Lammey: Broncos buy in on Mike McCoy offensive system

The Denver Broncos shocked a lot of NFL fans and prognosticators on Sunday as they trounced the Dallas Cowboys 42-17 at Sports Authority Field at Mile High.

And Denver did so on, at least in part, on the backs of its offensive.

In his postgame press conference, Broncos head coach Vance Joseph said the plan entering the game was to expose the Cowboys secondary.

“We knew that their starters would have trouble covering our receivers. But, the run game — that was the jump starter,” Joseph said. “To run the football and force those guys who play single-high to get No. 88 (Demaryius Thomas) and No. 10 (Emmanuel Sanders) one-on-one, we knew it was going to be our advantage.

“Our receivers versus their (secondary) was going to be an edge for us. And obviously, running the football helped that edge come true.”

New offensive coordinator Mike McCoy installed an offense friendly to the talent on the roster. This system seems to be getting the best out of quarterback Trevor Siemian and running back C.J. Anderson.

It’s clear from the offensive output in each game this season, the players are buying into the McCoy system.

A quarterback-friendly system

Siemian has been on fire this season, exemplified by a four-touchdown performance against the Cowboys on Sunday. After two weeks, Siemian ranks among the league leaders in a few major categories (passing touchdowns, etc).

In the past, McCoy’s system has been quarterback friendly, with all sorts of different players under center (or in the shotgun). Siemian is taking his game to the next level by understanding the concepts of the McCoy offense and how to best exploit a defense.

“I thought Trevor played excellent, once again. Very, very, very efficient with the football. He put us in good plays all night,” Joseph said. “Again, outside of the one interception, which was more of a unit issue than a Trevor issue, he played well.

“If he plays that solid for us, we’ll be hard to beat down the stretch.”

Siemian is off to a great start, and his comfort in the system is evident when he takes the field.

“I like the scheme a lot. It’s really player-friendly. You always feel, as a quarterback especially, but every player, I feel like we’re always in the right spot,” Siemian said after the game. “We’ve always got a chance to be successful, so no doubt, guys stepped up. That’s kind of what we’ve been seeing all through this year, OTAs, camp. It’s kind of cool to see it live-action and come to fruition.”

A strong rushing attack

Anderson led the way on the ground for the Broncos for the second week in a row Sunday, rushing for 118 yards on 25 attempts.

As Joseph has said, more than once, Anderson, who’s carried the ball more than 20 times in the past two games, is the “bell cow” back.

And to the surprise of some, it was Anderson who had more than 100 yards rushing on Sunday and not Cowboys running back Ezekiel Elliott. While many entered the week wondering how the Broncos would stop (or slow down) Elliott, it was Anderson who could not be stopped.

Still, Anderson said as good as the team has been on offense, they’re not playing their best to this point.

“It’s not where we want it to be. We still have, I call it, ‘dead time.’ We still have dead time. We were hot. We were good, then we came out cold, and we had the turnover,” Anderson said after the game. “Our goal is to get in the box every possession. Every possession, get in the box, somehow, some way. We don’t care if it’s run, throw, play-action, we don’t care. We just want to get in the box.

“So until we can do that, I think we can be where we want to be. But we’re definitely going to take this performance we had today.”

With the Broncos buying into McCoy’s system, it is scary to think what this offense will look like when it’s clicking on all cylinders.

If the Broncos keep playing like this, they are going to be tough to beat. It’s only two games, but the Broncos have the look of a team that can make a deep postseason run.

And it all starts with the belief in the offense.

Follow @CecilLammey