Sean Payton Addresses QB Zach Wilson's 'Not Great' Day With Broncos Starters

Zach Wilson wasn't impressive with the Denver Broncos starters on Tuesday, but Sean Payton doesn't sound worried.

May 23, 2024; Englewood, CO, USA; Denver Broncos quarterback Zach Wilson (4) during organized team activities at Centura Health Training Center. Mandatory Credit: Isaiah J. Downing-USA TODAY Sports / Isaiah J. Downing-USA TODAY Sports

With more than a month in the books since the Denver Broncos acquired Zach Wilson via trade from the New York Jets, the young veteran quarterback is still settling in. Broncos head coach Sean Payton has given Wilson equal bites at the first-team apple, rotating with rookie first-rounder Bo Nix and incumbent Jarrett Stidham.

Wilson flamed out in New York as the No. 2 overall pick in the 2021 NFL draft, but Payton wanted the chance to get his hands on the former BYU star.

“We just felt like, ‘Man, we’d love to work with this guy,'" Payton said on Tuesday. "[We] felt the investment was worth it relative to his skill set and his talent. So it took a while. We spent the better part of a month and a half working on that trade.”

Up until Tuesday, every Broncos OTA practice open to the media just happened to be Nix's day to run with the first-team offense — a total coincidence according to Payton. However, it was Wilson's turn with the ones on Tuesday and he seemed to struggle, according to those who observed the practice, like Denver Sports' Andrew Mason.

"Not a great day for Zach Wilson today," Mason tweeted. He wasn't alone in his assessment of Wilson's day at the office.

Not a great day for Zach Wilson today …

— Andrew Mason (@MaseDenver) June 4, 2024

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One day does not a full quarterback evaluation make. That's doubly true for a newcomer like Wilson, who, like Nix, is learning a new offense on the fly. After Tuesday's practice, Payton talked Wilson up further, praising the QB's progress thus far.

“He’s doing well with it," Payton said of Wilson. "When we got Jarrett, he came from—there’s about three strains of language in our league. I’d say you have the West Coast strain, you’ve got the old digits system, and then you have kind of what the Patriots have run, [former NFL coach] Ron Erhardt, Bill Belichick, and [Bill] Parcells. So Jarrett had come from that strain, and I’d say there’s a pretty significant iPhone to Android adjustment there. Whereas in Zach’s case, there are a little bit more similarities relative to how things are called. Not all, but these guys picked that up pretty quickly.”

The absence of a football language barrier should, in theory, accelerate Wilson's assimilation of Payton's scheme. But it's not even half the battle for a quarterback.

Yes, a quarterback must learn and master the playbook and nomenclature, but then comes the most important part: executing it with competency. It may be that Wilson is still working on that crucial component, and it's to be expected. After all, he's only entering his fourth year as a pro and he's in an entirely new football environment.

Meanwhile, Nix seems to be thriving, capitalizing on the opportunities Payton and the Broncos coaching staff have given him. Stidham may be under threat of losing his spot as QB1, but he's got it easy in terms of the scheme and obstacles that Nix and Wilson are facing. There's nothing new about it as Stidham enters his second year in Payton's system.

May 23, 2024; Englewood, CO, USA; Denver Broncos quarterback Zach Wilson (4) during organized team activities at Centura Health Training Center. Mandatory Credit: Isaiah J. Downing-USA TODAY Sports / Isaiah J. Downing-USA TODAY Sports

The arrow is still pointing to Nix being the Broncos' starting quarterback in 2024. The question is whether the Broncos will keep all three quarterbacks on the 53-man roster.

Many theorize that if Wilson shines brighter than Stidham this summer, the latter could find himself on the outside looking in. Stidham arrived last spring on a two-year, $10 million deal. Set to earn $5M this season, the Broncos could release him with a $2M cap hit. But it would save them $3M on the salary cap.

For his part, Wilson is on the books this year with a $1.05M salary, but the Jets reportedly will pay "a significant portion" of it. On one hand, that makes him more expendable, while on the other, he'd be a backup QB bargain if he acquits himself well this summer.

All things considered, the Broncos don't have that much of their salary cap allocated to quarterback spending. That means that if the Wilson/Stidham race is relatively neck and neck by the end of August, it could make sense to keep all three on the active roster. It just depends on how the competition shapes up.

On the Wilson subject, Payton may have fallen prey to a common form of NFL coaching hubris, which goes something like this: "Yeah, this highly-touted player failed to launch with his original team, but if we could get him under our wing, in our system and culture, we could help him reach the potential we identified in him as a prospect entering the draft. You know, before the Jets ruined him."

Sometimes it works. More often than not, it doesn't. When it comes to quarterbacks specifically, I wouldn't bet against Payton making it work with Wilson, his lackluster display on Tuesday notwithstanding. I'm just not counting on the BYU product suddenly looking like the second coming of Steve Young over the course of an offseason with Payton.

Regardless of pedigree or resume, Payton has elevated every quarterback he's coached dating back to his time with Kerry Collins and the New York Giants a quarter-century ago. It's not a question of whether Wilson will look better under Payton; it's how much better.

Wilson was a coveted QB prospect in the 2021 draft. But his three years in the Big Apple meat-grinder, tossed on the rocky shoals of the Jets' infamous organizational incompetence, has damaged his NFL goods, so to speak. He'll probably never reach the idealistic potential many NFL coaches and GMs projected for him, including that of Payton, but Wilson should be able to eclipse the forgettable resume he established with the Jets.

The Broncos are hoping that Wilson isn't too far gone as a result of the New York trauma. He's an athlete with a big arm, an accurate touch, and a good football IQ. That's a quarterbacking prototype that Payton has traditionally made a lot of hay with.

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