Sean Payton: Marvin Mims was not supposed to be in for late-game return that led to concussion

Parker Gabriel, The Denver Post on Oct 27, 2025

Published in Football

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DENVER — Marvin Mims Jr. was not supposed to be in the game on a late-game kick return in Sunday’s blowout of the Cowboys.

A communication failure led to Mims not only being in the game, but returning the ball 26 yards and sustaining a concussion at the end of the play, head coach Sean Payton said Monday.

Mims, a two-time All-Pro return man and a receiver who has seen his playing time and importance in Denver’s offense increase in recent weeks, is now in the league’s concussion protocol and will have to progress through several phases before he can return to the field.

Injuries are inevitable, but to have a starting player and one of the best return men in the game injured on a play while leading by 20 with 4 minutes, 44 seconds remaining will sting.

Payton said the communication broke down somewhere while attempting to send running back Tyler Badie into the game for Mims.

“We made a substitution,” Payton said Monday. “I know (special teams coordinator Darren Rizzi) was trying to send in Tyler for Marvin. Somehow the communication failed and somehow Tyler went in for RJ (Harvey).

“Fair question. In that stage of the game, you’re trying to be smart.”

Badie has been the third man up in the kick return game all season for the Broncos, and he replaced Harvey a week ago against the New York Giants when Harvey fielded a kickoff and stepped out of bounds at the 5-yard line.

This time, he was supposed to replace Mims. Instead, the Broncos will have to wait and see how quickly Mims can return from a concussion.

Greenlaw returns

Dre Greenlaw had his one-game suspension lifted Monday, according to the NFL’s transaction wire. The Broncos, though, were granted a one-day roster exemption for the inside linebacker. That means he won’t actually count against the 53-man roster until Tuesday.

The Broncos can wait until then to make a corresponding roster move. Currently their 53-man roster and practice squads are each full.

No throwbacks for Payton

The Broncos head coach also provided an answer to one of the most pressing questions from Sunday’s win.

Why didn’t he wear the retro 1977 gear like the rest of the coaching staff on the first of Denver’s three games sporting the Orange Crush-inspired uniforms?

Here’s Payton’s full answer:

“I’m like everyone, I love the — I grew up on the throwback uniforms,” Payton said. “I love the throwback uniforms. So when I got to work — I usually get to the stadium super early. And I said, ‘Flip (Broncos equipment manager Chris Valenti), the navy blue pants don’t match the throwback. We need either an orange or that Bronco blue, that old blue as a pant.’ And so I struggled with the navy and then the throwback on the top, so I just kind of went traditional. But make no mistake about it, I’m probably the biggest fan of the throwback colors.

“Listen, I wanted desperately to wear it. I just hated to match with the navy bottoms. So we need to work on getting a navy blue slack or I’d even sport an orange slack if it was the right color.”

The Broncos have 10 days to get the man some lighter slacks before the next retro gameday arrives Nov. 6 vs. Las Vegas on Thursday Night Football.

Start with the ball

Payton made an interesting decision in deciding to take the ball to start the game rather than deferring the choice to the second half as Denver normally does if it wins the coin toss.

The thought process: Get going offensively early against a bad team but also build in some certainty to how the game would start.

“A real good offense we’re playing, so I wanted it to be a little bit of a message to our offense relative to starting fast and to our team. The night before in the meetings, when you know that Dallas has deferred ‘X’ amount of times, then if we’re going to take the ball.

“You can kind of tell your players, ‘This is how the game is going to start. We’re going to be on kick return.’ It’s one of those times where I felt that was important.”

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