Pre-draft press conferences usually don’t result in much useful draft information, given the competitive and secretive nature of the process. On Monday, Broncos executive V.P. of football operations and General Manager John Elway was extra secretive about the team’s assessment of one of the most controversial prospects in the draft class.
After declining to say whether running back Joe Mixon is or isn’t on the team’s draft board, Elway provided this vague assessment of the team’s evaluation of the former Oklahoma running back’s character: “We’re still evaluating that. Obviously, that’s an issue and it’s something that we’re continuing to look at while getting as much background as we can on Joe to see where he may fall for us.”
Elway also provided a general, and generally positive, assessment of the team’s meeting with Mixon.
“We had a good meeting with him,” Elway said. “There’s no question. I didn’t get a chance to spend a lot of time with him, but I had a meeting with him. We went through the whole process and what happened. I’m sure he had been through it several times. But for us to be able to hear it from him, and what happened -- we went through all that.”
Whether any of that makes the Broncos more or less likely to pick Mixon remains to be unseen. Unlike other teams, however, the current ownership situation in Denver gives Elway more leeway than other football executives may have. The Broncos currently don’t have a single owner in the classic sense, with a small committee running the franchise until one of the children of Pat Bowlen emerges as ready and able to take over.