Grading the Week: Thank you, NFL, for giving us one more week of this mediocre Broncos mess – The Denver Post

The aphorist who coined the phrase “misery loves company” likely never conceived of the 2021 Broncos.

As all the empty seats that accompanied games at Empower Field at Mile High this fall can attest, it’s best that some miserable things just go away.

While football purists might find poetry in a 17-play drive to nowhere, all the Grading the Week staff found were yawns. And unfortunately for us, the NFL gave us one more week to drink in the mediocrity.

Broncos’ 17th game — D-

Generally speaking, you won’t get a lot of complaints from us about getting to watch more football. But of all the years for a Broncos season to be extended an extra week, did the NFL really have to pick this one?

Even worse, did they have to flex this agony into a nationally televised window for all to see? Against the Kansas City Chiefs, of all teams?

Call us crazy, but it sure feels like this could’ve all been wrapped up in 16 games.

Sure, there are still more than a dozen teams competing for playoff berths or seeding going into this weekend. But that has more to do with the extra playoff spot the NFL introduced last season than the fact a 17th game was added to the schedule.

If growing television revenue is the reason for this nonsense — and here’s guessing it is — couldn’t the NFL have simply extended the regular season by giving every team a second bye?

That would’ve killed two birds with one stone: 1.) The league’s television partners get the extra weekend of games to sell to advertisers, and 2.) Already-taxed rosters get an additional week to recuperate amid the regular-season grind while also avoiding the increased injury risk that comes with a 17th game.

One need only look at the Broncos’ current starting roster to understand how real the latter problem is.

Among the players missing: Week 1 starters at quarterback (Teddy Bridgewater), left guard (Dalton Risner), right guard (Graham Glasgow), receiver (KJ Hamler), both inside linebacker spots (Alexander Johnson and Josey Jewell), strong safety (Kareem Jackson) and cornerback (Ronald Darby).

And that doesn’t even include rookie cornerback Pat Surtain II, who started every week but the first for Denver but will also sit out Saturday’s finale due to injury.

A team whose most vociferous debate centered around whether Teddy Bridgewater or Drew Lock was the better option at quarterback is hobbling into one last meaningless game.

If Broncos Country couldn’t muster enough energy to care when their team was battling for a playoff spot, we can only imagine what the turnout will be like Saturday afternoon.

Nathan MacKinnon — A

Only a few weeks ago, the Grading the Week staff wondered whether the Avalanche superstar forward was a luxury item for a team loaded with offensive punch.

Fast forward to this week, and MacK is still struggling to score goals (three so far this season), but is dealing out assists like he’s Nikola Jokic on skates.

On Thursday night, he notched four assists and one goal in a 7-1 shellacking of the Winnipeg Jets. He now has 29 assists for the season (tied for fifth in the NHL), despite appearing in just 20 games.

Now we’re left to wonder just how dangerous this Colorado offense — already averaging a league-best 4.30 goals per game — might be once he starts finding the back of the net.

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