Broncos
Broncos TE Evan Engram recorded just three receptions in Week 1 and one reception in Week 2. When asked about his lack of usage, Engram responded that they have a lot of playmakers and are running the ball well.
“I mean, we’ve got playmakers all over the place,” Engram said, via Mike Klis. “We all have a role, and we were running the ball pretty well, and we have a lot of packages that we just keep rolling into the game.”
Chiefs
Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes is hoping to get WR Xavier Worthy back on the field this week and said that he brings an added dimension to the offense.
“More than anything, having him out there is a threat in general,” Mahomes said, via ESPN. “At any moment, he can take a pass — short or long — and take it to the house. Having him on the practice field was very encouraging last week. Seeing him out there, he wanted to stay out there. It was kind of like holding him back.”
Mahomes added that the team is looking to turn around their winless record and thinks that this is the week that they’ll do it.
“You get the spotlight on you, the lights get brighter, and you get to showcase who you are,” Mahomes said. “It’s a great opportunity for us. With the start we’ve had, we want to prove we’re a better team than we’ve shown these first two weeks. ‘Sunday Night Football’ would be the perfect time to do it.”
- Chiefs fourth-round WR Jalen Royals (right knee) practiced Wednesday for the first time in the regular season. (Nate Taylor)
Raiders
Raiders QB Geno Smith already feels right at home in Las Vegas. The team made him a priority this offseason as their starting quarterback, and he is feeling more in command and secure than at any point in Seattle. He said in a recent interview he’s hoping to be able to finish his career with the Raiders, playing anywhere from four to eight more seasons.
“I finally got my team,” Smith said via ESPN’s Ryan McFadden. “I always felt like I was trying to replace Russell [Wilson in Seattle], and you can never replace all the great things that he did. So I never felt like Seattle was my team.”
Smith revisited the end of his time with the Seahawks, admitting that he knew for a while that he probably wasn’t going to end up signing a new extension in Seattle. He approached GM John Schneider with two years left on his deal to try and get a sense of where he stood.
“I think that’s a fair question to ask anybody,” Smith said. “They didn’t have a definitive answer. … It was kind of up in the air. And so for me, going into the [2024] season, I was like, ‘OK, well, this may be my last season here.’ I literally had a playlist called ‘The Last Dance.’ I wanted to go out there and give it my all for my teammates.”
“Shoot, if they let [Pete Carroll] go, they let Russell go, the writing is on the wall, you know,” Smith added. “Eventually, they’re going to try to find someone younger, which every team does. I wasn’t mad at that, but it was more so how they were going about it, like, the honesty of it all. I felt like they were trying not to tell me what direction they were going.”
When negotiations quickly stalled between the Seahawks and Smith this offseason, it didn’t take long for the Raiders to emerge as the top option.
“When Carroll signed here, I knew he would be coming for me, and it was a matter of time before that happened,” Smith said. “The other options [I had], I kind of took them off the table. I looked at their offers, and they were decent offers, but I wanted to be with Coach Carroll.”
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