Broncos vs. Titans: MHR on Kyle Orton

Kyle Orton puts up pretty good numbers year in and year out yet it seems like whatever team he is on is always looking for a better option. I asked John Bena why the Broncos were trying to trade him this offseason:

Teams could do a lot worse than Kyle Orton, that's for sure. Is he a Top-10 quarterback? No, not on a team that needs their quarterback to overcome their shortcomings. I think the Broncos wanted to take advantage of a perceived run on quarterbacks. Tennessee, Arizona, Minnesota, Miami, all teams that were looking for quarterbacks. There were others, too. If the Broncos could take advantage of supply and demand, getting some assets while saving $9 million, why not do it. Orton, of course, had no reason to take a pay cut in 2011, unless, of course, he was given the security of a long-term contract. That is seemingly where the deal with the Dolphins fell apart. They are paying Chad Henne about $550,000 this season and signed Matt Moore for around $2.5 million. Not a bad haul when Orton would cost you double that, at least.

In the end the market just didn't give what the Broncos had thought it might. Orton is the best quarterback on the Broncos, and in a new season it is hard to justify to players like Champ Bailey that the team is not going to do everything it can week in, week out to win. Orton has the support of the locker room and he is a team leader.

Well there you have it. I haven't been a big fan of Orton since the whole thing that went down after the game here last year, but he has been putting up some solid numbers.