John Elway’s Josh Allen, Bradley Chubb NFL draft whiff still haunts Broncos Country

The Broncos don’t need another first-round edge rusher. They need an exorcist. Because years after John Elway left the building, The Ghost of Josh Allen still haunts the dang place.

The specter of big No. 17, dressed in a tattered Orange & Blue jersey that never was, passes through walls at Dove Valley, rattling his first-down chains in the dead of night, wailing like a banshee at the stars shining back from an arid sky.

The creaks and howls pick up at this time of year. The real-life Allen just played in his 10th NFL playoff game since January 2020 with Buffalo, his real-life team.

Hindsight makes geniuses of us all. But in a bit of drafting karma that the football gods still hold against the Broncos like an unpliable grudge, the ex-Wyoming quarterback once dangled for Denver to take with the No. 5 selection in the 2018 NFL draft.

You know the rest of the story by heart. Or, at least, by the shattered pieces of what’s left of it. Elway, then the Broncos GM, chose to pluck North Carolina State outside linebacker Bradley Chubb instead. Allen went at No. 7 — more karmic irony for Elway — to the Bills, who said “thanks much,” and laughed all the way to the bank.

While Andy Reid and Patrick Mahomes seem to own Allen in the postseason, the fact remains: Buffalo’s signal-caller has now appeared in as many postseason games since 2019 as the Orange & Blue amassed from 2007 to 2015. And has piled up almost as many playoff wins (five for Allen; six for the Broncos) in those 10 tilts.

“We have to make sure that we have the most dangerous pass rush in the NFL,” Chubb said on a conference call after the Broncos brought him on board. “I’m looking forward to the opportunity.”

Y’all know the rest of this one, too. The premise was Chubb on one side, Von Miller on the other, and the mother of all sack parties for years to come. The reality is that the pair alternated injuries and only wound up playing in 22 games together from 2018 to ’21.

Meanwhile, the Broncos kept whiffing at quarterback and head coach, necessitating a trade in November 2021 that sent Miller, a Mile High pillar, to the Rams.

The Vonster turned the move into another ring. The Broncos turned it into Russell Wilson.