At first glance, the primary heroes for the Denver Broncos in their Christmas night win over the Kansas City Chiefs were the usual suspects. Quarterback Bo Nix led drives, RJ Harvey had a touchdown reception, and some familiar names on the Broncos defense made plays as the unit got stops.
But there was one unfamiliar hero in this winning script: Alex Forsyth, the backup center who stepped up when regular center Luke Wattenberg was declared out with a shoulder injury. Forsyth, of course, was knocked on his backside last season at the end of Denver’s painful loss at Arrowhead when a crucial field goal by kicker Wil Lutz was blocked.
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Forsyth took the blame for that one, as did his Denver teammates, but there were no such issues this time around.
“This was special. I was just kind of flooded with emotions when I came in here,” Forsyth said to Nick Kosmider of The Athletic after the win on Thursday night. “It was great to have my teammates, who have been so supportive with (what happened in) last year’s game, supporting me after that and sticking up for me and sticking with me.”
The 2023 seventh-round pick made it back into this role by grinding, which is what Forsyth does. His practice and play style was lauded by both coach Sean Payton and Nix after the game.
“It was a tough trip home (from Arrowhead) last year,” Payton said. “It’s a little life lesson for someone like him, to come back in a starting role, that was pretty cool.”
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Nix knows Forsyth from their days together at Oregon before the lineman was drafted, so he had a good idea what he was going to get from his college teammate going into this one.
“I would say nobody prepares more in this league than he does,” said Nix. “He’s one of the most in-depth preparers I’ve ever seen. It’s awesome to play behind him and I knew going into this game he wasn’t going to leave a stone unturned. He was going to (give) the team the best chance of succeeding.”
The game itself also involved a lot of grinding. The game plan from Kansas City wasn’t what Nix was expecting, so a change in strategy was required.
“Honestly, it was the exact opposite of what I thought we were going to get,” said Nix. “I thought they were going to pressure us like crazy. We got a bunch of two-high zones the whole game. They put a lid on top of it and made it hard to find explosive plays. You’ve just got to inch your way down the field and score on longer drives. We just did what we had to do.”