Could the Denver Broncos benefit from trading away their veteran safety this offseason?

While the highly-anticipated NFL offseason has yet to officially kick off, there remains a ton of speculation around the league surrounding what direction each franchise will take over the summer. This year’s champion has yet to even be crowned, but it’s never too early to look ahead to next season.

Especially when diving into the current state of the Denver Broncos, a lot of work needs to be done. They finished the 2023 season with an underwhelming 8-9 record while missing out on the AFC playoff picture. A few steps need to be taken to get this roster up to speed, but it might just start with a bit of subtraction before being able to bring in new pieces.

According to Over The Cap, the Broncos currently rank bottom-five in the league salary cap for this offseason at over -$23 million. That’s before any move has been made on the future of Russell Wilson. If this team wants to have any ability to get this show back on track, this expensive roster needs to be scaled down a sizable amount.

That’s where the tough decisions come in.

The Broncos hold a deep collection of hefty contracts that need to be shed for this front office to have ample flexibility, even if that means parting ways with a productive player like Justin Simmons. He’s fresh off another great season where he earned All-Pro and Pro Bowl honors, but the choice to send him elsewhere via trade this offseason might not be as wild as it sounds.

In a piece by Brad Gagnon of Bleacher Report, a trade proposal is presented to send Justin Simmons over to the NFC to the Detroit Lions for immense cap relief while managing the Broncos’ timeline:

“When you consider how close the Detroit Lions got to the Super Bowl in 2023, a deal for a game-changing defender could be the type of move that puts the team over the top in 2024… Simmons is on the wrong side of 30, and a Denver Broncos team that simply hasn’t been competitive can save $14.5 million by moving on ahead of a walk year for the two-time Pro Bowler, per Spotrac. Here, they can send him out of the conference to a team that could get more bang for its buck with him as a contender in 2024.”

With Denver stuck in cap hell, it’s much more feasible for the Lions to afford Simmons’ $18.2 million deal. Detroit ranks seventh in the NFL for available cap space with $47 million and could find great benefit by bringing in an All-Pro safety to assist Dan Campbell’s unit on the back end. For a team a week removed from being one game out of the Super Bowl, bringing in that help would be a welcome addition.

If the Broncos managed to bring in some additional draft capital for this April from Detroit in a deal, it’s one GM George Paton would have to put some heavy thought into. The team only holds six selections in the upcoming draft, also stuck without their second-round pick. Some new young talent could breathe some life into this core, but it can’t be done without the right assets to do so.

It could be hard to imagine this Broncos team without Simmons, considering he’s been a vital part of this defense for the past eight seasons. But, on the difficult road to get Denver back to a Super Bowl-caliber team, there’s a small chance his fate is gearing up to land elsewhere.