John Elway Confident Ahead Of First Ever Virtual NFL Draft

DENVER (CBS4) - As the Denver Broncos prepare for the virtual NFL draft, which begins on Thursday, Vice President of Football Operations John Elway isn't choosing to focus on the challenges this year. Rather, he's focusing on the positives that have emerged as he prepares for a virtual draft.

"If anything, I think it makes us prepare a little bit harder to have an idea at each position of where we are right now, whether we go up or back," said Elway. "I think as the draft goes and once we get through the first day and get through the second day, by the time we get to the third day, everybody we'll have a pretty good feel for it. We should make it through it just fine."

The Broncos have several areas of need heading into the 2020 draft. Receiver and offensive tackle are the two positions at the top of the list. Several mock draft have the Broncos filling their need on the outside with their 15th pick in the first round.

"It's kind of what flavor you like because it's a very deep draft when it comes down to receivers," Elway said.  "I think everybody obviously is going to have different views on what they think is the best fit for them."

As for offensive tackles, the Broncos are fortunate that this is a deep draft for that position as well.

"There is some good depth at tackle too," Elway said. "I think that's one of the stronger positions. That's the thing that we'll continue to do our mock drafts the next couple of days, just kind of play with different scenarios to see how they fall and fall with other positions and what direction we may go."

No one will be at the team's facility on Thursday during the draft. Both Elway and head coach Vic Fangio will be in their homes navigating the draft as will the G.M's and head coaches for the other 31 teams as well. There are bound to be some challenges that pop up during this year's draft, and when that inevitably happens, Elway says the Broncos will need to be flexible.

"For the most part as an organization we've been trying to be flexible and go with things that we can control," said Elway. "The things we can't control we'll go through that and do the best we can to comply with all the things that we can't control."

The 2020 NFL draft begins Thursday night at 6 p.m.