Why Broncos HC Sean Payton believes in breather before player, staff evaluations

The coaching carousel is spinning in historic fashion across the NFL.

Seven head coaches are out, including two of the winningest in New England’s Bill Belichick and Seattle’s Pete Carroll. The Patriots, through a unique arrangement, have already named a successor in Jerod Mayo.

There’s much more action to come, too, after Wild Card weekend finishes and teams begin to focus on top candidates.

The Broncos are perfectly happy not to be part of the circus this winter as they had been the past two.

In fact, head coach Sean Payton said at the end of his first season that Denver will, if not ease its way into the offseason, at least avoid jumping right into the biggest decisions on deck.

Denver’s coaches were in the office most of last week after the season ended, compiling playing time reports and some other more objective information, but they’ll all get away a few days this week before getting into the true evaluation and decision-making process.

“The true key is to get, as best as you can, an objective and a clear as-close-to-accurate grade as possible,” Payton said last week. “I’ve found over the years that sometimes the schedule doesn’t allow it because of the postseason. When you get into the postseason, your calendar changes. It gets a little quicker or shorter. I’ve found that a gap from when you played to when you do that exercise is helpful.

“I think, in this case, it will serve us well.”

The Broncos coach said he’d been looking at his grades from the 2013 New Orleans Saints — an 11-5 team that won in the Wild Card round, then lost to a Russell Wilson-led Seattle team in the divisional round — and that sometimes the shine of a postseason run or dejection of missing out injects too much recency bias into grades if they’re done immediately.

“I think maybe some guys do it a little different, but our schedule is just starting now, relative to those evaluations,” Payton said during his postseason news conference. He added that typically any decisions he might make regarding his coaching staff would follow along a similar timeline.

So, essentially, the Broncos planned to take this week off and then get down to the real offseason nitty gritty after the divisional round of the playoffs.

“When we’re back, we start the roster review and that usually takes three, maybe four days,” Payton said. “We’ll hear from the trainers. We’ll hear from the strength coaches. Every player that came through our doors that’s here, we’ll discuss in depth. Health, all elements of the program. Then we get into … scheme review, cut-ups — offensively and defensively — for a good two weeks.

“Then free agency begins to pick up.”

Then the draft closes in. Then OTAs and minicamp. Payton said Denver’s schedule is essentially set through the start of the summer break, which arrives in mid-June.

The first step in the process, though, in terms of reviewing the roster and making decisions about players and coaches, will be a critical one for the Broncos.

Payton said he told Wilson he didn’t expect the decision on the veteran quarterback’s future, “would be a long, drawn-out process.”

“When we get back, we begin this process of looking at our roster and where we select (in the draft),” Payton said. “There are so many things that go into a decision specific to the quarterback, which is significant, obviously.”

So perhaps Denver will reach a decision in the second half of January.

Even if the head coach decides to keep his staff wholly intact — major, extensive changes would be a surprise — there’s a good chance at least a few will get looks from other teams or opportunities at promotions once seven head coaches get hired and start assembling staffs of their own around the league.