Denver Broncos · History

The Denver Broncos are a professional American football team based in Denver, Colorado. The club was founded in 1960 as a charter member of the American Football League and plays in the AFC West. Its home is Empower Field at Mile High, which opened in 2001 next to the site of the old Mile High Stadium. Denver has played eight Super Bowls and won three.

A charter AFL club

Businessman Bob Howsam put Denver among the eight original teams of the American Football League. On 9 September 1960 the Broncos beat the Boston Patriots 13-10 in the first regular-season game in league history. The early uniforms were brown and mustard yellow with vertically striped socks; head coach Jack Faulkner burned them at a public bonfire in 1962 and switched the club to orange and blue. The team played at Bears Stadium, renamed Mile High Stadium in 1968 and sitting 5,280 feet above sea level. In 1961 a group led by Gerald Phipps bought the franchise and stopped a move out of the city. Denver did not post a winning record until 1973 and never managed one in its ten AFL seasons.

Floyd Little, the player who kept the team in town

Floyd Little was the first pick of the 1967 draft and the first number-one choice the club managed to sign. He ran for 6,323 yards in nine seasons, and his arrival was used as the argument in the campaign that funded the stadium expansion and kept the team in Denver. He was known as The Franchise and entered the Hall of Fame in 2010.

The Orange Crush defense

In 1977, under head coach Red Miller and with Craig Morton at quarterback, Denver reached the playoffs for the first time. The 3-4 defense built around Randy Gradishar, Lyle Alzado and Tom Jackson was nicknamed the Orange Crush, after the soft drink. It won the AFC Championship Game 20-17 against the Oakland Raiders. The Broncos then lost Super Bowl XII in January 1978, 27-10 to the Dallas Cowboys. The club has sold out every home game since 1970. Gradishar was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2024.

The trade for John Elway

John Elway was the first overall pick of the 1983 draft, selected by the Baltimore Colts. He refused to play there and threatened to take up baseball, having been drafted by the New York Yankees. On 2 May 1983 the Colts traded him to Denver for tackle Chris Hinton, quarterback Mark Herrmann and a 1984 first-round pick.

The Drive, The Fumble and three lost finals

With Dan Reeves as head coach the Broncos lost three Super Bowls in four years: XXI to the New York Giants, XXII to Washington and XXIV to the San Francisco 49ers. On 11 January 1987, in the AFC Championship Game at Cleveland Stadium, Elway drove the team 98 yards to tie the score with 37 seconds left; Denver won 23-20 in overtime and the possession became known as The Drive. A year later, in the same fixture, Earnest Byner lost the ball on the Denver 3-yard line and the Broncos held on 38-33 in the game remembered as The Fumble.

Eight Super Bowls

Denver lost its first four finals and won three of the next four.

Back-to-back titles with Shanahan and Terrell Davis

Mike Shanahan coached the team from 1995 to 2008. On 25 January 1998 Denver won Super Bowl XXXII 31-24 against the Green Bay Packers; Terrell Davis was named MVP with three touchdowns despite a migraine that kept him out for part of the second quarter. Davis ran for 2,008 yards in 1998, was voted league MVP and the team opened the season with thirteen straight wins. The second title followed in January 1999, 34-19 against the Atlanta Falcons with Elway as MVP. Elway retired after that game with 148 wins as a starting quarterback. Those sides also had tight end Shannon Sharpe and wide receiver Rod Smith, who arrived undrafted in 1994 and is the club's career receiving leader. The Mile High Salute, Davis's touchdown celebration, stayed with the club.

Peyton Manning and Super Bowl 50

Tim Tebow gave the club its first playoff win since January 2006 on 8 January 2012, with an 80-yard touchdown pass to Demaryius Thomas on the first play of overtime. Peyton Manning signed in March 2012 after being released by the Indianapolis Colts. In 2013 he threw for 55 touchdowns and 5,477 yards, both league records at the time, and the team scored 606 points, a mark that still stands; the season ended with a 43-8 defeat in Super Bowl XLVIII against the Seattle Seahawks. Two years later the Broncos won Super Bowl 50 on 7 February 2016, 24-10 over the Carolina Panthers. Wade Phillips's defense, with a secondary nicknamed the No Fly Zone, carried the game and Von Miller, the second pick of the 2011 draft, was named MVP. Manning retired the following month. Elway ran the football side of the club from 2011 to 2021. The cornerback of the years in between was Champ Bailey, acquired from Washington in March 2004 in the trade that sent Clinton Portis the other way; he entered the Hall of Fame in 2019.

The AFC West rivalries

The series with the Raiders dates from the AFL and followed the opponent through both of its cities. The Kansas City Chiefs and the Chargers have completed the division since 1970. Denver played seven AFC Championship Games between 1977 and 1998.

Ownership, stadium names and retired numbers

Pat Bowlen bought the club in 1984 and ran it until 2014; he died in 2019. In August 2022 the Walton-Penner group, led by Rob Walton, bought the franchise for 4.65 billion dollars, the highest price paid for a sports team at that point. The stadium, which seats 76,125, was Invesco Field at Mile High from 2001, Sports Authority Field from 2011 and Empower Field at Mile High from 2019. Retired numbers are Elway's 7, Manning's 18, Floyd Little's 44 and Frank Tripucka's 3; Tripucka gave his permission for Manning to wear 18. The Ring of Fame was created in 1984. Elway is the club's career passing leader and Terrell Davis its leading rusher. Sean Payton has been head coach since January 2023, and quarterback Bo Nix arrived as the twelfth pick of the 2024 draft.