Zach Allen Is the Only Wall Standing. Behind Him, There Is Nothing.

The depth chart at defensive end shows three names. That number is doing a lot of dishonest work. Zach Allen produced every meaningful snap at the position last season — every single one, according to the playing-time data. The names behind him on that chart, Tyce Westland and Sai'vion Jones, registered zero observed production. And now Matt Henningsen, the player Denver was quietly counting on to change that equation in 2026, has torn his Achilles for the second consecutive August. Same position. Same training camp window. A year to the day.

I wrote after the Henningsen news broke that the depth at defensive end was already a fiction before this injury. What the second Achilles tear does is remove the fiction entirely. There is no longer any plausible argument that Denver has a functional rotation at the position. Allen is the starter, Allen is the depth, and Allen is on an expiring contract. That last part is the detail that should be keeping the front office awake: the one player carrying the entire position has no guarantee of being here next season, and the team enters 2026 with nothing behind him that has proven it can play.

This matters beyond the injury report because of what the 2025 season actually told us about this roster. Denver went 14-3, which looked dominant until you ran the point differential. Their pythagorean expectation based on scoring margin was a win percentage of roughly .646 — meaning the record outran the underlying performance by more than three wins. They were a team that won close games at an unsustainable rate. When the margin for error tightened in January, New England beat them 10-7 in the Wild Card round. That is what this roster looks like when the luck normalizes. Now remove functional depth at defensive end and ask what happens when Allen misses three games, or four, or the whole second half.

The linebacker situation compounds the problem rather than containing it. Only two linebackers logged meaningful snaps last season, and Jonathon Cooper — listed atop the DL depth chart — faces an arraignment hearing at the end of August on multiple charges. If that proceeding triggers a suspension or a release, Denver loses another body at a position group that is already operating without a margin. The roster analysis flags the linebacker rotation as thin by count even before any legal fallout. Two positions adjacent to each other on the defensive front, both structurally fragile, both facing independent crises simultaneously.

My read is that Denver cannot enter September treating this as a depth problem. It is a structural problem that the Henningsen injury has made impossible to paper over. The Broncos need a defensive end who can actually play, not a name on a depth chart. The case for urgency here is not about replacing a backup — it is about ensuring that the one player holding the position together does not become the only thing standing between this defense and a collapse the underlying numbers already suggested was coming.