This year’s Broncos not buying suggestion they’re supposed to be a year away

NEW ORLEANS — Take a step back, better to take a panoramic view of the 2024 Broncos.

Big picture? They’re probably a year away from where they want to be.

Logic says a team doesn’t start a rookie quarterback and say this is the year it wins the Super Bowl.

But give Bo Nix and young players like Riley Moss, Marvin Mims Jr., Jonah Elliss, Troy Franklin, Devaughn Vele, Nik Bonitto and Audric Estime another year or two?

“We are building,’’ Broncos head coach Sean Payton said after a convincing 33-10 win Thursday night against his former team, the New Orleans Saints. “We are figuring it out. … Certainly the reps our young quarterback is receiving and our receivers are receiving, we are young as a team and so that is invaluable.”

The Broncos are 4-3 with a highly winnable home game this Sunday against the woebegone Carolina Panthers, who were the worst team in the NFL last year at 2-15 and tied for the worst this year at 1-6.

Then the Broncos go head on with one of the toughest parts of their schedule, at least on paper: Back to back road games at Baltimore and at Kansas City. Beat Carolina as they should, and somehow figure out a way to beat either the Ravens or the Chiefs, and the Broncos will have earned the right to start thinking playoffs. This year.

And if they make it, then a strong case can be presented they are one year ahead of schedule.

“You guys can say whatever, we care about the guys in this locker room,’’ starting safety P.J. Locke said after the win against the Saints. “We know we’re a good team.”

A big reason why the Broncos are better-than-expected at 4-3 – oddsmakers put their preseason over/under win total at 5.5 – is their special teams.

*Their offensive starting field position is the 33.5 yard line, on average, which ranks No. 3 in the NFL. That means Nix and the offense begins roughly two first downs away from Wil Lutz’s field goal range.

*Their defensive starting field position is the 26.8 yard line on average, which ranks No. 1 in the NFL. Longer for opposing offenses to travel.

This means that returner Mims, punter Riley Dixon and kickoff-er Lutz are doing their part.