The Broncos have now won four straight games by a field goal or less, an improbable sentence that still lands remarkably low on the list of improbable outcomes they’ve racked up in a 10-2 start.
Here is The Denver Post’s stock report from the Broncos’ 27-26 win over the Commanders in overtime Sunday night.
Stock up
Evan Engram, north-south threat: In the locker room Sunday night, Engram nodded his head vigorously when asked how good it felt to finally break one. And kept nodding. The nods spoke for themselves.
“Feels great,” Engram said, with a soft smile. “Feels great just to make a big play like that, for the team.”
There’s plenty wrapped in that statement. Engram’s role through much of the year in Denver simply can’t have been what he envisioned when he signed in free agency, any “Joker” label long shredded.
But in his most active game of the season — the Broncos only carrying two tight ends as Nate Adkins still works back from a knee injury — Engram broke through with some vertical burst on Denver’s touchdown drive in overtime. Isolated against the Commanders’ Bobby Wagner from the slot, Engram ran a nasty “jerk” route and turned up the seam for a 41-yard catch-and-run.
His longest play of the year entering Week 13? 20 yards. Engram’s been mostly limited to short crossers and out routes. But Sunday put his top-end speed on full display, the explosiveness that Denver signed him for in free agency. He led the Broncos with six catches for 79 yards on nine targets against Washington, and could be in for a big stretch run.
Bo Nix, arm talent: In the red zone with the Broncos motoring on a two-minute drill to end the first half Sunday, Nix stepped up in a collapsing pocket and got dragged down by the Commanders’ Preston Smith.
Except as Nix’s legs toppled, he somehow contorted the shin of his back leg long enough and got enough front-foot drive to lace a rocket to Courtland Sutton in the end zone. Upon several replays, it defies most logical explanation.
Bo Nix somehow keeps the play alive to Courtland Sutton!
DENvsWAS on NBC
Stream on @NFLPlus + Peacock pic.twitter.com/vF27JLuilQ— NFL (@NFL) December 1, 2025
It was easily Nix’s best play of the year, and one of the more athletic plays any quarterback in the NFL has put on tape in 2025. He’s not just a checkdown artist, folks. Take away an instant-regret pick thrown to Wagner in the fourth quarter, and these past two weeks have been the strongest back-to-back performances of Nix’s 2025 season.
“He’s just getting better and better,” Payton said postgame.
RJ Harvey as a complete back: The pieces have never quite fit together all at the same time in his rookie season, but second-round pick RJ Harvey showed major flashes Sunday of becoming a legitimate three-down running back. It’s a welcome development for the Broncos in J.K. Dobbins’ injury absence.
One of Harvey’s major knocks in his introduction to Denver was his lack of pass-protection experience; he stepped up against multiple blitzes and took out rushers against the Commanders on Sunday.
It’s well-established what he can do as a receiver, too, and Harvey caught three more passes for 27 yards against Washington. And the rookie added two goal-line touchdowns Sunday, flashing all the tools of a future stud. That’s eight touchdowns in 12 games now for Harvey, by the way.
Dondrea Tillman: The reserve outside linebacker just continues to make plays whenever his number’s called. Tillman already has two massive picks this season, and came up huge with a second-down shoestring sack of Marcus Mariota in the fourth quarter. That single play transformed a 2nd-and-9 into a 3rd-and-21 situation for the Commanders, one of many defensive reps that added up for the Broncos down the stretch of Sunday’s game.
Tillman recorded two quarterback hits and a tackle for loss for good measure, too. He’s impacted the Broncos’ last few wins in a major way.
Stock down
Riley Moss’s pure luck: Man. First, the pass-interference penalties and ticky-tack grabbing got so bad that Moss resorted to wearing boxing gloves on reps in practice. Then, on Sunday, Moss played picture-perfect coverage in the end zone on the Commanders’ Treylon Burks — only for Burks to reach up Statue-of-Liberty-style and make one of the most unbelievable catches anyone in attendance had ever seen.
It’s been that kind of year for Moss, who has done plenty of things right and even great in 2025. He was brilliant for most of the game, too, with a couple of passes defended against Washington and several great coverage reps on Sunday. But he got burned on a late 38-yard hit in overtime to Deebo Samuel, and that’ll be the play that sticks in memory.
Moss continues to have a hard time winning in the public eye.
WR1 Troy Franklin: As the Broncos frequently went to heavier doses of heavier personnel against Washington on Sunday, Franklin often felt like the odd man out. After a first-quarter grab for 17 yards, the second-year receiver had little impact, finishing with two catches for 21 yards on three targets.
It’s clear Payton trusts rookie Pat Bryant more as a run-blocker, and recent signee Lil’Jordan Humphrey even seemed to cut into Franklin’s reps at times against the Commanders. Franklin was targeted a whopping 45 times in five previous games, and more balance for the Broncos’ passing game is likely a good thing for the offense.
Keep an eye on his usage in the coming couple of games.
RJ Harvey as a pure runner: Here’s the flip side of Harvey’s “stock up” — Denver’s running game simply hasn’t operated at the same level of efficiency with Harvey as the lead back instead of Dobbins. The rookie ran for 2.7 yards a carry in each of his last two games. Even factoring in increased short-yardage work, Harvey visibly missed one clear inside cut on a second-half run against the Commanders.
Payton emphasized postgame Sunday that the Broncos’ lack of run-game success against Washington was “nothing to do” with Harvey, but Denver needs to figure this out quickly to better close games.
Tight-end coverage: Maybe let’s pump the brakes on all that tight-end-stopper talk from the Chiefs matchup. Rookie Jahdae Barron played sparingly on Sunday with Pat Surtain’s return to the lineup, and Barron was largely used in dime formations on passing downs. There wasn’t a whole lot of opportunity for him to check veteran tight end Zach Ertz, who went off on Sunday: 10 catches for 106 yards.
Frequently, it seemed as if Ertz found soft spots in defensive coordinator Vance Joseph’s zone or tormented Broncos safeties in coverage. Surtain couldn’t help much here, as the All-Pro corner had his hands full with the Commanders’ top wideout Terry McLaurin.
Joseph doesn’t have many problems on his hands for the stretch run, but two tight ends on the wrong side of 30 — Ertz and Travis Kelce — have hurt the Broncos big-time in consecutive games.
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