The Lead
A week ago, Defensive Coordinator Ejiro Evero and Executive Director of Football Operations/Special Advisor to the General Manager Kelly Kleine took part in the NFL's inaugural Coach and Front Office Accelerator program, an initiative that aims to improve diversity at the most important levels of a football team.
In conversations with The Denver Post’s Ryan O’Halloran, Evero and Kleine each shared their thoughts on the experience, which Evero called "eye-opening."
"In your mind as a football coach, you get caught up in scheme and X's and O's and player evaluations and things of that nature," Evero told O'Halloran. "[The seminar] was a good awakening in terms of, if you want to take that next step and be in a leadership position of a head coach or GM, how many other things ownership is looking at on the business side, fan engagement, dealing with the media."
In addition to meeting with various team owners, the participants heard from speakers like Colts head coach Frank Reich during leadership development seminars.
"The league is trying to make a change and it was a really great event," Kleine told O'Halloran. "It was really, really good for all of us to meet each other, too. You got to meet the owners and know them personally, but it was huge for potential head coaches and GMs just to get to know each other because these are the people hopefully getting hired eventually and boom, you have connections."
To hear more from Evero and Kleine on their time at the program, be sure to check out O’Halloran’s full story.
Below the Fold
CBS Sports’ Bryan DeArdo has assigned a “burning question” for each AFC West team, and the one he picked for the Broncos is easily the most important.
"Can Wilson get Denver back into the playoffs?" DeArdo writes. "It largely depends on how fast he can master new head coach Nathaniel Hackett's offense. It also depends on whether or not Denver can win enough games against some of the top teams on its schedule, teams that includes the 49ers, Titans, and Rams as well as the teams within its division. The Broncos also need to take care of business against the weaker teams on their schedule like the Texans, Jets and Jaguars."
