ENGLEWOOD • What took so long?

Seriously, though. Where has this Vance Joseph been?

“No,” the embattled coach clapped back Monday at UCHealth Training Center when asked if the Broncos are, as players believe, better than their 3-5 record at the midpoint of the season.

“You are who you are. In the first (half) of the season we’re 3-5. We’ve won three games and we’ve lost five. I told our guys 5 minutes ago: we’re 3-5, but I can take 15-20 plays in those five losses that are critical plays that we didn’t make and that’s the reason we’re 3-5.

“But we are 3-5. We are not better than that right now.”

Dang, coach. Here it’s closing time and I’m ready to chat over another cold one. The sincerity. The blunt honesty. The critical evaluations that sound closer to a paddling than the customary hug. Where has this been?

Everybody’s thinking it, anyway: the Broncos host the 5-3 Texans Sunday. Then, a bye week, when changes are most often made. Dun, dun.

Guess things change when a man is backed into a corner. The company line blurs and he’s prone to retreat to what he believes in and what got him here. This V.J. we heard the day after the Chiefs toyed with the Broncos during another butt-whoopin’ — 30-23, K.C.’s seventh straight in a rivalry that’s grown lopsided — sounded like the hard-liner we were promised the day he was introduced. I called it a risky hire. Stand by it, too, because the combo of guys who already got their rings and a bunch of young fellas is a dangerous mix for a first-time head coach.

This guy sounded like the guy advertised by football lifers Gary Kubiak, Marvin Lewis, Adam Gase and John Elway. Sounded like a guy who’s going out, if he goes out, the way he was supposed to come in.OK, so it’s not exactly like Kubiak knowing it was his final game, so forget what’s supposed to happen, we’re sticking with Trevor Siemian over Paxton Lynch in a meaningless regular-season finale. But it’s kinda, sorta like that.

Going in on Case Keenum for a rare time, considering the quarterback hasn’t been nearly as safe as the Broncos expected or what training camp suggested, Joseph sounded like this:

“He’s kind of like our football team. In critical moments he’s got to play better. That’s the quarterback’s job. Third downs, that goes through the quarterback. The reads. The movement in the pocket. Making off-schedule plays. That goes through him, and he understands that. Our team and Case are very similar. We play good enough football to win, then we’ve got these five critical plays a game where we don’t play well and we end up losing to good teams.”

Where’s this been? Because the imbalance of Joseph’s rep vs. Joseph’s reality stands as the most perplexing equation of the Broncos’ tumble to 5-11 and 3-5. What we were told about Joseph hasn’t equaled what we’ve seen. Mostly, the discipline promised vanished in the wind.

Here, take this explanation as an example. Remember that shanked punt by Colby Wadman on Sunday? The one that squirted sideways like a Titleist off the hosel? The one that hopped 22 yards and eventually turned a two-score game into a three-score game and the lights off?

Wadman and other special teamers claimed they heard a whistle, so they just stopped playing. Joseph claimed bollocks.

“Again, come on,” he said. “Whatever. Kick the ball.”

“Kick the ball” is the new “do your job.”

What took so long?

Trade deadline’s 2 p.m. Tuesday. Demaryius Thomas got it all off his chest on Sunday and predicted there’s a 50-percent chance he’s gone. It’s more like it’ll-be-a-shock-if-DT’s-still-here percent.

“Whatever John is going to do between now and 2 o’clock is to make us better,” Joseph said.

What else? Joseph hinted at benching left tackle Garett Bolles, who’s driving the struggle bus, and called out defensive back Bradley Roby, who’s riding shotgun, and Keenum, who took Siemian’s seat in the back and is checking the rear-view mirror for the next loose pass-rusher.

“I would say this: I think we’re all 3-5. (Keenum is) a 3-5 quarterback right now. I’m a 3-5 coach. We’re a 3-5 football team. Can he play better? Yes. Can I coach better? Yes,” Joseph said.

Tough to imagine how the Broncos dig out from this hole covered in penalty flags and what the hecks. The next four opponents would be in the AFC playoffs right now. Who knows, maybe an earlier return to accountability would’ve stopped them from digging so deep in the first place?

(Contact Gazette sports columnist Paul Klee at paul.klee@gazettedev.gazette.com or on Twitter at @bypaulklee.)

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ENGLEWOOD • What took so long?

Seriously, though. Where has this Vance Joseph been?

“No,” the embattled coach clapped back Monday at UCHealth Training Center when asked if the Broncos are, as players believe, better than their 3-5 record at the midpoint of the season.

“You are who you are. In the first (half) of the season we’re 3-5. We’ve won three games and we’ve lost five. I told our guys 5 minutes ago: we’re 3-5, but I can take 15-20 plays in those five losses that are critical plays that we didn’t make and that’s the reason we’re 3-5.

“But we are 3-5. We are not better than that right now.”

Dang, coach. Here it’s closing time and I’m ready to chat over another cold one. The sincerity. The blunt honesty. The critical evaluations that sound closer to a paddling than the customary hug. Where has this been?

Everybody’s thinking it, anyway: the Broncos host the 5-3 Texans Sunday. Then, a bye week, when changes are most often made. Dun, dun.

Guess things change when a man is backed into a corner. The company line blurs and he’s prone to retreat to what he believes in and what got him here. This V.J. we heard the day after the Chiefs toyed with the Broncos during another butt-whoopin’ — 30-23, K.C.’s seventh straight in a rivalry that’s grown lopsided — sounded like the hard-liner we were promised the day he was introduced. I called it a risky hire. Stand by it, too, because the combo of guys who already got their rings and a bunch of young fellas is a dangerous mix for a first-time head coach.

This guy sounded like the guy advertised by football lifers Gary Kubiak, Marvin Lewis, Adam Gase and John Elway. Sounded like a guy who’s going out, if he goes out, the way he was supposed to come in. OK, so it’s not exactly like Kubiak knowing it was his final game, so forget what’s supposed to happen, we’re sticking with Trevor Siemian over Paxton Lynch in a meaningless regular-season finale. But it’s kinda, sorta like that.

Going in on Case Keenum for a rare time, considering the quarterback hasn’t been nearly as safe as the Broncos expected or what training camp suggested, Joseph sounded like this:

“He’s kind of like our football team. In critical moments he’s got to play better. That’s the quarterback’s job. Third downs, that goes through the quarterback. The reads. The movement in the pocket. Making off-schedule plays. That goes through him, and he understands that. Our team and Case are very similar. We play good enough football to win, then we’ve got these five critical plays a game where we don’t play well and we end up losing to good teams.”

Where’s this been? Because the imbalance of Joseph’s rep vs. Joseph’s reality stands as the most perplexing equation of the Broncos’ tumble to 5-11 and 3-5. What we were told about Joseph hasn’t equaled what we’ve seen. Mostly, the discipline promised vanished in the wind.

Here, take this explanation as an example. Remember that shanked punt by Colby Wadman on Sunday? The one that squirted sideways like a Titleist off the hosel? The one that hopped 22 yards and eventually turned a two-score game into a three-score game and the lights off?

Wadman and other special teamers claimed they heard a whistle, so they just stopped playing. Joseph claimed bollocks.

“Again, come on,” he said. “Whatever. Kick the ball.”

“Kick the ball” is the new “do your job.”

What took so long?

Trade deadline’s 2 p.m. Tuesday. Demaryius Thomas got it all off his chest on Sunday and predicted there’s a 50-percent chance he’s gone. It’s more like it’ll-be-a-shock-if-DT’s-still-here percent.

“Whatever John is going to do between now and 2 o’clock is to make us better,” Joseph said.

What else? Joseph hinted at benching left tackle Garett Bolles, who’s driving the struggle bus, and called out defensive back Bradley Roby, who’s riding shotgun, and Keenum, who took Siemian’s seat in the back and is checking the rear-view mirror for the next loose pass-rusher.

“I would say this: I think we’re all 3-5. (Keenum is) a 3-5 quarterback right now. I’m a 3-5 coach. We’re a 3-5 football team. Can he play better? Yes. Can I coach better? Yes,” Joseph said.

Tough to imagine how the Broncos dig out from this hole covered in penalty flags and what the hecks. The next four opponents would be in the AFC playoffs right now. Who knows, maybe an earlier return to accountability would’ve stopped them from digging so deep in the first place?

–>