Horse Tracks: Countdown to MNF begins now

Good morning, Broncos Country!

Training camp is done, preseason is over, and cuts have been completed. The 2026 season is officially here. WooHoo!

And that means the Broncos’ two-week countdown to their opening game against the Chiefs on Monday Night Football is officially on the clock.

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And no one in the locker room, even the rookies, needs a refresher on what this game will mean.

“We know we’re playing a really good football team, a divisional opponent, Monday Night Football,” said Sean Payton after the first practice with the official 2026 roster. “It’s not like Andy [Reid] and I have to go in and give our teams a pep talk.”

But it is still just Week 1, and while the stakes are always high with a division opponent — especially one that had won the AFC Championship in five of seven appearances since 2018 until a 6-11 trainwreck season last year — keeping perspective on the season is important, Payton says.

“You really focus on the process leading up to the game,” Payton said, noting the logistics of a Monday night game and an extra practice day that week. “With a Monday night game, I spend more time thinking about the schedule to make sure that we’re ramping up to play our best and it doesn’t get stale because we’re not playing on Sunday, if that makes any sense. But our players will know the significance of the first game, and I think it’s the process and the details.”

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Veteran offensive tackle Mike McGlinchey knows the significance as well as how important the next two weeks of prep will be.

“It’s huge. I think every week is about getting better,” he said. “We’ve done that since we started training camp. This week is no exception. You don’t want to go into a game week next week off of a three-day off day and not feel like you accomplished something the week before or get better at your job.”

With two weeks before kickoff, McGlinchey said this week allows the new team to hone in on some details before specifically game-planning for the Chiefs.

“I think it’s an incredible opportunity we have for the next three days to go and compete against each other for a couple more times here, hone in on some of the small details, kind of the introductions to what we want to do in the gameplan against Kansas City and then hit the ground running,” he said. “You want to be your best on Week 1, but it’s more important to be your best in Week 18. Every single week, you have to be better than the week before. It’s not going to be perfect when we first go out and start, but it’s about continuing to improve on each rep and each game as the season unfolds.”