Denver Broncos

John Elway will make sure the Broncos don't miss Brock Osweiler

Published Mar. 9, 2016 6:27 p.m. ET

foxsports

Some advice for Brock Osweiler:

Don’t let the door hit you in the arse on the way out of Denver.

The Broncos ultimately will be just fine based upon the franchise’s long track record of success and John Elway’s acumen at evaluating the quarterback position since becoming general manager.

The Houston Texans? We’ll see.

The succession plan Denver had hoped for following Peyton Manning’s retirement didn’t go as planned. The Texans swiped Osweiler away Wednesday with a reported four-year, $72 million contract that included $37 million guaranteed.

For a quarterback with seven career starts.

The deal was so exorbitant that long-time NFL backup Matt Flynn — no stranger to being overpaid himself — committed some player-on-player crime from his Twitter account.

It’s also the type of move a desperate franchise makes. The Texans put themselves in this position by flubbing the 2014 draft when eschewing Blake Bortles, Teddy Bridgewater and Derek Carr in favor of outside linebacker Jadeveon Clowney and guard Xavier Su’a-Filo with their first two draft picks.

With star defensive end J.J. Watt in his prime, Houston has a defense that is Super Bowl-ready. The offense was anything but in 2015 with a shaky cast of passers led by Brian Hoyer.

Osweiler was the best veteran option available in a thin group of QBs available via free agency or trade.

If the signing fails to pan out, head coach Bill O’Brien and general manager Rick Smith won’t have to sweat it. They’ll probably be looking for work elsewhere soon enough. Osweiler also buys time for the Texans to select a developmental quarterback (sorry, Tom Savage) in April’s draft.

The Broncos are likely to seek the same, although that won’t solve the immediate problem of trying to find a starter for a team trying to defend its Super Bowl title.

Elway saw the 1999 Broncos struggle with a similar situation following his retirement post-Super Bowl 33. But at least there were two viable in-house options in journeyman Bubby Brister, who went 4-0 as a starter the previous season replacing an injured Elway, and second-year QB Brian Griese. The latter was given the nod in training camp.

Though the Broncos went 6-10 that season, there were far bigger reasons than Griese — most notably the career-wrecking knee injury suffered by star running back Terrell Davis — that caused Denver to collapse.

The only quarterback currently on Denver’s roster is Trevor Siemian, a 2015 seventh-round pick from Northwestern. The only way he’ll start in 2016 is if the regular season begins tomorrow.

Thankfully for the Broncos, it doesn’t. Elway has time to figure a way out of this quarterback conundrum.

Ryan Fitzpatrick is one option if the Broncos want a game manager similar to what they had in Manning last season.

Maybe it’s signing free-agent Ryan Fitzpatrick away from the New York Jets. He can fill the game-manager role that Peyton Manning played down the stretch in Denver.

Maybe it’s trading with the 49ers for Colin Kaepernick, who has made it no secret that he wants out of San Francisco.

Maybe it’s giving Robert Griffin III the chance to reinvent his career in the same style of West Coast offense where he enjoyed a blockbuster 2012 rookie season that ended with a horrific knee injury.

Maybe it’s none of the above, but someone else Elway has in mind.

This is what I do know: As a Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback, Elway knows the position as well if not better than any other NFL general manager. He found a way out of the Tim Tebow dilemma in 2012 by wooing Manning as a free agent and later constructing a roster in 2015 where a dominant defense made amends for mediocre quarterback play.

I’ve written this before as well — nobody knows Osweiler better than Broncos coaches and front office. Beyond the seven-game sample size of Osweiler as a starter in 2015, Denver has spent four seasons watching his practice habits, leadership skills and football IQ in the meeting room.

Elway has been able to evaluate Osweiler up close since drafting him in 2012 and knew exactly how much he wanted to pay.

The biggest reason the Broncos reinserted Manning as their starter last season was Osweiler’s inability to prove he was unquestionably the best option under center while the former was rehabilitating a foot injury. Sore feelings toward the franchise may very well have led Osweiler to consider his options elsewhere this offseason rather than succeeding the retiring Manning.

We do know for certain that the Broncos had a price on how much they were willing to pay Osweiler. The fact Denver wouldn’t match Houston’s offer speaks volumes about what Elway thinks about Osweiler’s upside, even if the Broncos now have a gaping hole to fill.

It’s now on Osweiler and the Texans to prove Elway was wrong.