As the Broncos’ offensive menu continues to expand, Devaughn Vele is becoming one of the foremost beneficiaries.
The rookie wide receiver is lining up all over the field, playing different spots and making an impact in several different ways.
The seventh-round draft pick already had three catches in the first half of Denver’s 29-19 win at Las Vegas when head coach Sean Payton put him alone on the backside of a unique, 4-by-1 formation.
The Broncos had Courtland Sutton and Troy Franklin aligned into the boundary with running back Javonte Williams and jumbo tight end Matt Peart as an eligible receiver all to quarterback Bo Nix’s right.
Vele pushed vertically up the field, gave a head-fake inside that kept cornerback Decamerion Richardson on his heels and then eventually snapped off his route to the inside. Nix pinned the ball on him for a 26-yard gain.
Vele’s showed a knack for getting open and making plays since rookie minicamp in May. In recent weeks, though, his ascension has only accelerated.
The 26-year-old has fortified himself as the No. 2 option at receiver behind Sutton and on Sunday he finished with six catches (nine targets) for 80 yards.
Since he returned from being out four games — one due to a rib injury and three healthy scratches — Vele’s been on a 58-catch, 782-yard pace.
In the three weeks since his playing time jumped to about two-thirds of Denver’s offensive snaps, he’s got 14 catches (18 targets) for 185 yards and a touchdown.
Vele’s most recent game and his trajectory drew praise about as strong as you’ll hear from Payton on Monday morning.
“He’s been really good,” Payton said. “The strengths for him: Certainly, his hands. You guys saw it in camp — he’s got strong hands in traffic. He’s a guy that plays well over the middle. He reminds me a lot of Marques Colston, who I had in New Orleans for 10 or 11 years.”
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Colston was also a seventh-round pick in 2006, Payton’s first New Orleans draft class. He ended up catching 70 balls for 1,038 yards and eight touchdowns as a rookie, then going for 98 catches, 1,202 yards and 12 touchdowns in his second season. In his 10-year career, Colston racked up 711 catches, 9,759 yards and 72 touchdowns.
Those are lofty marks, but Payton’s clearly been impressed with Vele.
“Just in our staff meeting 20 minutes ago, I said, ‘We’ve got to continue to find touches for him,’” the coach said.
They’ve already started putting him in more positions as the No. 1 target. The 26-yarder looked to be designed for him. So, too, was a late-game miss that came out of the same 4-by-1 set. Instead of breaking in, Vele went vertical — a wrinkle from the original look — and Nix just left the ball too far inside.
Nix threw him two slants out of RPO looks and the Broncos put him in motion and used Lil’Jordan Humphrey to create a pick to get him open on third-and-short for a conversion.
He caught a scramble-drill ball for 23 yards and went up to catch it even knowing he was going to get hit hard when he landed. He sat down in a soft spot in zone coverage. He caught a pass as the safety valve and got upfield for a first down.
“Sometimes, as a coach, you feel like you’re stopping the progress by not getting him touches,” Payton said Monday, likening Vele earlier in the season to where running back Audric Estime is now. “And now — I don’t want to say we’re guilty as coaches, but oftentimes (you’re) afraid to play the rookies. And very quickly we’ve seen his growth.”
One small thing I liked: Nik Bonitto is getting a lot of attention, and rightfully so.
The Broncos’ third-year pass-rusher has racked up 10 sacks in his past 10 games. He’s turned into a high-end pass-rusher and gives Denver a pairing between him and Jonathon Cooper, who just got a four-year contract extension, that’s easy to imagine building around long-term.
Outside of the highlight-reel, game-sealing strip sack on Sunday, though, Bonitto made plays against Las Vegas that he simply would not have made earlier in his career.
Most impressively: Bonitto recognized two different screens — one to a running back and one to a receiver — in the first eight minutes of the game and ruined them by playing smart, alert football and hustling.
On the first, Bonitto didn’t get fooled by Vegas’ motioning and stayed locked on Ameer Abdullah. Minshew had to throw the ball into the ground.
On the second, he started roaring up the field but saw left tackle Kolton Miller and other Vegas linemen start to break out to block down the field. Bonitto swung around quickly and hit a dead sprint out toward receiver D.J. Turner. He took such a good line that he ended up directly in the throwing lane and forced Minshew to again throw it in the dirt.
Bonitto’s first step and his bend are upper-echelon traits that will get him paid. But playing smart, consistent football on top of that is what can make him a great all-around player.
One small thing I didn’t like: Payton put together a questionable play-calling sequence late in the fourth quarter.
After Raiders kicker Daniel Carlson cut Denver’s lead to 26-19 with 3:38 to go, the Broncos took over at their 30.
Payton’s inclination to dial up an explosive play to start the drive was understandable. Get in heavy personnel on first down — Peart checked in as a jumbo tight end — and then play-fake and throw the ball down the field.
Nix, though, left a throw too far inside for Vele, who could not come down with a contested catch.
Las Vegas had all of its timeouts, which meant Denver needed to get a first down to really go to work on the clock. Instead, two more incompletions led to a three-and-out. Total time run off the clock: 26 seconds.
Payton defended the sequence without prompting Monday, saying, “We’re trying to win the game at the end of the game there. The last thing I was going to do was hand the ball off three times. They’ll use their timeouts. Then they’ll drive down the field.”
The first-down throw was an aggressive and understandable decision. But missing it set the Raiders up for one more chance.
The Broncos defense, as it has often this year, rose to the occasion when Bonitto logged his 10th sack and forced a fumble to set Denver up in the red zone.
Payton dialed up another pass above the two-minute warning on that series, too. By then, Denver had the game in full control. Still, going 0 of 4 plus two runs for 2 yards and rolling just 57 seconds off the clock over two late possessions is far from ideal.
One trend to watch: The Broncos’ offense hasn’t just shown signs of life recently. It’s revved into a gear that, while not elite, has not been seen in Denver since Peyton Manning retired.
Denver’s scored 28 or more points in five of its last eight outings and in that span is averaging 25.3 points per game.
The Broncos haven’t had more than four games of 28-plus points in a season since 2014 (10).
In fact, they’ve only hit four twice (2015 and 2020). The rest: three once (2023), two each in 2016, 2021 and 2022, and one in each 2017-19.
The Broncos still have some volatility. Their other three totals in the recent eight-game set were 10 against Baltimore, 14 against Kansas City and 16 against the Los Angeles Chargers.
For the first time in a long time, though, the Broncos have an offense capable of putting a big number on the scoreboard.
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