Bo Nix has drawn comparison to Drew Brees early in his NFL career, so it came as little surprise that the Denver Broncos’ second-year quarterback spent some time this offseason with the Hall of Famer.
Brees won a Super Bowl while playing for Sean Payton for 15 seasons in New Orleans, and Payton saw a lot of similarities between the two when drafting Nix with the 12th overall pick in last year’s draft.
Nix led Denver to the playoffs as a rookie, throwing for 3,775 yards, 29 touchdowns and 12 interceptions while completing 66.3 percent of his passes. Like Brees, Nix doesn’t have elite arm strength but has been praised for his vision, footwork, grasp of the offense and leadership abilities.
During his first full NFL offseason, Nix spent time with Brees and noted throwing instructor Tom House while also hosting a few days of workouts with a group of skill position players.
“He’s someone who works his tail off, wants to improve and the whole offseason is planned out,” Payton said Wednesday. “He’s gone and visited Brees for four or five days and adds Tom House in here. There’s a lot that he wants to absorb in a fast period of time. That’s a great thing for a young player like that.
“Him just reaching out (to Brees) and just coordinating some time to dive into the offense, the schedule, the calendar, his schedule and his work week in season. All of that is just stuff he’s doing on his own.”
Payton said Nix visited with Brees in San Diego to learn more about the offensive scheme and talk about playing quarterback in the NFL. As for House, the well-known baseball instructor, Payton said the focus has been on mechanics and arm care work that may go unnoticed.
“There’s a lot of management of your arm and delivery. None of us will see exactly … there’s just certain warmup techniques if you will,” he said. “You’re not going to see a different release. The arm care for a pitcher might be different than the arm care of a quarterback. Then how you might warm up, there may be some parallels, but I don’t know that we’ll see it with our eyes.”