Kiszla: Broncos rediscovered their mojo by reducing quarterback Russell Wilson’s role

Mr. Let’s Ride has been reduced to being just another passenger on the Broncos bus.

Is quarterback Russell Wilson cool with that? If a reduced role bugs the team’s most expensive player, DangeRuss isn’t saying it.

“I love it when our guys are making plays. I don’t really care who’s getting in the end zone. All that matters to me is our guys are making plays,”  Wilson said Wednesday. “I love winning. I’m obsessed with it. I love seeing everybody get the shine.”

A Broncos team that once let Russ cook has told Wilson to take a step back in the kitchen.

Less Russ. More Us.

Amid a two-game winning streak after a miserable 1-5 start to this NFL season, it appears Denver might have found a new recipe for winning. It makes Russ humbly stand down and look, as coach Sean Payton devises ways to work around this franchise’s looming $245 million liability at quarterback.

During the past three games, Payton has used Wilson more like Tim Tebow than Drew Brees. Twice the Broncos have produced fewer than 100 net passing yards. With running back Javonte Williams finally rounding into form after his remarkable recovery from a serious knee injury, they have adopted a rock-em, sock-em style of football that bruised the Green Bay Packers and put a dent in the Kansas City Chiefs.

Has Denver become run heavy and Russ light?

Nobody will complain so long as the Broncos continue winning.

But at the same time, it’s nearly impossible to forget that a major reason why Wilson wanted out of Seattle was he felt Seahawks coach Pete Carroll and team management were holding him back. Remember? Two days after the Super Bowl in 2021, Wilson told Dan Patrick: “You play this game to be the best in the world. You know what I hate: I hate sitting there watching other guys play the game. There’s nothing worse.”

When Wilson relocated to Denver in a blockbuster trade, the grand design was to get the Broncos back in Super Bowl contention as well as his career back on track to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio.

After Wilson lost 16 of his first 21 games as the starting quarterback in Denver, however, there are hints Payton has discarded the idea of having Wilson operate an offense that resembles anything close to the 2009 New Orleans Saints that won the Super Bowl with Brees at quarterback.

To get out of their early season rut, the Broncos have begun to find their groove with a run-heavy offense featuring Williams and rookie Jaleel McLaughlin that might have more in common with the 1990 New York Giants that Bill Parcells coached to a championship with an aging Phil Simms at quarterback.

Hmm, makes me wonder if maybe Payton has chatted with his football mentor about how Parcells managed to win games while dealing with a veteran quarterback whose skills ain’t what they used to be.

In the 24-9 victory that broke a 16-game losing streak to Kansas City, Wilson threw only 19 times, while adding eight rushes to a Broncos offense that ran the football 40 times. That was almost Tebow-esque, don’t you think?

Needing nothing less than six victories in the nine games remaining on its schedule to have any shot at earning a wild-card berth to the playoffs, what can keep Denver’s newfound mojo going?

“The attention to the details, the preparation and all the little things that we have to be maniacal with and understand,” Payton said. “I use that term: ‘the fine line between a groove and a rut.’  You’re always one step away from one or the other. That sense of urgency, it’s transforming how to do things.”