With a tier-one matchup on the road vs. the Baltimore Ravens on Sunday, Bo Nix has the chance to prove to the NFL and the Denver Broncos that the future is now when it comes to his franchise quarterback potential. The Broncos drafted Nix at No. 12 overall out of Oregon with the hope that he was a future franchise quarterback.
Halfway through his rookie campaign, though, Nix has already displayed 'franchise' makings. He became the first Broncos rookie quarterback to start the regular-season opener since John Elway in 1983, earning the job by beating out two young veterans in training camp. And Nix has since set several other franchise marks.
Nix's five wins already surpassed the franchise rookie quarterback mark as the most ever, leapfrogging Elway and Drew Lock (2019). His four rushing touchdowns thus far rank as the second-most by a Broncos rookie quarterback behind only Tim Tebow's six.
Nix's 165 completions are the most ever by a Broncos rookie. If the season ended today, his 81.4 QB rating would rank second among franchise rookie signal-callers. But there's still a long row left to hoe this year, and if his last four games are any indication, that rating will grow.
The rookie is just getting started. Nix will easily finish with the most rookie passing yards in team history.
In the Broncos' Week 8 win over the Carolina Panthers, Nix set a franchise record with completions to 11 different receivers. The rookie has also emerged as a bonafide dual-threat quarterback, as evidenced by his eight passing touchdowns and four rushing scores.
In fact, only four quarterbacks in NFL history have passed for eight touchdowns and rushed for at least four additional scores through the first eight games, and Nix is one of them, joining Dak Prescott (2016), Robert Griffin III (2012), and Cam Newton (2011). Believe it or not, Nix is the only Broncos quarterback not named Elway to post at least two games in a season featuring two passing scores and a rushing touchdown. Elway owns the franchise mark with three such games.
Throw in Nix being named the NFL's Offensive Rookie of the Month of October — only the third Broncos rookie to ever garner the accolade and the first since running back Clinton Portis in 2002 —and it's clear this kid is on a bright path.
But all these stats and records notwithstanding, Nix can prove to Broncos Country and the NFL at large this weekend that he's already a franchise quarterback — still obviously in chrysalis, but a specimen all the same.
The Broncos will face an equally 5-3 Ravens squad in their house on Sunday. It'll be the most hostile environment Nix will have faced up to this point in his young career, and it won't get any easier from there with a consecutive road trip to face the hated Kansas City Chiefs — the back-to-back defending World Champions.
Across from Nix on Sunday will be two-time NFL MVP Lamar Jackson. If one was looking for a measuring stick to gauge where Nix stands as a budding quarterback in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't get much clearer than going head-to-head with Jackson.
If the Broncos emerge from Baltimore with six wins on the season, it'll be time to stand up and proclaim with confidence that Nix is The Guy™ henceforth. And the complexion of the game won't matter.
Nix has defeated other perennial MVPs like Aaron Rodgers, winning about as ugly as it gets at MetLife Stadium. In fact, the only uglier quarterback win in recent memory was Tim Tebow's two-completion performance vs. the Chiefs at Arrowhead in 2011.
Nix passed for just 60 yards in a torrential downpour vs. the New York Jets, but the Broncos came out on top 10-9. Rodgers called his ignominious loss to the upstart Nix an "outlier," but the kid simply made more plays than his veteran opponent when the chips were down. The four-time MVP should give the kid the credit he deserves.
The cool thing is, Nix doesn't care about his stats. He cares about delivering the win, and although some will cringe and wring their hands over the assertion that victories are a quarterback stat, it's an inescapable reality of the NFL. Wins and losses are the first measure of an NFL quarterback, let's face it.
Winning quarterbacks tend to stick around, hold onto jobs, and rake in tens of millions of dollars, regardless of the style in which they achieve them. There are exceptions that prove the rule, like Alex Smith and the San Francisco 49ers, or Alex Smith and the Chiefs, in the not-too-distant past.
I suppose you could throw Tebow and the Broncos in that conversation, too, although it's a bit more of a stretch, considering Denver only won seven regular-season games and backed into the playoffs. But that overtime victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers in the Wildcard Round would have, by rights, been enough to cement Tebow as the Broncos' quarterback of the future if it wasn't for the Indianapolis Colts shaking loose the biggest free-agent fish in NFL history a couple of short months later.
Peyton Manning became a Bronco. Tebow was shipped off to the Jets. Four division titles, two Super Bowl berths, and a World Championship later, the Broncos proved they made the right decision by going with Manning and jettisoning Tebow to a landing spot of his choosing.
Bringing it back to the present, if Nix can deliver a win over the Ravens, the debate over his franchise bonafides should be put to bed. Stylistically, we can expect the young quarterback to continue to develop and improve as the weeks and months march on, but a win in Baltimore would prove the kid's mettle.
On the heels of being named the Offensive Rookie of the Month, the Ravens will be gunning for Nix. He'll have a big bullseye on his back, but it won't be the first time in a long playing career dating back 61 college games before he entered the NFL. As the pride of Auburn, Nix shouldered the burden of being a target in the SEC with aplomb, finishing as the Conference Rookie of the Year despite the heat.
A loss won't definitively disprove Nix's franchise wherewithal, and it could be instructive as he navigates his rookie trial-and-error learning curve. But a victory, oh, baby... that would silence his still vocal critics and put to bed the bitter claims that he should have been a Day 2 pick instead of the sixth quarterback off the board in Round 1.
Go get 'em. I Bo-lieve.
