Taking a look at the Denver Broncos schedule and current offensive rankings, it seems like selling while you can may be a good idea. Remember when the price of gold skyrocketed? If you had a bunch of gold, and sold it all in 2011, you would have made tons of money. Now gold still has value, but it has dropped off since its highs. The same holds true for the Denver offense.
Denver has the second hardest schedule for the 2014 season. This fact has not been lost on me, seeing as I own pieces of their offense on my various teams. In the last week I have started to think about using those players to trade up to players with more favorable situations. This thought started to cross my mind as I watched the Broncos play the Seahawks in week 3 of the season. They were shut down for 3 quarters of the game. Now understood that Seattle has a formidable defense, but Seattle is far from the only difficult task throughout the season.
Looking at the Broncos schedule from after their bye in week for on, the outlook is somewhat bleak for their prospects. Let us examine the data. The defensive rankings are through the third week of the season, so small sample size, but I still think the data is likely applicable.
The Broncos opponents average total defensive ranking is 10.07 for the rest of the season. The low outliers are Kansas City at 19 and Cincinnati at 17, both on the road. Denver already played Kansas City in week 2, putting up 24 points. They only managed 88 yards rushing and did not score on the ground. Peyton Manning was 21-26 for 242 yards and 3 touchdowns. In this game Emmanuel Sanders had 8-108, and 3 different Broncos scored. The yardage production for Manning is slightly lower than you might expect against a supposedly depleted secondary at home. The high outliers are at the Jets (2nd in total D) and at New England (3).
What looks like the best case for the Broncos is the opponents run defense, coming in at an average of 15.3. Weeks 5, 6, and 7 look particularly brutal for their run game, as the worst run defense they face is 6th ranked San Francisco. After week 7 it begins to ease up slightly, possibly with some favorable run match ups against the Raiders (31) in weeks 10 and 17, the Rams (29) in week 11, Miami (20) in week 12, and Kansas City (23) in week 13.
The passing defense of Broncos opponents came in at an average of 10.8 rest of season. Only 3 of their opponents are currently ranked in the bottom half of the league in pass defense: Arizona in week 5 (19), Buffalo (26) in week 14, and Cincinnati (17) in week 16. This lends itself to the thought that even with Peyton at the controls, it might be some tough sledding for the Broncos in the passing game. I feel it necessary to note that the passing numbers for Oakland (4) may be flawed as Oakland is the second worst team against the run, so teams do not need to.
No matter what it was going to be difficult to repeat the season Denver had in 2013 in which they set a few offensive records. The difficulty has me interested in getting what I can for my Denver players. After last year, and being so early this year and post bye, you should still be able to get top dollar for many of your Denver guys. I have not been able to find a statistic ranking defense against tight ends, but Julius Thomas has been producing at a high level. I am personally not going to look at trading him where I have him. Emmanuel Sanders is also producing well, having 2 100 yard plus games and averaging 8 catches a game through the first two weeks. If you can sell pretty high on him, do it. If not, holding on to him doesn't seem a bad idea yet.
The rest of the offense is on the block in my leagues. I have been actively seeking a trade for Montee Ball in one league, and would entertain offers for Demaryius given enough value. I don't think I would take much less than another top tier wide receiver and maybe a running back of lower value. Peyton can also bring you a haul. I just traded him in a 2 quarterback league in a 5 player deal giving up Peyton and Alfred Morris and getting back Calvin Johnson, Tony Romo, and DeAndre Hopkins.
If you find the right owner, with the right mix of players, and the right needs, dealing the Denver offense is not a bad idea. You can likely get players to fill holes in your roster, and free yourself from the Broncos match up nightmares.
