Sunday’s game against the Rams was a lot like your classic schoolyard fight, featuring the quiet pipsqueak vs the bully who beats up every kid who crosses him. No one gives the pipsqueak a chance, because well, he’s a pipsqueak. He has no business winning the fight and everyone expects another massacre, but then the fight starts and the pipsqueak walks right up to the bully and punches him in the nose. The bully is shocked, the other kids are shocked and even the pipsqueak can’t believe it, but that’s just the beginning. He keeps coming at the bully with lefts and rights and eventually the bully gives up, not because he is physically unable to win at that point, but because he is mentally psyched out.

If you have the stones to do so, go back and watch that game and that’s exactly what you’ll see. The Rams open up the first quarter as the aggressor; they take shots down the field in the passing game, pound the Broncos’ defense with their running game and relentlessly assault Peyton Manning with creative blitz packages. They take the lead, receive a huge boost in confidence and never let up for a second. Meanwhile, the Broncos do little to adjust and seem to believe that just because they are more talented, they will prevail in the end. What we have here is a severe oversight by the Broncos and a lesson that they should have already known – on any given Sunday, any shrimp can kick your ass if you don’t match his intensity.

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