Broncos’ inside-out build has worked so far, but playoff hopes ride on leaning in further: “It always comes down to blocking”

Bo Nix turned, looked to his right and threw his hands in the air as a gaping hole came into his periphery.

As Audric Estime plunged into the end zone to cap a bruising opening drive last week in Los Angeles, he did so over a right side that had been completely caved in.

Right guard Quinn Meinerz watched Chargers defensive tackle Poona Ford shift from his outside shoulder to inside and knew he had the big man right where he wanted him.

Same for Mike McGlinchey, who saw Joey Bosa move to his inside and collapsed him down right into the path of linebacker Junior Colson.

That left little work for pulling left guard Ben Powers, who cleaned up Colson as Estime easily hit pay dirt.

That’s $211.5 million in total contract value and $48.5 million in average pay per year paving the way at the point of attack for Denver.

This is what the Broncos are built to do. It’s what head coach Sean Payton set out to forge from the day he took the job two years ago.

And now comes a critical juncture at which Denver will put its eight-year playoff drought on the line and its inside-out building project to the test against a Cincinnati team that’s got real problems on both lines but terrific perimeter talent.

“That’s what this group has prepared for,” Meinerz told The Denver Post. “It’s what we’ve built on from Day 1 when this staff came in is being ready for the big moments. We talk about the moment of truth all the time and that’s these type of games. That’s these type of two-minute drills. That’s these type of end-of-game, end-of-half scenarios that we’ve been training for for two years now at this point.”

From the moment the Broncos drafted Nix No. 12 overall back in April, Payton’s regularly pointed to two ingredients that make life easier on a rookie quarterback: quality defense and a strong run game.

The Broncos have had the former and sometimes the latter, but what’s clear is that both are powered by work at the line of scrimmage.

And in that department, Denver’s been really good this season.

In fact, the trenches more than perhaps any other factor have powered the Broncos’ surprise run to the doorstep of the postseason.

They’ll likely determine, too, whether Denver kicks down the door and clinches its playoff spot or falters in the final two weeks of the season and leaves its fate in the hands of others.

“It’s interesting when you look at how teams are built,” tight end Adam Trautman told The Post, using an example a couple of days before Chicago lost its 10th straight game Thursday night against Seattle. “If you look at the Bears, right, they’re built outside-in. Football is such a dependent sport. The quarterback depends on the O-line. The quarterback depends on the receivers getting open. Receivers depend on the O-line for targets. Tight ends depend on the O-line.

“Everything meshes together, but it all, always, will begin with the guys up front.”

For the most part, the statistical profile of Denver’s offense this year is that of a decent unit.

They’re 10th in the NFL in scoring — and have scored 28-plus points seven times — but have also benefitted from a whopping 39 defensive points.

They’re good in the red zone (No. 8 in red zone TD percentage) and middling on third down (No. 18). They’re tied for No. 22 in net passing yards per attempt (5.8) and tied for No. 17 in rushing yards per attempt.

In terms of overall analytics like estimated points added, the Broncos check in at No. 18 offensively.

Where the offense really shines, though, is in offensive line metrics.

ESPN’s win rates rank the Broncos No. 1 in pass block win rate and No. 3 in run blocking. Pro Football Focus is less charitable with the run game, ranking the Broncos No. 16 in run blocking, but also considers Denver the best pass-blocking unit in the NFL.

It’s a group that’s paid upper-echelon dollars — McGlinchey and Powers were among the first two free-agent signings of Payton’s tenure in Denver, while Meinerz and left tackle Garett Bolles have signed four-year extensions in the past six months — and feels like it’s performing to that standard.

“One hundred percent,” Meinerz said. “I think the amount of time and effort we’ve put into becoming a cohesive group and the amount of extra reps, extra time, side conversations and all of that (helps) so that we can fit combinations or come up with our own little language of how we want to do things. It’s within the framework of our rules and stuff like that, but (offensive line coach Zach Strief) also does a great job of giving us the freedom — giving us multiple ways of being able to do something and then kind of leaving it up to us to figure out what the best way is with our skill sets.”

McGlinchey and Powers have played on really good offensive lines for teams that have made playoff runs in San Francisco and Baltimore, respectively. Meinerz, Bolles and center Luke Wattenberg are trying to get to the postseason for the first time.

McGlinchey said the group puts that goal on its own 10 shoulders.

“Our group has preached it here under Strief that we want to be the reason this team goes somewhere,” he said. “I think we’ve done that to an extent so far this year, and now it’s time to go cash in.”

The group has been at the vanguard of preaching confidence in Nix, the rookie quarterback, but it has also instilled confidence and calm in him.

Payton is quick to point out that pressure can be controlled by the quarterback and the way he operates in the pocket. Sacks, he says often, are as much a quarterback stat as an offensive line stat.

And yet, the Broncos offensive line has consistently given Nix time to think through what he’s seeing.

Chicago rookie quarterback Caleb Williams was sacked seven times against Seattle on Thursday night and has now been sacked 67 times in 16 games for a whopping 11.2% sack rate. Washington rookie Jayden Daniels, who is putting together a terrific season and has a chance to get the Commanders into the postseason, has a sack rate of 8.1%. New England’s talented Drake Maye? 8.4%. Nix is rolling along at 4.2%. That’s just 22 sacks, even though he’s No. 8 in the NFL in drop-backs. The 26% pressure rate against Nix is third-lowest in the NFL.

Former Denver quarterback Russell Wilson, by comparison, missed the first six games of the season but in 10 starts for Pittsburgh has been sacked 29 times on just 351 drop-backs compared to Nix’s 22 on 571.

So even if the Broncos haven’t exactly taken Nix off the high dive all the time — through 16 weeks across the league he was No. 6 in passing attempts — they’ve at least put him in a comfortable situation more times than not.

“If you look around the NFL, teams with good offensive lines play good offense,” Denver offensive coordinator Joe Lombardi said. “I think we have one. I feel very confident in that. I think we’re going to run the ball well. Our protection’s been excellent. And when you combine those things, good things are going to happen.”

The Broncos now need good things to happen over the final two weeks of the season.

For a while last week against the Chargers, it looked as though they’d ride a dominant outing by the offensive line to a Week 15 clinch.

Denver rushed it 11 times for 73 yards and a touchdown on its first two drives and by halftime had 89 yards on 13 carries.

That production, though, dried up in the second half. Los Angeles adjusted, the Denver offense stalled and Payton called just eight run plays in the second half despite leading into the fourth quarter and being within a score until the final 2 minutes, 27 seconds.

McGlinchey called the critical fall-off the result of “a little bit of everything,” including adjustments that L.A. made.

“That first-down call matters a lot, and you’ve got to stay ahead of the chains,” he said. “If you can stay in manageable situations and on schedule on second down, it gives the play-caller a lot more confidence to continue to call it. Obviously (Payton) comes from a place where they were lights-out for 20 years and nobody could stop them throwing the ball, so that’s what he knows. When it comes down to it, we’ve got to give him the reason to trust us and we’ve got to be better throughout the game.”

They should still get their chances to show it over the next couple of weeks, beginning Saturday in what could be a rainy evening against the Bengals.

Asking Nix to match Joe Burrow throw-for-throw is bad business. The Broncos don’t have receivers like Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins, don’t have a tight end as accomplished as Mike Gesicki (47 catches for 511 yards), and don’t have a running back with nearly the offensive production as Chase Brown’s 1,259 scrimmage yards.

What they do have is a big, expensive offensive line now in its second year mostly playing together.

A group that believes it’s among the league’s best.

A group that reveled in the early-game slug-fest against Los Angeles this week and is desperate to be turned loose against a Bengals defense that’s been every shade of bad so far this season.

A group capable of driving an otherwise average offense to a place the franchise hasn’t been since 2015: the playoffs.

“The more you get into important football games, the more obvious situations matter,” McGlinchey said. “The more every play matters. It matters how you block people. Giving the quarterback an extra second in the pocket, giving a receiver an extra second to get open, giving the running back a little bit more daylight to get that extra three or four yards.

“You never know what it’s going to come down to, but it always comes down to blocking.”

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