Nathaniel Hackett’s days had long been numbered in Denver before the Broncos fired him earlier this week. The former offensive coordinator was given his first head coaching job but he couldn’t last the full season.
Hackett was under fire from the get-go. He had trouble with clock management early in the season, leading to the Broncos hiring Jerry Rosburg to assist Hackett with game and clock management.
The Broncos started out the season 2-1 but have only won two games since with four- and five-game losing streaks in the mix.
Hackett lasted through most of the season, however, which was surprising given how he started. It was also a bit surprising that the Broncos didn’t let him finish out the final two weeks of the season.
Nick Ferguson and George Stoia of the Audacy Original Podcast “Touchdown Denver” talked about what the tipping point may have been for Hackett and the Broncos.
“When I was there on Sunday, you could feel it. All season it felt like Hackett had control and yes, things were going poorly, but the team wasn’t lost and guys were playing hard, there was no internal beef … guys still believed in him,” Stoia said (2:01 in player above). “Sunday, there was a complete lack of control.”
Sunday’s game had the perfect storm of poor play on the field along with multiple off-field incidents with Randy Gregory getting into it with Rams guard Oday Aboushi after the game. On top of that, Walter Payton Man of the Year nominee Dalton Risner was spotted pushing backup quarterback Brett Rypien after a disagreement on the sideline.
“It was off the field stuff, Nick, that I think did him in and I think that the Penner group woke up on Monday morning and said ‘We have to do something because this is unacceptable,’” Stoia continued. “And I think that they wanted to send a message and I think that’s why they ended up letting him go. … I think it reached a tipping point where they’re like ‘We have to make a move and send a message.’”
Ferguson thought that Hackett would be given a chance to finish out the season after not getting fired earlier on, but the tipping point was reached on Sunday.
“What it seems as though had happened is National television. That was the tipping point because they were going to fire Nathaniel Hackett probably anyway. But the embarrassment was what kind of sped it up,” Ferguson said.
Not only did the Broncos have those off-field incidents, but they allowed a season-high 51 points to a struggling Rams team. Everything added up and Hackett had to go.
“The optics of everything. The gameplay. The interaction between Risner and Rypien on the sideline. The Randy Gregory situation. All of that came to a tipping point,” Ferguson said. “They were just like ‘Yo, we were all embarrassed. Not just Hackett. Not just the team. We were all embarrassed as ownership and we needed to do something about it.’”
The Broncos did something about it but still have a long way to go to become a contender.
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