ENGLEWOOD • After a few days off, the Denver Broncos came back from their bye week feeling a little better.

The sting of the 41-7 loss to New England and a recent 1-3 slump hadn’t gone away, but the Broncos were at least ready to move on.

“We’re frustrated with the Monday night loss, but at the same time we’re not down,” running back Michael Pittman said. “It’s not a bad vibe in the locker room, but we know we have to do better as a team.”

The Broncos have become an unpredictable team, even to themselves. Turnovers and poor play, especially on defense, have erased most of the good feelings from a 3-0 start, but they know there’s an opportunity to be a playoff team.

“We’re at the crossroads, a fork in the road pretty much, that’s where we are,” defensive end Ebenezer Ekuban said. “It’s a crossroads for what type of team we’re going to be this year.”

The mood in the locker room after Monday’s short practice was more upbeat than last week when the slump and injuries – including season-ending injuries to linebacker Boss Bailey and quarterback Patrick Ramsey and a four-to-six week injury to cornerback Champ Bailey – seemed to be wearing on the team.

The time away from football might serve the Broncos well.

“It’s always good to get away and refresh yourself for that late run, and I think everyone here is refreshed and ready to go,” receiver Brandon Stokley said.

The Broncos had a good day Sunday without taking the field. San Diego, the second-place team in the AFC West, lost. So did the other two teams in the division, Oakland and Kansas City. The Broncos are 4-3 with a game-and-a-half lead on the Chargers in the AFC West.

Gaining a half-game on every team in the division should have been another mental boost, but the Broncos looked at it objectively. It helps to have a lead, but it won’t matter much if they don’t play better.

“Anybody that feels like that would be stupid, anybody in this locker room that thinks we’re in the driver’s seat at 4-3,” Ekuban said. “I can tell you no one in this locker room feels at all a sense of ease because we’re leading the division by a game, game-and-a-half.”

The Broncos did heal up a bit over the bye. Stokley, who missed Denver’s last game with a concussion, was back at practice. Tight end Tony Scheffler and running back Selvin Young, who have each missed two games with groin injuries, could return to practice by Wednesday.

Denver knows it hasn’t played well lately. The defense ranks 30th out of 32 in yards allowed and the offense hasn’t scored more than 20 points in a game since September.

That’s why the Broncos have plenty of urgency going into the final two months of the season.

“No one’s comfortable, man,” Ekuban said. “We have no right to, losing three out of four.”

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Contact the writer: 476-4891 or frank.schwab@gazettedev.gazette.com. Check out our Broncos blog at gazettebroncos.freedomblogging.com

Denver Broncos offensive tackle Ryan Clady, who was the team’s first-round draft pick in the 2008 NFL draft, runs to take his position on the field for the opening day of football training camp at the team’s headquarters in southeast Denver on Friday, Ju Photo by (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)