Did Sean Payton just turn Zach Wilson into a functional NFL quarterback?

Marc Lebryk-USA TODAY Sports

Zach Wilson still isn’t a starting-caliber NFL QB, but the Broncos seem to be the perfect spot for the former second overall pick to save his career.

Quarterback development is not linear. It rarely happens on a smooth curve, for all kinds of reasons.

Young quarterbacks coming into the NFL could be bedeviled by offensive systems that in no way resemble what they worked with in college. They might have coaches intent on retrofitting their quarterbacks into systems that don’t work for them. If they’re highly drafted prospects, the lack of talent around them may magnify their limitations and liabilities. And it may come to pass that the quarterback himself doesn’t have the gear to serve in the NFL’s beloved corps, to paraphrase Gunnery Sergeant Hartman in Full Metal Jacket.

Whatever the reasons are for quarterback busts, seeing a guy come back from that horrible designation is pretty rare. The Jim Plunketts, Alex Smiths, and Geno Smiths of the world don’t just fall off trees – they must be repaired in the right systems with the right coaches and teammates and schemes. Reviving a quarterback bust is as much about right place, right time as anything else.

In the case of Zach Wilson and the Denver Broncos, it would appear that there’s a bit of smoke that Wilson, the second overall pick in the 2021 NFL draft, is on a similar path. Wilson did very little of positive note in his three years with the New York Jets, and by the end of the 2022 season, the Jets had seen enough of what Wilson couldn’t do to go all-in on Aaron Rodgers. That Wilson looked no better after Rodgers’ 2023 season-ending Achilles tendon injury was the last straw. The Jets traded Wilson and a 2024 seventh-round pick to the Denver Broncos on April 23, 2024 in exchange for a 2024 sixth-round pick.

You can’t fall much further down the Quarterback Ecosystem than that.

The hope was that with Sean Payton in his corner, Wilson could actually become a functional NFL quarterback. But that was going to be a tough haul. Wilson had been terrible under pressure throughout his NFL career, and his inability to read defenses at anywhere near an NFL level were the primary obstacles to overcome, and those aren’t generally simple things to solve.

Through the 2024 preseason, though, Wilson did look for the most part like the quarterback the Jets wanted him to be. Overall, he completed 28 of 44 passes for 397 yards, three touchdowns, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 115.4. Under pressure, per Pro Football Focus, he completed four of 10 passes under pressure with one explosive completion (which we’ll get to in a minute), but he didn’t make any of the egregious errors he had made before. Perhaps most importantly, he looked like an evolutionary version of himself when reading the field.

Perhaps the environment has made a difference.

“I can’t think of many games in my career where it’s been able to feel like we’re getting into a rhythm,” Wilson said after the preseason finale against the Arizona Cardinals, when he completed 16 of 25 passes for two touchdowns, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 123.9. “Even if you go three-and-out or get stopped here and there, it’s like, ‘we’re going to put something together on the next drive.’ It feels good to feel that as an offense; one bad play happens and you expect something good to happen on the next one.”

Perhaps this was also a worthy indictment of the Jets’ passing games, though Wilson had more than enough to do with those failures.

In any event, Payton has already seen enough to seem to want Wilson on his team, backing up 12th overall pick Bo Nix.

“Look, he made some impressive throws,” Payton said after the Cardinals game. “The shot play in the hole to Brandon. He has got a live arm down the field. I thought he threw it away when it was not there. There were a couple sacks, but overall, we moved the ball. You are trying to measure how the offense is doing when he is in there. We had plenty of time on the play clock, enough time to get in and out of plays if need be. He has had the better part of the last two and a half weeks. You guys have seen his practices.”

Let’s start with the shot play in the hole to receiver Brandon Johnson This happened with 1:34 left in the third quarter. The Broncos had second-and-10 at the Arizona 38-yard line. Wilson dropped this dime down the backside boundary against Cover-2 for a 37-yard gain, and a near-touchdown.

Wilson’s other deep pass to Jackson (who also impressed Payton) came with 6:29 left in the game. Here, Wilson had a choice between two vertical routes – one to Jackson, and one to receiver Michael Bandy. Maybe you’d like a bit more sauce on this ball to counter the converging safety, but the result was a 46-yard touchdown. Yes, I was reminded of Brock Purdy’s ability to throw into coverage without the usual consequences.

Wilson had four explosive passes against the Cardinals, and though I’d like to see him respond to pressure and blitzes with comprehensive answers, I wasn’t too bothered that Arizona’s defense didn’t throw too many pressure concepts at him. This was more about Wilson having to navigate pre and post-snap coverage switches, simulated pressures, and other sleights of hand that Wilson has simply not been able to deal with before.

This 21-yard completion to receiver Troy Franklin with 3:32 left in the first quarter was probably Wilson’s best example of reading through a complex coverage and making the right decision.

This 24-yard completion to receiver David Sills with 12:59 left in the first half was Wilson’s first explosive pass of the day, and another great example of how he’s clearly expanded his ability to read what’s going on in the timing of the down. Wilson’s first read was receiver Jalen Virgil on the front-side deep out against Cover-3. But Wilson saw that Virgil was plastered by cornerback Divaad Wilson, so he calmly refocused to the backside dig, where Sills was working cornerback Elijah Jones.

“I think my ultimate goal is that I wanted there to be a calmness, you know?” Wilson concluded. “When I’m in the huddle, I want the sideline to feel the calmness of just that the operations are going to be good. We’re going to get the ball snapped, guys are going to be lined up the correct way. We’re not going to deal with some of that preseason stuff—I feel like I’ve played enough to be better than having those issues. So just a clean operation, getting the ball out of my hands, just playing quarterback how you are supposed to, putting our team in the best position possible.”

Of course, we would be remiss if we didn’t mention Wilson’s occasional foibles, which still show up from time to time. Payton also talked about Wilson taking a couple of sacks, and this was one where he went back to some old habits. This was a bit too Looney Tunes for Payton’s taste, and Wison still needs development in the concept of taking a profit. When the halfback is open on the Texas (angle) route – the old Bill Walsh staple – there’s no need to improvise.

So we’re not at all saying that Zach Wilson will suddenly live up to that second overall draft pick in 2021. He’s not even a starting quarterback in the NFL at this point. But all those guys previously mentioned – Jim Plunkett and the two Smiths – had to marinate in different and better systems before they were able to regenerate their careers.

At least for now, Zach Wilson might have a bead on a similar result.