ENGLEWOOD, Colo. — Bo Nix was at a public park earlier this offseason when a couple of young fans approached the Denver Broncos quarterback with a blunt question.“I’ve got little kids at the park asking me if my legs are crooked,” Nix said with a smile Tuesday as he spoke to members of the media in person for the first time since his clutch performance in an AFC playoff win against the Buffalo Bills in January and the ankle surgery that followed. ” … I asked him, ‘Does it look like my ankles are crooked?’ He sort of gave me a good no. Thank god he didn’t say yes.”Nix went through stretches and individual drills as the Broncos opened up their three-day minicamp Tuesday. It marked his first practice since he suffered a fractured bone in his ankle on the final drive of that overtime win against the Bills. Nix had surgery days after the injury and then had a follow-up procedure in April to address a bone spur that was causing the quarterback discomfort as he worked through his rehab process.“Even though I probably could have done the whole season again, it was just aggravating me for too long,” Nix said of the decision to have a second surgery this offseason. “What we did was, since I was a little bit ahead (in the rehab schedule), we thought it was best to go ahead and decompress it a little bit and still have plenty of time to get back for the summer to prepare for the season. … I feel really good about the steps I’m making.”As Nix rehabbed from his second surgery, while also enjoying his new role as a first-time father following the birth of his daughter Riley, he was amused by a fervor sprouting across social media or on radio talk shows about his operation and the recovery that followed. Videos of the quarterback walking on the sideline during OTAs earlier this month were broken down frame-by-frame by users on social media like some kind of modern Zapruder film. All the while, the Broncos consistently said Nix would be fully cleared well before training camp in late July. His limited participation in minicamp this week has long been a planned step in that progression.“I think it’s funny. For one, no one’s ever cared about me this extensively for a long time,” Nix joked Tuesday, addressing the attention around his injury. “I don’t think it’s a bad thing. … At the end of the day, I’ve been here before. I feel great. I’m going to be strong. I’m going to be fast, elusive. Everything I’ve done in the past, I’m going to be able to do it again. It’s a broken bone, for crying out loud. Everyone here has probably had an issue with a broken bone, and you feel right back the same.”Broncos head coach Sean Payton has expressed confidence about Nix’s health throughout Denver’s offseason program. The veteran coach said he doesn’t expect the young quarterback’s mobility, the trait that allows him to avoid sacks at a top-of-the-league rate while creating explosive plays outside of the pocket, to be lessened once Nix fully returns from his offseason surgery.Nix himself expressed an even stronger confidence in that part of his game going forward.“My concern is (doctors) say it’s back healthy and is as good as new, and I have really been like that in a couple years,” he said. “My concern is maybe I’ll move around a little bit better.”The ankle injury in the playoffs was not the first for Nix. He suffered one in high school. Then again during his first college stop at Auburn. He had a minor procedure on his ankle after his rookie season in Denver. Rarely, though, has Nix missed extended time because of those setbacks.“When I had an ankle injury in high school, we won the state championship,” Nix said. “When I had an ankle injury in college, we went and won a lot of games at Oregon. Now, I expect it to be the same thing. For me, it’s another bump in the road, another thing, but one thing I don’t worry about right now is my health. We play this game long enough, you get hurt, you have bumps and bruises. We have great medicine these days, great training to where you get back on the field. You look at some of the worst injuries you can get, and guys are back on the field the next year feeling stronger than ever. … I don’t worry about that at all.”Nix, in a letter he wrote to his daughter through “The Players’ Tribune” earlier this offseason, admitted that he’s “not a very patient person.” The hardest part of the decision to ultimately have a clean-up procedure in April was knowing it would delay his full return to practice. But Nix is also entering his third year in the offense, which will be called this season by Davis Webb, his former quarterbacks coach. The big picture was the right picture for a quarterback who is entering the year with sky-high goals.“At the end of the day, you ask the question to every quarterback, they probably want to win a Super Bowl and MVP,” Nix said. “That’s going to be my goal each and every year.”Jun 16, 2026Connections: Sports EditionSpot the pattern. Connect the termsFind the hidden link between sports terms