DENVER— The Bo Nix era officially started on Sunday.

Yes, the ledger shows he was the Week 1 starter and became the first starting quarterback to open a season under center for the Denver Broncos since the lofty John Elway in 1983. But for any young passer who successfully finds his way in the NFL , there is always a moment when potential becomes achievement, hope becomes tangible outcome and the ambitions of the entire franchise find certainty in his hands.

And that brings us to Sunday against the Atlanta Falcons.

Bo Nix was nursing a two-game losing streak, coming off a loss that was perhaps the most excruciating regular season loss in more than a decade. He walked onto the field with the confidence of a veteran who knew the pain from last week was under control. this week would be different.

And his teammates followed suit – all the way to a 38-6, three-phase romp.

“Bo is not your average rookie, I would say,” safety P.J. Locke said. “And you can just see his confidence growing, his leadership growing and that rubs off on a lot of people, man. And he goes out there and executes and gets that offense going, and man, it’s just a… It’s a fun sight to see, and I think everyone feeds off of it, man.”

As Locke noted, when Nix plays well and puts the Broncos ahead, defensive coordinator Vance Joseph can attack. So Nix played a role in the defense’s best performance of the season, holding the mighty Falcons to a pair of field goals.

“When you go on offense … it’s a whole different game,” Locke said. ‘VJ calls the game differently. You know, he’s able to rush the passerby, you know. You know how VJ did it, man, when he’s ready to rush the passer, it drives him crazy.

Meanwhile, Nix remained unperturbed. Atlanta starter Kirk Cousins ​​went down three times. None, just once when Mike McGlinchey was shoved in his path by Atlanta’s Matthew Judon.

That issue aside, Nix had time to operate and climb into the pocket. And he never looked so beautiful.

BO NIX HAD A DAY LIKE NO OTHER ROOKIE QB, BUT IT WASN’T IN A VACUUM

The extent to which Bo Nix stood out, yes, that is an outlier. It’s not likely he’ll have another game this season where he throws four touchdown passes, rushes for 300 yards, completes 80 percent of his attempts and doesn’t throw an interception. It had never happened before for a starting quarterback.

But it wasn’t just a one-off against an enemy that was in trouble early on. This had actually been building up since week 3.

Since then, Nix had managed to learn how not to lose. He avoided mistakes at a clip better than almost any starting quarterback in NFL history over an eight-game span. Of his six interceptions so far this season, four came in Weeks 1 and 2. And the skittishness that was evident during those first two games gradually faded.

It wasn’t that there still weren’t some shaky moments — there was the pass down the left flank in New Orleans that landed nearly equidistant between Lucas Krull and Troy Franklin — but those moments became rarer as the weeks passed.

Nix’s stats improved; Heading into Sunday night, Nix ranked 12th in EPA/play and 10th in CPOE among 34 quarterbacks with at least 100 plays from Week 6. There were signs of his growth in the two-minute offense; Heading into Sunday, the Broncos had scored on drives that started in the final four minutes of the first half in five of their first 10 games.

All signs of progress were there. Only the ignorant have overlooked them. And this said nothing about the intangibles of leadership, aspects that were always clear to teammates.

“He’s probably the most mature rookie I’ve ever been around,” edge rusher Jonathon Cooper said. “And the way he took control of the offense and just was a leader for this team, everything he does is not a surprise to me.”

And as left guard Quinn Meinerz noted, Nix has been “the same person” since his arrival.

“When I first saw him in training camp, like the beginning of OTAs and stuff, I saw a cool, calm, collected, confident, starting quarterback,” Meinerz said.

“I think in the beginning we all said, wow, this guy’s got some swag and he’s got some confidence, and he’s continued to develop and attack and get better every day, just like we all are. And that’s why it’s great that he’s leading us there.”

But it didn’t happen all at once. Like a storm raging over warm water, Nix needed some time to build up strength. On Sunday, he unleashed hurricane-force destruction on a battered Atlanta defensive line that was ill-equipped to compensate for the precision with which he struck in finding a series of passing targets all over the field.

There wasn’t a single throw on Sunday that Nix couldn’t make. A 33-yard strike to Devaughn Vele up the middle late in the second quarter was the kind of pass that seemed out of his reach in the early weeks of the season.

But against Atlanta, Nix inserted a needle that jump-started what would become a 10-play, 70-yard sprint to a 12-yard touchdown reception from Marvin Mims Jr. which stifled any chance the Falcons had to build momentum before halftime. Nix went 6-for-7 for 75 yards on that drive, overcoming a 12-yard loss on a goal-to-go sack.

That became the Broncos’ sixth score in 11 games this season on a drive that started with less than four minutes left in the first half. Nix is ​​30 of 48 for 328 yards in these series.

On the fleeting occasions when the Falcons showed life, Nix responded by stepping on them. Once again, Denver was great on third down, going 6-for-10 when Nix was on the court. Nix posted a 143.5 passer rating on third downs, going 8-for-9 for 86 yards and a touchdown.

So what’s next? ROOKIE OF THE YEAR?

“Rookie of the Year? …damn good…damn good,” said PJ Locke. “If not, we need to talk to someone.”

Then security controlled itself.

“Let me scale back. We’ve got a whole bunch of games left so I don’t want to spoil anything,” Locke said, “so just take it week by week, but I hope so.

It doesn’t seem so crazy now. Jayden Daniels of Washington has been in trouble and has been stabilized. Meanwhile, Nix is ​​on the rise and spreading the ball to his targets, making the Broncos’ offense greater than the sum of its parts.

This created a sense of giddiness in a dressing room that was gloomy a week earlier. Because after a day like this, when Nix took the entire operation to the next level, anything seemed possible.

Where is the ceiling for the team with this”

“I don’t really think there is, especially with him behind center,” Williams said. “I haven’t seen a quarterback in a long time, a starting quarterback like him.

“And the way he stays calm, the way he treats people and the way he plays on the field, I mean, he’s got the complete package.”

More importantly, he is the answer to Broncos Country’s deepest hopes, jaded and exhausted by the quarterback questions that yielded no clear answers despite repeated attempts through various methods to find one.

Now the Broncos have their answer. For the first time since Peyton Manning, they have The Man.

And his name is Bo Nix.