Sean Payton's benching of Russell Wilson is an embarrassment for the Broncos

The Broncos coach is approaching Urban Meyer levels of toxicity

Nobody runs spin control like Sean Payton. The Broncos head coach was a master of playing the NFL media talking heads even before he spent a year in the studios at Fox Sports, and he’s now stronger than ever.

In case you missed the big news, the Broncos announced earlier this week that they are benching Russell Wilson despite the fact that the team is still in the playoff hunt. They are now turning to Jarrett Stidham as the starter over these final two games of the season, and Payton expects us to believe this is purely a football decision.

That fantasy came crashing down almost immediately, as reports came out that the decision was motivated by the injury guarantees in Wilson’s contract. Apparently, Payton went to Wilson following a big upset win over the Chiefs and gave the quarterback an ultimatum: agree to a reworked contract that removed the $37 million in injury guarantees that would kick in shortly after the 2024 league year began, or be benched.

Naturally, this took Wilson by surprise. The Broncos had just won two in a row and upset the defending Super Bowl champion, and Wilson was playing well. Why would he agree to such a ludicrous demand?

Wilson did not give in, and his play continued to improve as the team won their next three games. Suddenly, they had won five in a row and had a winning record for the first time all year.

Then came a three-game road trip, and the Broncos didn’t handle it well. They lost to the Texans, beat the Chargers, and got blown out by the Lions. It was that final game in which Payton once again was caught screaming at Wilson on the sideline, something we hadn’t seen since the winning started.

Payton seemed fine with Wilson when things were going right, but always made sure to look at his quarterback first when things went wrong. That kind of behavior is expected from fans, but not what you want from a head coach.

Denver returned home from the 1-2 road trip and lost to the lowly Patriots. Wilson played well, with 238 yards passing and two touchdowns with zero turnovers. But the back to back losses was enough for Payton to remember that Wilson had refused to partake in his silly little ultimatum, so now Wilson is going to be inactive the final two weeks of the season.

And so the spin has begun. NFL insiders like Adam Schefter and Ian Rapoport have already put out talking points that suggest Payton was held back by Wilson; supposedly, Payton couldn’t run his offense because Wilson couldn’t firmly grasp it. Though apparently Stidham, who has two career starts to his name and has never played for Payton before this season, can run the offense the way it’s supposed to be run.

When Payton met with the media following the decision, he had this to say about the reports:

“We’re desperately trying to win,” Payton said. “Sure, in our game today, there are economics and other things but the number one push behind this — and it’s a decision I’m making — is to get a spark offensively.”

If you think about this statement for even a second, it’s easy to see right through Payton. Stidham has played in 14 games over his four years in the NFL, with just two starts. In just six of those games, Stidham has attempted 10+ passes, and his team has lost every single one of those games.

There is not a single soul who genuinely believes Stidham presents a better chance to win than Wilson.

There are already plenty of thinkpieces out there explaining that Payton is just a misunderstood genius who was too smart for Wilson, and that this was an arranged marriage that was doomed from the start. What these products of the Payton Spin Factory conveniently forget, though, is that Payton chose the Broncos and Wilson’s albatross of a contract.

Strictly from a financial perspective, the move makes sense. Wilson hasn’t been playing up to his contract, even though he’s been markedly better this year than last year. But then again, the contract as it exists was a bad decision from the jump. Payton may not have been the one who gave him that deal, but he did take this job knowing full well what he was getting into.

And therein lies the problem with the Denver Broncos.

When the Walton-Penner ownership group took over this franchise, they wanted to ensure success. The GM they inherited, George Paton, was highly regarded across the league and had built what many considered to be a roster that was a quarterback away from contending. And as luck would have it, Aaron Rodgers was openly considering a split from the Packers.

So Paton went out and hired Rodgers’ offensive coordinator, Nathaniel Hackett, to be his next head coach. The same Hackett who Rodgers had said he’d “follow anywhere.” The same Hackett whose hiring by the Jets this past offseason actually landed Rodgers.

But Hackett couldn’t get Rodgers to move to Denver. When that became apparent, the Broncos shifted their attention to Wilson, who wanted out of Seattle. Suddenly they had a rookie head coach pairing with a veteran quarterback and neither of them had worked with each other before. That is the arranged marriage that was destined to fail.

A few months later, ownership fired Hackett, but they were still committed to Wilson; they had inked him to a massive deal upon trading for him. So the head coaching search quickly turned into a quest to find someone that could “fix” Wilson. The search was, by all accounts, decidedly pro-Wilson.

That led to Payton’s hiring. It made sense on the surface, as Payton had thrived in New Orleans with another undersized quarterback in Drew Brees. But in order to get Payton on board, the Broncos had to give him complete control over the team, which they did. That meant Paton was essentially a lame duck GM, and Wilson was only going to stick around as long as Payton still liked him.

There were, of course, early signs that Wilson would fail this popularity contest. Payton is a brash, coarse personality that is known to be hyper-aware of his public perception. Wilson is a quiet, quirky type that often seems out of place in the NFL.

Still, Payton chose Wilson when he took the job. He even made bold proclamations in his introductory press conference about being able to win with Wilson:

“Obviously it wasn’t the type of season he wanted to have. I do feel like the last couple weeks we saw a little bit more of what we were expecting or accustomed to,” Payton said. “I think the No. 1 job for us as coaches when we’re evaluating our players is, ‘What does he do really well?’ And then let’s try to put him in those positions. At least, that’s the starting point is to highlight their strengths and then minimize what might be the weaknesses.”

That was then and this is now. Then, Payton was happy to speak in platitudes about molding the offense around Wilson’s strengths. Now, we’re being told that Wilson is getting benched because he “can’t operate Payton’s offense.”

What this ultimately comes down to is a tyrant coach who was given the power of a tyrant, at least within Broncos Country. And even though he signed up for Wilson as his quarterback, and that unwieldy contract, Payton has now decided that he wants no part of it. And now he’s electing to move on from the Wilson era, as the quarterback is expected to be released after the season.

Payton will now spend the offseason looking for “his” quarterback, whether that comes in free agency, the draft, or another trade. But make no mistake about this: Wilson is the scapegoat. He wasn’t the one who gave up 26 points to the Bailey Zappe Patriots, or gave up 70 to the Dolphins. Wilson may not have been the answer to all the Broncos’ problems, but he was far from the problem either.

This now becomes Payton’s team, through and through. Less than a year ago, it was Wilson’s team. But just like Josh McDaniels ran Derek Carr out of Las Vegas, Payton has run Wilson out of Denver. He even benched him for Stidham, just as McDaniels did.

That didn’t go so well for McDaniels, and it seems unlikely to go well for Payton either. But this is what happens when you hand the keys to the franchise to one individual. Payton deserves plenty of blame for this mess, but ownership are the ones who empowered him in the first place. And that may just be the most terrifying part for Broncos fans.