INDIANAPOLIS — Sean Payton hit leadoff at the NFL Scouting Combine.

The new Broncos head coach strolled to a podium 10 minutes before his scheduled news conference and talked about his staff (nearly in place but not yet complete), his football team and his quarterback, among several other topics. General manager George Paton followed and noted, among other things, that the team is hopeful running back Javonte Williams (knee) will be ready by the season opener and that the franchise is hoping to come to contract agreements with free agents-to-be Dre’Mont Jones and Alex Singleton.

Here are a couple of other quick observations:

Payton’s staff blends youth and experience

Payton talked at length about being impressed by new defensive coordinator and former Denver head coach Vance Joseph and acknowledged that his defensive and special teams staffs have more experience while the offensive group skews younger.

“We felt like we were going to be real patient with that hire and try to dig as much as we could relative to the fit and finding the right guy,” Payton said.

He acknowledged that he tried to convince Vic Fangio to come along with him and that he’s planning on having another conversation with former Detroit head coach and New England assistant Matt Patricia about a potential role on the 2023 staff. Though he said it was “a little early” to know if a spot would materialize for Patricia.

Overall, Payton said they have a couple of roles left to fill on defense and are down to just a quality control hire on offense.

Analysis: Payton said he gets “energized” working with younger coaches, so perhaps its no surprise he’s got several young guys and first-time NFL assistant coaches on offense, including quarterbacks coach Davis Webb, offensive line coach Zach Strief, tight ends coach Declan Doyle, receivers coach Keary Colbert and running backs coach Lou Ayeni.

Broncos want to move forward from Wilson’s poor 2022

Payton said he planned this offseason to “park a car” that had no rearview mirrors or no side mirrors and that his focus would be on moving forward with quarterback Russell Wilson, leaving the struggles of 2022 behind them. Payton said something similar in his introductory news conference, and added Tuesday that he doesn’t think there’s much good left in revisiting last year accept to acknowledge that no single person is at fault for a 5-12 mark and the worst year of Wilson’s career.

Analysis: Payton has said many times that he’s looking forward to working with Wilson and trying to figure out how to help him get back on track, but he’s also clearly, intentionally not gone overboard in talking about his new quarterback. They both understand the task at hand and it’s clear Payton will be taking a diametrically different approach to working with Wilson than former head coach Nathaniel Hackett.

Roster rundown 

Asked if he had done a deep dive on the roster, Payton said he hadn’t gone in “with scuba tanks. Maybe a snorkel.” Those meetings will ramp up in earnest after the Combine, he said.

Paton made it clear the team has a lot of work to do this offseason.

He said his conversations with Jones and his representatives have been “very positive” and that the Broncos view him as a core defensive player. Denver would also “love” to get linebacker Alex Singleton back in the fold. “He’s just a baller,” Paton said.

Among a variety of injury updates, Paton said the medical team is hopeful Williams (knee) will be back by the start of the regular season, pass-rusher Randy Gregory (knee) will be ready for the offseason program and receiver Tim Patrick (ACL) is trending toward returning at some point this offseason.

Paton also said the Broncos have to “upgrade” on the offensive line and that he expected that to happen during free agency and during the draft in late April.

Analysis: Denver has a lot of roster questions to answer and less than two weeks before free agency opens. Five Broncos offensive linemen from 2022 are free agents and that group, in particular, seems ripe for an overhaul. Denver doesn’t have draft picks until the top of the third round, but Paton expressed confidence his team can still find impact players in the middle rounds. They’ll have to in order to most effectively re-stock the roster.

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