Bills coach, GM expect Broncos’ Davis Webb to call plays

INDIANAPOLIS — Brandon Beane may have spilled the Broncos’ beans.

In January, Beane and Buffalo interviewed then-Denver quarterbacks coach Davis Webb for their vacant head-coaching job, before ultimately turning to an internal promotion and more years of experience with offensive coordinator Joe Brady. Webb, though — who the Broncos promoted to offensive coordinator in early February — left quite an impression on Beane, as Buffalo’s general manager recounted at the NFL Combine on Tuesday. And Beane offered a notable stance on the play-calling question that will dominate Denver’s offseason.

“As we talked about when this opportunity came and then when we went in a different direction was, ‘Hey, dude, you’ve only actually been coaching three years — you’ve been playing, so it seems like longer,’” Beane said of Webb, a 31-year-old former NFL quarterback. “‘Just keep building on this.’

“He’s going to get an opportunity, I believe, to call plays now,” Beane continued, “which I think will only help his resume.”

Just a few minutes later, Brady himself referred to Webb as a “first-time playcaller,” noting the benefit of having Payton in Denver as a resource for Webb.

“I think Davis is an absolute stud, he’s going to be great regardless,” Brady told reporters at the combine. “But to have somebody that’s been through it and has called games at a high level, to pick his brain and everything like that — that’s going to be a huge resource for him.”

It’s a potential mini-bombshell from an AFC rival, as everyone both inside and outside Denver’s building has their own opinions but few real facts on whether head coach Sean Payton would actually pass off play-calling reins to Webb. The optics strongly suggest Webb will have an elevated role, and perhaps even take over the play-sheet, after an offseason of head-coaching buzz and play-calling interest from other franchises. Ultimately, though, Payton’s the only real figure who knows whether or not he’ll pass the baton.

The Broncos’ head coach has never had a subsidiary play-caller in his 18 seasons as an NFL head coach, despite letting previous offensive coordinators like Pete Carmichael and Joe Lombardi assume control for preseason games. But Payton’s Broncos have experienced a few points of offensive instability following a 14-3 season in 2025: a 14th-ranked finish in scoring and the firing of previous OC Lombardi and wide receivers coach Keary Colbert.

Notably, too, Payton gave himself a sort of public pep talk during the Broncos’ bye week heading into the playoffs.

“When I was younger, like, we’d run a reverse on the 8-yard-line and then think nothing of it,” Payton told reporters in mid-January. “And as you get older, you think about all of the ramifications – and so, I have to also remove that. And it was said, as you get older, maybe you don’t drive in the rain at night … I can’t let that happen as a play-caller.”

A third-round pick by the New York Giants in 2017, Webb spent three years as a backup quarterback in Buffalo. Former Bills and current Patriots receiver Stefon Diggs said Webb helped teach him “a lot of the offense” in Buffalo, a sentiment Beane echoed Tuesday.

“There were many times we would acquire a player in the season and the coaches are up there game-planning, and Davis would say — it can be a running back, a receiver, tight end — and, ‘I’ll take ‘em down to the meeting room myself, and school ‘em up,’” Beane said.