NFL coaching trees are more like vines, wrapping their roots around players, schemes, franchises and towns. Where three years can seem like three generations.
Two additions to the Bengals coaching staff can help shed some light on the Broncos before they meet in Saturday's Wild Wild Card Game (4:30 p.m.-Cincinnati's FOX 19 and NFL Network) at Paycor Stadium.
Offensive assistant Jordan Salkin came from the University of Oregon, where he spent last season working closely with surging Broncos rookie quarterback Bo Nix as an offensive analyst for the Ducks.
Pass game coordinator Justin Rascati cut his NFL teeth in Denver as an offensive line assistant, where he developed a bond with Broncos left tackle Garrett Bolles, the Next NFL Gen Stats leader in quarterback pressure percentage allowed.
That seems like decades ago, back in 2019 when Vic Fangio was the Broncos head coach. Suddenly, Bolles is their longest-tenured player, and he'll continue to be after signing an extension two weeks ago.
"I'm happy for him because he and his family really love it out there," says Rascati, who keeps in touch once or twice an offseason. "He's been a very solid guy for them."
Salkin has occasionally been in touch with Nix this season as they chat about life in the bigs. But not in a few weeks. Probably because they both had this weekend circled all season?
"Maybe," Salkin says. "Being in the same conference, I'm not looking to give him any tips."
Salkin, 32, has the ear of Bengals head coach Zac Taylor with his smart, succinct manner in breaking down tape and tendencies during brief appearances in front of coaches and players that got him a cameo on Hard Knocks.
He gives one here on Nix:
"He is very, very serious about what he does. He's in the building all the time. Perfectionist. No stone left unturned kind of guy. Very dialed into run-game checks. Protection. Perfect play mentality. And he's a son of a coach, so he grew up learning that stuff from a young age. It's kind of second nature to him. A guy who just understands the game very well. "
Salkin watched as the 6-2, 217-pound Nix led the nation in touchdown passes and yards, so he wasn't exactly surprised when Denver put down the 12th pick on him.
It sounds like they took a guy who approaches things like Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow while he tries to do what Andy Dalton did as a Bengal when he became the first rookie quarterback to throw 20 touchdown passes, win nine games and make the playoffs.
At 9-6 with 22 touchdown passes, Nix can do the third. But he'll have to outduel the NFL's hottest quarterback in Burrow's league-leading 39 touchdown passes.
Coach's son. Perfectionist. A ravenous consumer of information before spitting it out faster than received.
Sound familiar?
"Super intelligent, super competitive, fiery, very fast processor," Salkin says. "That's why he took 10 sacks in two years. He gets the ball out and understands where to go with it, knows the problems and how to fix them."
That has certainly helped Bolles and right tackle Mike McGlinchey rank first and fifth, respectively, in that pressure percentage allowed stat. It sets up a marquee matchup between Bolles and Bengals NFL sack leader Trey Hendrickson in a battle of 2017 draft picks.
"(Bolles) is talented. A first-round pick. Athletic," Rascati says. "Physical. A two-way player who can protect as well as do it in the run game."
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If there's one thing that has stood out to Salkin about Nix's rookie year, it's how effectively he's worked behind that line.
"I think people are starting to see that he's probably a little bit more athletic than people getting credit for that. He throws it really well on the move," Salkin says.
The numbers say what Salkin has seen. Recent NFL Next Gen Stats have Nix as the only quarterback to record an average speed of more than five miles per hour on dropbacks. Nix has also scrambled on 17.8% of dropbacks, seventh most in the league, and has traveled an average distance of nine yards per dropback for fourth highest.
"I think he's doing a really good job of moving around with the rush and he's processing quickly, which I had no doubt that he would be good," Salkin says. "It's interesting to see that they're doing some of the stuff that we did last year. They've incorporated it into their offense, some of the movement passes that he's good at. I wonder if he asked for some of those. He's really good there because he's a good athlete."
The Bengals also adopted some of the LSU stuff Burrow used to win the Heisman Trophy. And like the Bengals, the Broncos drafted one of Nix's main men in Oregon wide receiver Troy Franklin. The Bengals had to wait a year for Ja’Marr Chase, but Denver got Franklin in the fourth round this year.
But there's more than Franklin. When Nix threw a tracer from his own end zone a few weeks ago in the Mile High Monday nighter, it was Marvin Mims catching it down the middle.
"He's throwing the ball down the field well," Salkin says. "That throw that he made against Cleveland, the 93-yard touchdown, was pretty impressive."
Rascati is an object lesson in how quickly things change in NFL coaching. When he went to Minnesota after Vic Fangio got fired, Rascati would occasionally facetime Bolles with guys he knew on the Vikings.
Now there's a new owner in Denver.
And current Broncos defensive coordinator Vance Joseph, a college teammate of Bengals director of player personnel Duke Tobin who left the Bengals secondary 10 years ago for his first coordinator job, became head coach a year later for these Broncos. He got fired in favor of Fangio before re-surfacing a year ago in Denver as head coach Sean Payton's top lieutenant.
"That's the way it is. Things keep moving," says Rascati, musing about the league's annual scouting combine. "You go to Indianapolis every year and you can see all the connections. We're connected by so many things."
Payton, who succeeded Fangio, had been on the Bengals' radar long before he so famously shattered a Paycor Stadium fire alarm during a hectic pregame while leading the 2018 Saints.
After serving as offensive coordinator at Miami of Ohio for two seasons in the mid-1990s, there were no surprises set off at Paycor when Payton left Oxford, and there has always been mutual respect with Bengals president Mike Brown.
The two former college quarterbacks covet quarterbacks, and now they're looking at the same playoff spot with one of the best and one on the way.
After spending the week working with Burrow, Salkin figures he'll catch a word or two with Nix.
"Big fan of his," Salkin says. "But not on game day."
