John Elway Considered Firing Vance Joseph, Replacing Him With Mike Shanahan Last Year

According to Woody Paige, Broncos GM John Elway considered firing Vance Joseph and replacing him with Mike Shanahan last year.

However, Broncos CEO Joe Ellis told Elway that if he was going to fire Joseph, he needed to conduct a full coaching search and not simply hand the job to Shanahan.

Mike Klis of 9 News confirms the news and adds that Ellis gave Elway two options: Either fire Joseph and do a full search or stick with Joseph and give him a better quarterback to work with.

Elway chose the latter.

Part of the reason to not bring back Shanahan was that he had just one playoff win in his final 10 seasons.

Unfortunately, Joseph finds himself on the hot seat for the second straight year, as the Broncos were just eliminated from postseason contention and it looks like Elway could conduct a full coaching search in the coming weeks.

Joseph, 46, began his NFL coaching career with the 49ers as their assistant defensive backs coach back in 2005. He spent six years in San Francisco before joining the Texans as their DBs coach in 2011.

After three years in Houston and two more with the Bengals, Joseph was hired by the Dolphins as their defensive coordinator. The Broncos would hire him as their head coach a year later.

During his two years as Broncos head coach, Joseph has led the team to a record of 11-19 (36.7 percent) and no playoff appearances.

We’ll have more regarding Joseph’s future with the Broncos as the news is available.