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Bo Nix is hearing it from all corners.
The Broncos quarterback threw for just 107 yards in Thursday’s 17-14 win over the Seahawks, the latest in a string of disappointing outings for the 2024 first-round pick.
It was enough to stir some strong feelings in former teammate Ben DiNucci, now a CBS Sports analyst.
“Bo looks disinterested, checked out, and like there are 500 places he would rather be than on a football field every week” DiNucci wrote in a since-deleted post on X. “I am a fan of the Broncos and wish them the best, but I would rather watch paint dry right now than their offense play football.”
The former QB, who was signed to the Broncos practice squad last season when Nix’s season ended with an ankle injury, later walked back his harsh criticism — “I was doing a disservice to Bo and guys in that locker room who were my teammates,” he posted — but he was far from alone in his initial assessment.
DiNucci’s criticism was a response to Prime Video analyst Ryan Fitzpatrick’s brutal evaluation after watching the proceedings at Denver’s Mile High Stadium in person for “Thursday Night Football.”
“Bo Nix is not playing competitively,” the 17-year NFL vet said. “It’s almost disrespectful to the quarterback position how he’s playing football right now.”
The Broncos’ offensive issues caused head coach Sean Payton to take play-calling duties away from offensive coordinator Davis Webb last week, but the change did little to spur Nix, who has thrown for just 1049 yards to go with six touchdowns and three interceptions through six starts.
Denver sits at 4-2 and second in the AFC West, but Nix’s completion percentage (60.3), yards per attempt (5.6) and QB rating (41.5) are way off from the averages he set in his first two NFL seasons.
His passer rating of 79.4 ranks 26th out of 31 fellow pass-throwers.
“He’s not competing right now and that’s something that he’s hung his hat on for the last two years. I don’t know if he’s still injured and I don’t know what’s going on, but it’s not good enough,” Fitzpatrick said, going on to add, “That effort is garbage. That is not a quarterback in the NFL. [We] deserve better.”
Fitzpatrick comments rang true for another former QB in ESPN’s Dan Orlovsky.
“Right now he looks like a quarterback who doesn’t want the football,” he said Friday morning on “First Take.”
“Watching him, it looks like he’s in a state of ‘somebody else take the football, because you make the mistake, I don’t want to be the guy that makes the mistake.’ That’s not how he can be great in this league … he just looks like a player that doesn’t want the football ’cause he doesn’t want the fingers pointing at him when it goes bad.”
For his part, Nix is aware something is off, even if he can’t figure it out right now.
“I don’t understand why we can’t really push the ball vertically right now, but defenses are just sitting back there,” he told reporters. “I don’t know where the disconnect is right now, to be honest with you.
“We’re for some reason struggling to find those explosive plays.”