this is the real opportunity. He has quietly put together some strong football over the last few weeks, even if the early part of the season was almost invisible. He played only six snaps in the first two games, which made the criticism around both his usage and Denver’s first-round selection easy to understand.
Surtain’s injury is not how anyone wanted to get here, but it has opened the door for Barron to build confidence through demonstrated ability. Thursday night gives him his best chance yet to do that.
Moss’s possible return adds another layer, but it doesn’t change the larger point. The Broncos shouldn’t be trying to hide Barron or shield him from Jaxon Smith-Njigba. Denver is going to see Smith-Njigba matched up against Moss, Barron and slot corner Ja’Quan McMillian, and the reps Barron gets in those moments matter.
If the Broncos spent a first-round pick on him, they believed he could handle nights like this. Now they have to let him find out.
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Broncos Have A Trade Deadline Chance They Can't Waste
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League chatter has already centered on a handful of teams that could be open for business, which gives Denver a realistic path to chase help without forcing a desperate move. The tricky part is figuring out which targets are worth the price, whether that means a linebacker with a manageable contract or a runner who can give the offense another layer, and the Broncos do not have much time to sort through those possibilities before the deadline closes in. [Read more 🡒]