All aboard, the Denver Broncos hype train is about to leave the station. And it is packed. No team has gotten more offseason love than this one. They’ve become the most popular overachiever pick in the NFL for 2025, the darlings of the offseason. But can they actually dethrone the Kansas City Chiefs in the AFC West?
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K.C. has ruled that division with an iron fist for nearly a decade, winning it nine years in a row. That streak even stretches back before the Patrick Mahomes era. The last time another team won the division was the 2015 Broncos. And they capped that off with a Super Bowl victory.
So, can history repeat itself a decade later? Some might say the hype train is overcrowded, but Chris Simms isn’t fazed. He says keep buying Broncos stock. In fact, he’s doubling down, predicting not only a strong playoff run but also an AFC West crown to finally end the Chiefs’ reign of terror.
“With one of the greatest coaches we’ve seen, definitely one of the best play-callers of the last 20 years in Sean Payton,” Simms started on the Up & Adams show.
“A quarterback that I think is awesome and really fits what he wants to do. An offensive line that’s got a lot of talent. A running back they drafted in the second round that I’m a big fan of, the receivers are better than I think the public realizes, and the defense was one of the best defenses in football last year, and it only got better,” the analyst added.
"I think this is the year the Denver Broncos upset the Chiefs and win the AFC West."
— Chris Simms on WHY he's rolling with the Broncos@heykayadams | @CSimmsQB | #BroncosCountry #ChiefsKingdom pic.twitter.com/Cad793NYM6
— Up & Adams (@UpAndAdamsShow) September 2, 2025
Denver had a top-three scoring defense and a top-seven overall defense last year. They also led the league in sacks, with 63, which was nine more than the next best team. So what did they do? Continue stacking up. They pilfered the 49ers’ defense for All-Pro safety Talanoa Hufanga and middle linebacker Dre Greenlaw to bolster an already strong unit.
On top of that, Simms hasn’t been convinced by the way the Chiefs have played the last few years. They have been playing to just barely get by, not to dominate like they did early in the Mahomian age.
“Don’t hold onto last year. It’s a new year… They’re not gonna have Rashee Rice [for first six games], I gotta see it first. We’ve had two years of Chiefs playing defensive football and kind of just barely winning through the defense. It hasn’t been dominant.”
There are also the upstart Las Vegas Raiders and Los Angeles Chargers to consider. They have built similarly to the Broncos with a respected veteran head coach and a reliable QB.
However, while we like Simms’ anti-Chiefs optimism, we’re not sure we can buy that the Broncos will surpass them this year. We do agree with Simms that Mahomes and the offense have been very underwhelming.
But we think that blowout loss in the Super Bowl will have served as a factory reset for that unit. A wake-up call, of sorts. Mahomes is going to be big this year. He might not win another Super Bowl, but he’s going to put up gaudy numbers.
