Broncos Head Coaching Rumors: Mike Shanahan To Replace Vance Joseph? Elway Reportedly Mulling Change

The Denver Broncos (6-8) have been eliminated from playoff contention for the third year in a row, leading to much speculation about the fate of head coach Vance Joseph. A new report from Woody Paige in The Gazette raised a major question about the Broncos’ potential head coaching search: Could GM John Elway hire his former head coach, Mike Shanahan?

Paige reported that Elway secretly met with the 66-year-old former Broncos and Washington head coach last year. Joseph was coming off a 5-11 debut season as Denver’s head coach and Elway considered pulling the plug right away, in order to reunite with Shanahan.

However, team CEO Joe Ellis stepped in and said the Broncos would need to do a real head coaching search if they fired Joseph. Elway ended up retaining Joseph, who has gone 11-19 in less than two seasons as the Broncos head coach.

Even though the events in question took place a year ago, the report will undoubtedly generate rumblings of a Shanahan return to Denver in this upcoming offseason. Few expect Joseph to keep his job after two disappointing campaigns, and Elway’s most successful season as a GM came with another former coach and Shanahan disciple (Gary Kubiak) at the reins.

Shanahan has also expressed interest in a return.

Elway and Shanahan won two Super Bowls together in Denver in the late 1990s, but the 21st century has been less auspicious for the longtime head coach. He missed the playoffs in each of his last three seasons in Denver, before guiding Washington to three losing seasons in four years as that team’s head coach.

Multiple quarterbacks who started under Shanahan in the NFL have publicly spoken about their tense relationships with him in the years since, including Jake Plummer and Robert Griffin III. Plummer eventually reconciled with Shanahan, more than a decade after the coach benched the quarterback after a 7-4 start in 2006, which ended with the Broncos missing the playoffs.