Broncos' Sean Payton adjusting play-calling process with Davis Webb, sources say

Parker Gabriel, The Denver Post on Oct 8, 2026

Published in Football

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DENVER — The Davis Webb play-calling experience, at least in its original form, lasted all of four games.

Head coach Sean Payton is set to be more heavily involved in offensive play-calling going forward, sources told The Denver Post on Thursday. It remains unclear whether Payton is assuming full play-calling duties or something short of that, like calling certain segments of games, having heavier influence in the game-planning process or some combination.

Webb is slated to speak with reporters Thursday, while Payton’s next news conference in a typical week would be Friday.

Payton has always had a voice in the Broncos’ planning and said in February, when he announced Webb would take over play-calling, that much of the process would be collaborative. Some kind of inflection point arrived, however, after four games of inconsistent and mostly underwhelming offensive play from the Broncos and third-year quarterback Bo Nix.

Denver has scored just 13 first-half points over four games and, at the de facto quarter mark, ranks No. 27 in yards per game and scoring.

The 62-year-old head coach has been asked about Webb’s role as the play-caller and, in varying ways, if he’d consider making a change this early in the season twice since the end of Sunday’s 24-14 loss to San Francisco. While Payton didn’t say yes in either instance, he also has seemingly gone out of his way to avoid denying the possibility, too.

Here are his answers in full:

Sunday after the game when asked if he’d consider Webb’s role as the play caller: “It’s too early (to talk about). It’s a fair question and I appreciate it, but man, it’s tough to discuss any of that right now. I told those guys, we played some tough teams and this is another good football team. There were a lot of good things we did defensively for a good portion of the game. I felt like the time of possession began to affect us. We had the big turnover, obviously, in the kicking game and that flips the field and all of a sudden you’re back out there on defense. But back to your original question, we always, each game, look at everything. That’s kind of how we’ll approach this one.”

Wednesday when asked if four games represented a big enough sample to determine whether he should be the play-caller: “I think our focus needs to be more on the specifics and the details of each play regardless. I think Davis is very fast and quick and understands what we’re doing. I appreciate the question but I think that the most important job I have is really evaluating the whys and I think — and look, I think collectively we all, after a game and after a four-game sample size, alright, certainly this isn’t championship football, what we see, and how quickly can we correct those things?”

When Payton first announced he was handing the play sheet to Webb, a 31-year-old former NFL quarterback who has been held in high regard since he jumped right from playing to working as Denver’s quarterbacks coach in 2023, Payton said he would “still be involved in what we do offensively,” and described a collaborative effort in game planning. In the months since, he has said Webb has the latitude to run meetings how he wants and has indicated Webb is in charge of offensive planning, even if Payton and other assistants, like run game coordinator Zach Strief, have a lot of input.

He said he’d have “some suggestions, some mandates” on what got called, but has reiterated in recent weeks that he wasn’t going to dictate on that front.

He, in various ways, sidestepped questions over the course of the offseason about whether he’d really be able to keep from taking the duties back from Webb if the Broncos started slow by insisting that it was going to go great and, thus, that would not be a consideration.

Four games in, it’s no longer just a consideration.