ENGLEWOOD, Colo. — In April 2013, the Denver Broncos were still in pain after an overtime loss to the Baltimore Ravens in the AFC’s divisional round that abruptly ended quarterback Peyton Manning’s first season with the team. But in the “we just have to get back to work” mantra of then-GM John Elway, the Broncos’ scouting and personnel staff had already gathered for predraft meetings.

Nobody knew it then, but that room provided a glimpse at future NFL front offices. Among the scouts, interns and assortment of staffers were six would-be NFL general managers, four of whom are currently in their positions, with Elway forming what would become the Broncos’ deep general manager tree.

“I learned so much,” San Francisco 49ers general manager John Lynch said. “I’m not sure if I’m in this position if I don’t see it done that way with those people. You can’t see years ahead in that moment … but that foundational desire for people to want to pull in the same direction to succeed — I saw that there, right from John on down to all of us.”

The Broncos (3-2) face the New York Jets on Sunday in London’s Tottenham Hotspur Stadium (9:30 a.m. ET, NFL Network). The 0-5 Jets are in their first season with general manager Darren Mougey, who joins Lynch, the Las Vegas Raiders‘ John Spytek and the Washington Commanders‘ Adam Peters as current GMs who cut their teeth on Elway’s Broncos staff.

That staff also included former Raiders GM John Ziegler, who is currently an assistant general manager with the Tennessee Titans. Champ Kelly was there, too; he finished out the 2024 season as the Raiders’ interim general manager and is currently a senior personnel executive with the Miami Dolphins. All six were with the Broncos between 2013 and 2015, three seasons out of a four-year run in which the Broncos tallied 50 regular-season wins, four AFC West titles, two Super Bowl appearances and a Super Bowl 50 championship.

“I think we all had aspirations, but you were so focused on the tasks,” said Mougey, who started as a scouting intern for the Broncos in 2012. “Nobody was sitting around like, ‘Man, I’m going to be such a GM’ … [but] I always felt like it was a talented group. You’d just watch how they worked and how they treated people and know if you got the chance to do this, you’d want it to feel like that.”

As the GMs reminisce about the Broncos days, there are memories of cramped spaces, thousands of player evaluations, arguments, moments that made them laugh and what each called the construction of a “rare” bridge from being co-workers to lifelong friends.

“Adam Peters and I shared an office — it was like a box, like 10 feet by 10 feet, two desks facing each other, glass wall out to the hallway, so like a fish bowl,” Spytek said. “[After] Thanksgiving, we were in there every day. He had outranked me, so he made me have the desk with my back to the hallway so everybody could see what was on my computer screen. … Still makes me laugh.”

While Peters was hired into the Broncos’ scouting department in 2009, it was a group assembled largely by Elway after he was entrusted by former Broncos owner Pat Bowlen in early 2011 to pull the franchise out of a malaise that included missing the playoffs for five straight seasons. More than a decade later, the group holds true to the roots that trace to late nights and shared offices on the second floor of the Broncos’ complex (which some called the “bullpen”).

“You know, I was talking to Adam and [Spytek], especially when they were going through the process of getting those [GM] jobs and then [Mougey],” said Matt Russell, who was the Broncos’ director of player personnel and is now a senior personnel executive with the Philadelphia Eagles. “And I told my wife at that point, I don’t know if there is a record for GMs out of one place, but this has got to be close. A rare thing.”

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EACH CURRENT GM has a memory of the moment when Elway welcomed them into the fold. And when asked about the biggest lesson they learned from the Hall of Fame quarterback and Broncos legend, they each used the same word, unprompted.

Bold.

“Just be bold, make decisions with courage,” Peters said. “Think we all learned the value of courage in the job, looking right into the pressure and make the right decision.”

The pursuit to sign future Hall of Famer Manning in 2012 encapsulated that ethos. The then-four-time NFL MVP was coming off his fourth neck surgery and had missed the 2011 season when the Broncos dove in to get one of the most decorated players to ever enter free agency.

As Elway famously said, “There was no Plan B.”

“To see how competitive John was, how driven he was in that role, how much it all meant to him,” said Spytek, who was hired by the Broncos as a Southwest area scout in 2013. “You saw how to go for it, to not be scared ever. Just say f— it. Back when it happened I don’t think people really saw Denver as the option for Peyton Manning or thought Peyton would come here. But John was like f— it, let’s make that happen.”

All four current GMs say they remember Elway’s boldness as they form their own strategies toward free agency, the draft and day-to-day decisions with their rosters. Decisions such as Mougey moving on from quarterback Aaron Rodgers for Justin Fields, Lynch trading for running back Christian McCaffrey in 2022 and Spytek convincing Pete Carroll to come out of retirement to coach the Raiders.

Even Lynch — who attended his first combine with the Broncos’ scouting staff in 2011 while he was still a color analyst for Fox — was not immune to the aura. Lynch was a Hall of Famer in waiting at the time and had been asked by Elway to dip his toe into scouting. Lynch served as an advisor with Denver. And he saw a different side of his longtime friend — a confident decision-maker who was willing to allow those around him to have an unfiltered opinion.

“I mean, I had a playing career, had played for the organization, had been around John in a lot of different situations,” Lynch said. “But I learned John is an intimidating presence; he’s John freaking Elway. … But I would guess if you asked any of us, his ability to listen was so big. He heard us, all of us.”

Lynch, who was hired as the 49ers’ general manager in 2017, said those meetings with the Broncos influenced one of his most significant hires. Shortly after he accepted the 49ers job, Lynch brought Peters in from Denver as his vice president of player personnel.

“Even if he had thoughts that were contrary to John’s, he’d share them and he had the reasons why,” Lynch said. “And when I got the opportunity, I remembered and hired Adam.”

Peters said that the first time Elway asked a scout or another member of the personnel staff for an opinion in a crowded meeting room served almost as a rite of passage. Elway then might challenge that opinion to see whether the staffer was ready to defend it — or he would simply nod at points well made.

“And the first time he agreed with you, and it worked out, man, that felt pretty good,” Mougey said.

“Elway always did such a good job of bringing people in and still letting you know you had a place and a voice,” Peters said. “Some places you might be just a scout, or just pro personnel, or just an intern, but you never felt you were ‘just’ there; you were heard. I remember that, and try to keep that with me as I do this.”

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ONE OF THE more unique things about that Elway regime was the “breakfast club.” The environment in NFL front offices, in Spytek’s words, often involves “a bunch of people hunched over screens.” But Elway had a different idea.

If you were on Denver’s scouting staff and working in the building, there was a daily 7 a.m. standing appointment. It would involve a weight training and conditioning workout in the team’s weight room, put together by then-Broncos strength coach Luke Richesson and led by Elway. Attendees say it never felt voluntary, nor did they consider it a chore. It was as normal a part of their day as breakfast. And it wasn’t easy; even Lynch, roughly five years removed from playing, had to push to keep up. He said, “I thought I was in really good shape then, but I was like, ‘Damn.'”

“One of the reasons John built it the way he did was the player in him,” Mougey said. “We were his team, his group, his guys — we agree, we disagree, we shoot the s—, we talk. He was building teams in a team because those were his experiences as a player. It’s powerful. And you could tell he loved that part of it.”

Peters said the 49ers formed their own breakfast club when he and Lynch moved to San Francisco, and that’s when they became invested in each other outside football. As they spent time together, discussions moved beyond the next meeting or deadlines to conversations about family, social life, alma maters and places to eat on the next road trip. And it’s that sharp-tongued, give-and-take that they remember with smiles now.

“It was ball busting, 7 a.m. version,” Spytek said. “It was what John knew as a player, what he brought to us. We knew what was going on in each other’s lives. It creates natural conversations that help do the work. … And most importantly, I think it made the disagreements more functional because we all knew what we were about.”

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PETERS SAYS THERE are days when his cellphone almost ceaselessly crackles with activity. Injury updates, agents reaching out, practice squad slots to fill and any number of problems that come with the job.

Yet among the frenzy will be a photo, meme, joke, thought of the day or just a check-in from someone in the still-ongoing group chat.

“A picture will get shared of somebody’s trip or something funny they saw. Something will come up, or somebody will say something or do something in public, and everybody will bust on it,” Mougey said. “We’re all-in there still, everybody from that group in that time, not just [the current GMs] — a lot of important people to me.”

“Sometimes, even some actual football gets done,” Spytek said. “We’re still tight.”

But it’s not all fun and jokes. The bond goes deeper. The Raiders’ current GM can recall story after story of the moments that made him laugh, but the most important will always be an emotional trip to the Senior Bowl in January 2015. It occurred weeks after Spytek’s 21-month-old daughter Evelyn Grace had died on Dec. 24, 2014, from complications from surgery. She was born with cytomegalovirus infection, or congenital CMV, a type of virus that can impact a newborn’s brain, liver, spleen and lungs and effect their growth.

“My wife [Kristen] and I were devastated, our family was devastated, and the guys you’re talking about, they were the people that showed up for me and my family,” Spytek said.

“But Adam Peters — we were supposed to go to the Senior Bowl, and I hadn’t really gone to work since we lost her. He asked me if I wanted to go, so talked it over with my wife and I ended up flying out with him into Pensacola [Florida]. And all that’s left is this two-door, tiny speck of a car, and we were smashed together driving down the highway. And he didn’t need to say much or do much in an impossible time of my life. … You could work a lot of places and never be with people who show up for you the way those guys did and have.”

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THE BRONCOS’ PERSONNEL department eventually eroded, a victim of its own success. After Denver’s Super Bowl win to close out the 2015 season, Spytek was hired by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers as their director of player personnel. Lynch and Peters left for San Francisco after the 2016 season.

Denver missed the playoffs for eight seasons after the Super Bowl win, and by 2021, Elway had stepped away from running the team’s football operations. Mougey remained after current Broncos general manager George Paton was hired in 2021, eventually becoming assistant general manager before he was hired by the Jets earlier this year.

While everyone has dispersed across the NFL, they still gather each year at the combine. They carve out an evening at The Whistle Stop Inn in Indianapolis to celebrate Tom Heckert’s life. Heckert, a former general manager for the Eagles and Cleveland Browns before he came to the Broncos in 2013 as director of pro personnel, died in 2018 of amyloidosis, a rare blood disorder.

“Everybody who knew Heck tells the same stories and laughs the same laughs,” Peters said. “And you wouldn’t miss it. … It kind of brings us together and we kind of remember all of the people we were with there.”

Even as they all look back on their time with the Broncos, there is still the competition of the job. They’d like nothing better than to hoist a Lombardi Trophy before the others do. And then, as Spytek said, “Everybody else can win one after that.”

Perhaps they’d needle one another in the chat while embracing memories of a cramped second floor, a Hall of Fame legend for a boss and more hope than experience.

“I know there are people who say they can sit in a room and tell which of the scouting interns will be a GM someday,” Russell said. “I don’t think that’s possible, but what I will say is possible — because I saw it with my own eyes in that room — there are guys that are young, have the energy and the confidence that separate themselves. And they have separated themselves.

“I’m not surprised. Not one bit.”

We’re one week into the 2025 MLB playoffs, with two games having now been played in all four division series matchups.

In the small-sample-size world of October baseball, it might seem like that means we’ve seen enough to know a lot. But the reality for a sport that combines 162-game seasons with the chaos of short playoff series is: Things can change in a hurry this time of year.

As we do early in every MLB regular season, we asked our MLB experts to go all-in on one thing they’ve noticed by giving us their boldest prediction for the rest of the postseason based on what they’ve seen so far.

Some of our predictions are quite bold, whereas others took a milder approach. But all of them have a chance of becoming smokin’ hot by the time the World Series trophy is raised this month — or ending up freezing cold.

The themes that we’ll all be talking about

All four division series will go five games

The division series was introduced 30 years ago, and only once, in 2012, did all four of them go the distance. It’ll happen again this year — even though three of the four have already begun with a 2-0 lead.

The gap among the eight remaining playoff contenders feels smaller this year than it has in quite a while, especially with arguably the two best, the Philadelphia Phillies and Los Angeles Dodgers, squaring off so early. The New York Yankees and Chicago Cubs are perfectly capable of winning back-to-games at home. The series between the Detroit Tigers and Seattle Mariners, which began with a split in Seattle, seems primed to extend into a fifth game. And though the Phillies have their backs against the wall, coming off two straight losses in Philadelphia, they have the ability to take two in a row at Dodger Stadium — heck, they did it less than a month ago. — Alden Gonzalez

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One pitch will decide October

The team that wins the World Series will be the team that has the best differential in performance between throwing splitters and hitting them. Do I know if this will happen? Definitely not! But the proliferation of splitters so far in the postseason has been staggering.

TruMedia has pitch-type data going back to 2008. The percentage of pitches classified as splitters has ranged from 0.2% (2016) to 3.1% (2023). So far this year: 5.7%. The leading practitioners: the Toronto Blue Jays, by far, at 25.9%, mostly thanks to Kevin Gausman and the amazing Trey Yesavage. Incidentally, they were also by far the best-hitting team against splitters in the regular season (.346 WOBA). Guess this means the Jays are going to win it all. — Bradford Doolittle

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The success of the splitter this October will make it the most-talked-about pitch in the spring

The eye-opening postseason performances of Trey Yesavage, Kevin Gausman and Roki Sasaki will serve as jet fuel for the rising popularity of the split-fingered fastball. There was already growing interest in the splitter throughout the 2025 season, thanks to the success of the likes of Hurston Waldrep. Then, along came Yesavage and Gausman and their diving splitters, neutralizing the powerful Yankees: In the first two games of the ALDS, New York was 0-for-22 with 13 strikeouts in at-bats ending with a splitter. The Yankees swung at splitters 39 times and missed 24 times. In a copycat industry, you can bet a ton of pitchers will be tinkering with splitters before next spring, just as hundreds of pitchers adopted cutters because of Mariano Rivera. — Buster Olney

The stars who will shine all postseason

Cal Raleigh will outhomer every other 60-home-run hitter in the postseason — combined

The Mariners’ star slugger just became the fifth player to reach the postseason on the heels of a 60-homer season. The others?

1927 Babe Ruth: 2 HR in 4 games
1961 Roger Maris: 1 HR in 5 games
1998 Sammy Sosa: 0 HR in 3 games
2022 Aaron Judge: 2 HR in 9 games

Raleigh didn’t leave the yard in the first two games of the ALDS against Detroit, but he did collect four hits while Julio Rodriguez, batting behind him, supplied the power. Given Seattle’s balance, depth and October path, it’s easy to envision a long run — and with it, at least half a dozen blasts from the Big Dumper. — Paul Hembekides

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Jackson Chourio will become the 10th player to win both LCS and World Series MVPs

Why doubt the Milwaukee Brewers now? They’ve enjoyed a magical run to this point and have looked great at the onset of the division series. Chourio has been quite the table-setter — he had three hits in two innings in Game 1 — and he’s one of the game’s budding superstars. This October is his breakout party. — Tristan Cockcroft

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Roki Sasaki, Jhoan Duran and Andres Munoz will post nothing but zeros

This trio — two relief aces and a starter-turned-closer for the playoffs — won’t give up an earned run in either the LDS or LCS. Munoz and Duran were two of the top relievers in the sport this year, and Sasaki started looking like one in the past couple of weeks, which my colleague Jeff Passan broke down in his dive into how the Dodgers fixed their flamethrower. — Kiley McDaniel

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Roki Sasaki Clayton Kershaw will record the final out of the 2025 World Series

As Dodgers manager Dave Roberts goes game to game in the postseason trying to figure out exactly which relievers he can trust in a big moment, how about this for the ultimate scenario: Kershaw, in his final pitch in the majors, gets that final out. Maybe it’s a save. Maybe it’s a blowout. Maybe the game goes extra innings. Maybe it’s an act of desperation after Roberts uses Roki Sasaki — who’s looking more and more like Roberts’ closer — earlier in the game. And that final pitch? A big, looping 72 mph curveball. — David Schoenfield

The teams that we’ll be watching all October

The Blue Jays will average 10 runs per game in the playoffs

Well, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and pals are certainly off to a great start, but why stop after two blowout wins over the Yankees? The Blue Jays hammered Luis Gil, Max Fried, Will Warren and Luke Weaver. Will Carlos Rodon, Cam Schlittler (maybe, if the series goes to Game 4) and whichever pitchers other remaining teams throw at the Blue Jays do better? Probably, but Vlad Jr., Daulton Varsho, Alejandro Kirk, George Springer, Ernie Clement and eventually Bo Bichette are ready to make history! — Eric Karabell

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Toronto won’t lose a game until the World Series

The Blue Jays have enough pitching to win every game on the way to the World Series. So much so that Max Scherzer and Chris Bassitt weren’t even needed in the ALDS and were left off the roster. They might be in the ALCS, but even then, Toronto will have choices to make for its rotation. The emergence of rookie Trey Yesavage has changed the calculus for the Jays on the mound, giving them more options than most teams at this time of year.

Add in the potential return of Bichette, Toronto’s great home record (tops in the AL) and a potential long series between the Tigers and Mariners on the other side of the AL bracket, and the Blue Jays are set up for a potential undefeated run to the Fall Classic. Their smoking hot offense might get them there on its own. — Jesse Rogers

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The Yankees will send the ALDS back to Toronto

As underwater as they look, the Yankees have a pathway back into this series despite a 2-0 deficit. Shane Bieber, the Blue Jays’ Game 3 starter, is going to fill up the strike zone — and has been homer-prone in recent starts. And with the short porch in right field calling, the Yankees’ left-handed bats will answer. Getting to Game 4 brings Cam Schlittler, who, in his first postseason start, threw eight shutout innings and punched out 12 without walking a batter. Although the Blue Jays are ball-in-play merchants, Schlittler’s stuff is overwhelming enough to quiet them and make for a Game 5 for the ages at Rogers Centre. — Jeff Passan

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The Dodgers are going to 2019 Washington Nationals their way through the postseason

Washington rode five starting pitchers and three relievers all the way from the do-or-die wild-card game through its World Series Game 7 victory over the heavily favored Houston Astros. Led by starters Stephen Strasburg, Max Scherzer, Patrick Corbin and Anibal Sanchez, eight pitchers combined to pitch 141⅔ of the Nationals’ 153 playoff innings. Joe Ross, who got a spot start in Game 5 of the World Series, was the fifth starter Washington used.

Those Nationals happened to topple the Dodgers in the NLDS.

This year’s Dodgers, like those Nationals, boast a deep rotation and a shaky bullpen. Shohei Ohtani, Blake Snell, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Tyler Glasnow, Clayton Kershaw, Emmett Sheehan, Roki Sasaki and Alex Vesia should absorb the bulk of the October workload. Of those eight pitchers, only Vesia was primarily a reliever during the regular season. The Nationals proved a version of the formula can work. Six years later, it’s the best recipe for the Dodgers to win a championship. — Jorge Castillo

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The Dodgers will sweep their way to a repeat

With 10 hitters who hit double-digit home runs during the regular season, the Dodgers simply don’t have to worry about that one bat going cold. And outside of Yamamoto, none of their pitchers has thrown over 125 innings — but they have such a depth in their rotation that they’ve been able to push some of their starters to the bullpen in October.

It’s all hands on deck in any game they need it. — AJ Mass

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The 2025 World Series champion won’t come out of the Dodgers-Phillies NLDS

Ever since the bracket for this postseason was set — even before the Dodgers advanced out of the wild-card series to make the meeting official — there has been a thought percolating that Los Angeles vs. Philadelphia was this year’s true World Series (or at least NLCS) playing out in the division series round. Well, I’m here to tell you that is not a foregone conclusion.

Yes, the Phillies and the Dodgers possess the most talent of any teams in the sport — but that didn’t stop the Brewers from going a combined 10-2 against Philly and L.A. during the regular season. And how about those Blue Jays (the team two of my colleagues predicted very big things for above), or the Mariners, who definitely have the it factor on their side, or the Tigers, who have the best pitcher on the planet (excluding at-bats vs. Jorge Polanco) on theirs.

I’m going to play the percentages here and say someone other than the Phillies or Dodgers will be the last team standing. — Dan Mullen

WUHAN:

Defending champion Aryna Sabalenka battled hard Wednesday to keep her unbeaten record in Wuhan intact, having to come from behind to beat Slovakia’s Rebecca Sramkova 4-6, 6-3, 6-1.

The world number one started slowly in her first match since she clinched a fourth Grand Slam title at the US Open last month.

But the Belarusian found her power game in the final set to reach the Wuhan Open last 16, where she will face the 16th-seeded Russian Liudmila Samsonova.

Sabalenka is chasing a fourth consecutive crown in Wuhan where she has a perfect 18-0 win-loss record.

The first three games went against serve but it was Sramkova who consolidated for 3-1, and it was all she needed to grab the opening set in 35 minutes, firing 15 winners.

Sabalenka hit back to level and swept through the decider to win in just under two hours.

“She played incredible tennis, especially in the first set. There wasn’t much I could do against her,” said Sabalenka.

“I knew after that little break, it will be not that easy to get back in my rhythm.

“But I’m really glad that in the second set I found my game, I stepped in, and I think I played really great.”

Gauff cruise

Third seed Coco Gauff, a semi-finalist in Wuhan last year, booked her place in the last 16 with a smooth 6-1, 6-0 performance against Japanese qualifier Moyuka Uchijima.

Gauff was flawless throughout a 51-minute victory that was her 18th on Chinese soil since 2023, the most at WTA level by any player in China during that period.

Gauff will square off with Chinese wildcard Zhang Shuai for a place in the quarter-finals.

In contrast, world number six Jessica Pegula survived a “wild ride”, needing seven match points and almost three hours to overcome fellow American Hailey Baptiste 6-4, 4-6, 7-6 (8/6).

Pegula served for the win twice, at 5-2 and 5-4 in the third set, but Baptiste dug deep to save five match points and took four games in a row for a 6-5 advantage.

Pegula steadied the ship to force a tiebreak and she finally wrapped up the victory on her seventh match point.

“It’s been brutal,” said Pegula, who will face Russian ninth seed Ekaterina Alexandrova in the third round.

“Match points, then she started playing well, I think I just got a little tentative,” admitted Pegula.

“And that’s all it takes sometimes for someone to come back.

“I’m really proud of myself for how I held it together because I think I easily could have just collapsed. But I held tough, so yeah, that was a wild ride.”

Heat again played a factor as 12th-seeded Karolina Muchova joined the likes of Emma Raducanu, Jelena Ostapenko and Dayana Yastremska on the list of mid-match retirees in Wuhan.

With temperatures soaring above 30C, Muchova struggled with the heat and had her vitals checked on court before she retired while trailing Magdalena Frech 7-6 (7/1), 4-1.