ENGLEWOOD, Colo. — It all seemed relatively straightforward.
The ball was snapped crisply from Mitchell Fraboni to punter Riley Dixon. It soared off Dixon’s right foot and bounced at the 6-yard line. The ball quickly spun forward after impacting the ground. Standing on the 1-yard line, directly between the ball and the end zone, was Marvin Mims Jr. He caught the ball cleanly, leaving the New York Jets to begin their drive with 99 yards of rain-soaked turf at MetLife Stadium ahead of them.
The play marked the third time this season the Denver Broncos downed a punt at the 1-yard line. The result of the ensuing opponent drives: a safety and two punts. Denver became the first team to pin the ball at the 1 that many times through the first four games of a season since at least 2000, which is as far back as TruMedia tracks the data.
“I don’t think I’ve ever been on punt team that downed three in a whole year at the 1-yard line,” said Tremon Smith, the veteran punt-team gunner who helped the Broncos make their first such splash play in Seattle in Week 1. “It’s a testament to the work we’ve been doing.”
Before this season, the Broncos had downed only three punts at the 1-yard line during the last 17 seasons combined. That may be an isolated statistic — pinning teams at the 2-yard line isn’t a bad outcome, for example — but it’s also a microcosm of the wholesale turnaround the Broncos have produced on special teams since Sean Payton arrived in 2023. The carousel of quarterbacks and coaches had defined Denver’s post-Super Bowl 50 malaise, but dreadful performances on special teams were a consistent, nagging subplot.
Now, heading into Sunday’s game against the Las Vegas Raiders, the third phase has become a source of strength. The Broncos have punted 24 times and have had only one touchback. Wil Lutz has made 10 of 11 field goals. Opponents are starting possessions following kickoffs at their own 27.2-yard line on average. Only the New Orleans Saints are giving teams a longer field to start drives. Perhaps most importantly, the Broncos have avoided the kind of mistakes on special teams that were commonplace before last season.
“When your team is in transition, (you ask), ‘What are the ways to speed up the process?’” Payton said.
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One way was to pry Mike Westhoff out of retirement — again.
In November 2017, the Saints were cruising at 7-2 and would eventually win the NFC South. But Payton believed his special teams needed to improve. He wanted Westhoff, who first began coaching that phase of the sport in the NFL in 1982, to oversee the operation. Westhoff initially resisted. He hadn’t coached in five seasons. He was enjoying his television media gig in the New York area that tucked neatly around the rest of his pursuits.
But Payton was persuasive. Westhoff relented, his only condition was that nobody could be fired to make room for him.
“So I said, ‘OK.’ We ended up being really good,” Westhoff said.
The turnaround was swift. The Saints were the No. 2 special teams unit in the league in 2018 by Rick Gosselin’s rankings. When Payton took over the Broncos, Westhoff was five years into his latest retirement — “I’ve only retired eight times,” he joked — but didn’t have to be sold as hard this time around. He was eager to work again with Payton, the coach Westhoff calls “the best on-field teacher I’ve ever seen.” His only condition this time was that Payton build out a special teams staff around him.
The Broncos brought aboard Ben Kotwica, who had previously worked with Westhoff in New York for the Jets. Chris Banjo, a special teams standout as a player on the New Orleans teams Westhoff and Payton coached, joined as an assistant. Their varied coaching styles and experiences have meshed across the past two seasons.
“We know how to spread it out,” Westhoff said this week as he stared across the field following a practice. “Chris runs all the perimeter stuff that he always did (as a player), the wide guys on the punt. And then Ben and I split stuff up. Ben does most of the actual scouting report of the opponent. I pick the guys out (on the opposing team) I want to try to beat. I’ll pick them out. And then we all come together and we sit down and say, ‘OK, what are we going to do?’ That’s how it works.”
Before the group could build its first collective game plan, though, it had to shift the culture. As Payton began the process of turning over the roster after taking over in 2023, the evaluation of returning and prospective new players included an in-depth discussion about how they would help in the kicking game. One of his first free-agent signings was Smith, a cornerback who was drafted by the Kansas City Chiefs in the sixth round in 2018 and had most recently played for the Houston Texans. Smith has played 85 percent of Denver’s special teams snaps across the past two seasons. He was the kind of player the Broncos wanted to put at the centerpiece of their special teams shift, which also included the immediate replacement of long-time kicker Brandon McManus.
“He’s an explosive individual,” Westhoff said of Smith. “When he runs, he’s not just fast. He can explode. He can accelerate. So he puts himself in a position to make those kinds of plays. So you’re looking for that kind of guy.”
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The Broncos made quick contributors out of draft picks such as JL Skinner and Riley Moss, and undrafted rookies such as Nate Adkins. They identified holdovers who fit into the system they were building, such as linebacker Justin Strnad.
“Last year it was a mindset of getting the players on the team who want to play special teams,” Adkins said. “Not the people who are just forced to go out there and block on punt and go down there. It’s actually guys who want to go out there and make a difference in the game. I think that’s the biggest difference.”
Being a part of that unit means being able to thrive under Westhoff’s decidedly old-school style. The 76-year-old said he is not everyone’s “favorite call-to-dinner person.” But he knows exactly what he’s looking for from each aspect of the operation. Take the thriving punt team. In practice, Westhoff said, the goal is to down every pooch punt inside the 10, but “my real goal is inside the 5.
“So I’m not happy unless we’re there,” he said. “There’s times where I’ll bring them all back and do it again. That’s why I eat dinner alone. No one eats with me.”
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Asked about Westhoff’s exacting demands, Smith shook his head.
“You don’t even know the half,” he said. “If it’s outside the 10, he’s going to be mad and we’re re-doing it. It’s a high standard and I feel like that makes us perform on Sunday.”
Westhoff could be fishing for sharks off the coast of Fort Myers, Fla. It’s a beloved hobby and one that will be waiting for him whenever retirement nine begins. But for now, he’s hunting more splash plays, five decades into his NFL coaching career.
“I don’t care what it is,” he said. “A fake, a kick, a cover, a punt that puts them in the hole, a field goal that wins the game. I want to make the play that helps win the game.”
(Photo: Luke Hales / Getty Images)
