When Drew Brees enters the Pro Football Hall of Fame after his first year on the ballot in 2026, one of the men he’ll surely thank in his induction speech is former New Orleans Saints, and current Denver Broncos head coach Sean Payton. Together, Brees and Payton crafted what was annually one of the league’s best offenses for a decade and a half in New Orleans until Brees retired in 2020. For fans in the Bayou, it was a match made in football heaven.
Coincidentally, when Sean Payton had his first chance to bring his own quarterback into the Denver Broncos organization, the signal-caller he chose was Oregon’s Bo Nix, who received a pre-Draft comparison to Brees from ESPN’s NFL Draft expert Mel Kiper Jr.. Shoot, even Payton himself made the comparison between the two quarterbacks, noting during training camp that both Nix and Brees were hard to sack.
Now, fans in the Mile High City will be hoping that Payton’s second act is just as successful as his time in New Orleans was. But much of that will come down to how close Bo Nix can resemble the second-leading passer in NFL history.
On Thursday afternoon, Drew Brees made an appearance on “The Herd” and discussed with host Colin Cowherd the piece of advice he would give the Broncos rookie quarterback.
The dynamic between Brees and Payton is a little bit different than it will be between Nix and Payton. By the time Drew Brees had come to New Orleans, he was already a 27-year-old who had five years of NFL experience under his belt. Payton was a 43-year-old first-year head coach. Now, Payton has sixteen years of head coaching experience under his belt, and even though Bo Nix is older for a rookie (24 years old) and has a ton of college reps to his name, it’s still a drastically different situation.
Sean Payton, Broncos “Bolieve” in Bo Nix
After a pair of rough outings in his first two NFL regular season starts, Bo Nix bounced back in Week 3, managing a 26-7 win in Tampa Bay . Nix completed a Brees-like 69 percent of his passes for 216 yards. He’s yet to throw for a touchdown, but for the second time this season, Nix used his legs to punch one into the end zone against the Bucs. To this point in the season, Jayden Daniels and former Oregon teammate Bucky Irving are the only rookies with more rushing yards than Nix.
After the win, the often-prickly Sean Payton offered his rookie QB some well-deserved praise:
“The kid’s been confident. This kid’s been through Auburn. He’s transferred. He’s won, and won, and won, and won,” Payton said in his postgame presser, per Grant Gordon of NFL.com. “And honestly, I haven’t seen him flinch.”
Ahead in Week 4 waits a difficult test against a New York Jets defense littered with players who have All-Pro potential. Let’s see if Bo Nix flinches then.
