Using the first week of National Football League action as a baseline for determining team strengths and weaknesses can be tricky. First of all, if a team looks really good, they might be playing a team that will prove to be very weak. If a team looks particularly bad, might it be against an opponent that goes on to have a magical season.
Then there is this, and this is my favorite thing. We get a team looking bad but their efforts are hampered by a real tough situation, and we find a team looking really good that was buoyed by a real good situation. And then, like a gift from God, these two teams meet each other in second week action.
The Denver Broncos opened their season last week with more fanfare than communities promoted during the 1800s when the circus was coming to town. After posting the best record in football last season and advancing all the way to their conference championship game, Sean Payton’s squad was high on most experts lists as a potential Super Bowl winner. I, for one, have them winning Super Bowl LXI.
Then the season started, and reality slapped Bo Nix and company like a stiff winter wind sears your face on a ski lift in January. The Broncos were a bet-on road dog in Kansas City where the Chiefs were coming off a six win 2025 season and didn’t know how quarterback Patrick Mahomes would fare following his surgically repaired knee.
While Mahomes was not quite as sharp as we’ve come to know him, his motivated squad guarded their sterling record at Arrowhead Stadium like a mother protecting her child from an intruder. The Broncos looked feeble in comparison to the Chiefs dominating defense. The home team limited the Broncos to a single touchdown while the Chiefs offense, keyed by the debut in a Chiefs uniform of Super Bowl MVP Kenneth Walker 173 rushing yards, blew out the highly regarded Broncos, 31-10.
Are the Chiefs that good?
Are the Broncos that bad?
No, and no.
Despite being slight favorites on the point spread, Kansas City kicked off giving 1½ points on the line, Andy Reid’s team had underdog motivation. Few things in football are more lethal than a favorite with underdog motivation. In those cases, you get both talent and situation on your side.
This week, the Chiefs host the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday night. The Colts lost their home opener to the Baltimore Ravens by 18 points, while the Chiefs won their game by three touchdowns. Are the Chiefs that much better than the Colts? Maybe. But if they aren’t, Indianapolis will be the more motivated team at Arrowhead on Sunday night and we will find out more definitely if the Colts are as bad as their first week play and the Chiefs as good as they looked on Monday night.
Meanwhile, the Broncos are headed home after being clobbered by the Chiefs and meeting a highly regarded Jacksonville Jaguars squad that diced, sliced and mutilated the Cleveland Browns in their opener. The final score in that game saw the Jaguars behind Trevor Lawrence winning 34-10, but anyone who witnessed the game knows it wasn’t that close.
Are the Browns that bad?
Probably.
Are the Jaguars that good?
Likely not.
Are the Broncos as bad as they looked against Kansas City?
No.
What takes us to this proposition? We can now have a very talented Denver team off a crushing road loss against a Jaguars team coming off a lopsided home win with this game played at Mile High Stadium. This serves up a favorite, the Broncos opened as a three-point favorite on a line that has been trimmed to 2½, with underdog motivation.
Lethal.
Qoxhi Picks: Denver Broncos (-2½) over Jacksonville Jaguars