Denver Broncos bringing back Vance Joseph in 2018 was the only move

For some reason, John Elway and the Denver Broncos are bringing back Vance Joseph for one more rodeo as head coach.

It was a whirlwind New Year’s Eve for Vance Joseph. On Sunday, conflicting reports had Joseph either remaining the Denver Broncos head coach or getting fired at the end of Week 17. As it turns out, the New Year has brought new faith from John Elway, who is apparently keeping Joseph for at least another year.

That might not make fans happy, but it means Denver won’t be scrambling to rebuild just yet and might end up coming out of this mess mostly unscathed.

After twisting in the wind for basically the last 24-hours, Joseph was told he would be coming back for at least the start of one more season as head coach in Denver.

This isn’t that surprising and is probably the best move the Broncos could have made — and that’s a very soft best. It’s not the move fans wanted after the team went into the tank this year but given the shallow head coaching pool, firing Joseph might have done more harm than good.

If Elway had fired Joseph it would have meant he felt there was a coach on the market worthy of giving the keys to the franchise’s future. Firing Joseph might have been a cathartic thing to do, but doing so may have put the Broncos in a position to hire another one-and-done coach.

By keeping him and promoting Gary Kubiak to a more influential front office role, the Broncos are doing something they haven’t done in years: look to the future. There was no foundation in place when Peyton Manning was in town, and Denver is playing the price for that now. Maybe Joseph isn’t the solution at head coach but he’ll have another year to try an figure things out and turn the team around. One more year of whatever he provides won’t be the difference between the team bouncing back or falling deeper into a hole. The Broncos had to choose from any combination of Paxton Lynch, Brock Osweiler, and Trevor Seimien this year at quarterback — it doesn’t get any lower than that.

Also, if Hue Jackson can go 1-31 over the course of two seasons and still keep his job, Vance Joseph deserves another shot.

Bailing on a first-year head coach is never a smart move. Bringing back Joseph at the very least shows that the Broncos aren’t going to let one bad season force some panic that further sets the franchise back.