Their inadequate coverage of tight ends and inability to get much production from their own are two of the biggest reasons they've fallen so far from their Super Bowl perch and have been looking up at the Kansas City Chiefs in the AFC West since 2016.Both problems appeared to be fixed this season thanks to an influx of talent on defense and a return to health of Jake Butt Womens Johnny Townsend Jersey , who missed his rookie season last year after tearing up his right knee in his final game at Michigan.Yet, Butt's season is over after he tore his left ACL at a walkthrough practice Thursday and the Broncos haven't shown much progress in throttling opposing tight ends, either.In their opener, the Broncos allowed Seattle's Will Dissly to become the first tight end in league history to top 100 yards receiving and score a touchdown in his NFL debut, one that included a 66-yard rumble featuring four missed tackles.Butt's third ACL tear was the crushing blow, coming four days before the Broncos (2-1) host the Chiefs (3-0) on Monday night ."I felt for Jake right away," Broncos coach Vance Joseph said. "He's worked so hard for the last two years to get himself back to this point. He was improving every day. He was making plays for us on Sundays. You can see the special ability this player had and the passion."This guy was the same guy every day: happy, fully engaged every day, a very smart football player. It's a shame that it ended that way on that kind of play."The Broncos promoted third-year tight end Brian Parker from their practice squad Saturday when Butt joined rookie Troy Fumagalli on IR.That means the Broncos' tight end group now consists of two undrafted players in Parker and Matt LaCosse and 2015 third-round draft pick Jeff Heuerman Youth Rodney Hudson Jersey , who has just 23 career catches and two touchdowns."He's been a good pass-catcher for us," Joseph said. "He's always been a pretty good pass-catcher. Now, without Jake, obviously his targets should go up a little bit. But he's done a great job in the past, especially in the red zone."Offensive coordinator Bill Musgrave said, "We're all just broken up about it."His loss is a big blow to the Broncos' special teams, too."It's a huge loss," special teams coordinator Tom McMahon said. "He's a great pro, he loves football. I love Jake. This football team loves Jake. How he acts as a man Youth Jared Cook Jersey , if my boys can be that guy 10 years from now, I'll be a very proud dad."Covering tight ends has been Denver's Achilles heel for two years.It was a big reason they didn't make the playoffs in 2016 and last year they allowed the third-fewest yards (3,395) in the NFL, but tight ends accounted for 1,023 of those yards — third-most in the league.After focusing on fixing that all offseason, Dissly's debut was a downer for the Broncos, who also allowed four catches for 49 yards to Oakland tight end Jared Cook the following week and Ravens rookie tight end Mark Andrews' 12-yard TD catch last week.Up next is Chiefs star tight end Travis Kelce, who had a 133-yard game against the Broncos last year."He's just a guy that is hard to put a linebacker on because of his ability," defensive coordinator Joe Woods said. "He has the size to match up with safeties. He's really like a wide receiver and tight end. He's definitely a difficult matchup Womens P.J. Hall Jersey , but I have a lot of confidence in the guys we have — Justin Simmons and our whole safety crew."I think we have a chance to go matchup at times against him and win our fair share." The loss against the Colts this Sunday felt like a Jekyll and Hyde story of efficient offense followed up by poor defensive play.The offense did give up a turnover at the end of the game; putting a dagger into the Raider’s chances of winning.It was the defense however that put the Raiders into a hole that got deeper as the game went on.Jon Gruden and defensive coordinator Paul Guenther were quoted in press conferences this week talking about getting different defenders more playing time.Many pundits and fans alike interpreted this to mean the Raiders were attempting to get some current film on players before the trade deadline this week.Gruden denied that the game would be an “audition” for defensive players in the doghouse like Gareon Conley and Karl Joseph— hopefully he was right because both players were victimized by Colts Tight-Ends for Touchdowns.The infusion of new starters surely added to the Raider’s defensive issues, and it seemed like players weren’t on the same page through four quarters of action.The Colts offense ran the ball at will and utilized tight-ends in the passing game, setting a record for number of tight-ends to catch a touchdown pass in a single game.Run defense This run play is as simple as it gets and is one of the first runs installed in any youth football offense — lead weak.The Fullback leads up the weakside A gap creating another gap that stresses the defense, forcing the linebackers to fill appropriately to negate an open running lane.Linebackers Tahir Whitehead and Marquel Lee actually do a solid job of filling the new gap presented by the fullback and it forces Colts RB Marlon Mack to bounce outside.Notice before the snap, Maurice Hurst is lined up in the B gap, his natural 3 technique position.Against the run Hurst needs to have his outside arm and leg free in the B gap in case the RB bounces in his direction but instead the rookie DT is driven back on a solo block and this is what allows Mack the room to bounce.DE Bruce Irvin also doesn’t give his best effort against this run and closes too late to be a factor.This again is another basic run play from the Colts defense— zone stretch out of 11 personnel.TE Jack Doyle does a superb job of helping seal the DE by getting a quick chip and allowing the left tackle to secure his block.But Doyle isn’t done yet, he finds more work and gets his hands on Tahir Whitehead.Whitehead jumping outside of Doyle’s block is the head scratcher here.Most defenses teach their linebackers to “spill” lead blocks meaning they should attack the blockers inside shoulder and make the ball bounce outside to the secondary.It’s possible that Guenther called a play for Whitehead to be the “force” man against outside run but that would mean either the safety or corner should end up inside Whitehead. That would usually only happen on a blitz or some kind of gap exchange against a mobile QB.Either way someone is out of position and theres a good chance it’s Whitehead.This play is a little more exotic and a staple of smash-mouth run teams— TE Wham. The left guard leaves PJ Hall unblocked allowing offensive linemen to quickly climb to linebacker level.The TE in this case, Jack Doyle once again, “whams” the unblocked DT from outside in.Whitehead is for certain the culprit of this poor defensive play.He inexplicably jumps inside the offensive lineman and leaves a ton of room for the back to work. There is a theme in 2018 of Raiders linebackers Womens Leon Hall Jersey , namely Whitehead, dancing around blocks and giving runners wide open holes to run through. Covering tight endsJack Doyle being the Colt’s primary run blocking tight end likely helped him get loose on this play.Andrew Luck shows play-action and you can see the linebackers flow to the left.Doyle sells a convincing down block, actually trips and get back up in the opposite direction from the flow on the linebackers. Marquel Lee and Kyle Wilbur are at fault on this play.Lee over-pursues and is too far away from Doyle by the time he realizes its a pass play.It’s possible however that Lee is free to be aggressive because Kyle Wilbur should be playing the crossing route from the backside.You can see Wilbur get tangled up with the backside TE, fall to the ground and get completely turned around.Wilbur is a journey man special teams player, not sure what the Raiders coaching staff thought they would get out of him in this game.But the Raiders linebackers weren’t all at fault.The 3 passing touchdowns to tight-ends came against defensive backs.On this play the Raiders are in Cover 1 which means man coverage across the board and a single safety deep.Karl Joseph draws man coverage against TE Eric Ebron.We all know how that usually ends, and Joseph’s struggles to match-up with tight ends likely is the reason for Paul Guenther being so reluctant to play the former first round draft pick.Joseph actually isn’t in a bad spot on this play.He impacts the corner route with his outside leverage position, forcing Ebron to run around him.But a perfectly thrown ball from Andrew Luck and a spectacular catch later — Joseph yet again gives up a TD catch against a tight end.Back to the linebackers blowing it.The Raiders are again in Cover 1 on this play. Usually when Cover 1 is played with a 4 man rush, there is a free player in the middle of the field called the hole player.This time it’s Nicholas Morrow not Whitehead who is out of position.Whitehead sees the crossing route from the backside and passes off the tight-end to the hole player.This is a type of combination coverage that is designed to help linebackers stay in leverage against crossing routes.The problem is Morrow is an inexperienced player with limited game action and doesn’t understand he should replace Whitehead as the hole player and simply chases the crossing route across the formation. This results in a wide open Jack Doyle adding to his highlight reel day against the Raiders.ConclusionThe linebackers quite simply sucked against the Colts.They were out of position against the run and the pass for the entire game.Andrew Luck made some phenomenal throws against Raider’s DBs who were in solid position but the strong arm QBjust made the play.The biggest assist to Luck’s day was the lack of pass rush generated by the Raiders defense.Luck was only hit once and had too much time to throw.Maurice Hurst and PJ Hall were drafted to provide an inside pass rush and save for only a couple occasions this has failed to come to fruition.But against the run both players have done well below average.They still have time to develop but so far offensive lines have their number in the run game.Erik Harris is the sole safety saving his place on the team.He was the only player on defense period who showed up against the run and the pass on Sunday.