Dre Greenlaw spent Sunday making life miserable for the Denver Broncos. Then, after helping the San Francisco 49ers beat his former team 24-14, he made sure Sean Payton heard about it.
Greenlaw finished with 12 tackles and a forced fumble, then needed Fred Warner to pull him away from Payton after the game. Apparently, beating his former coach wasn’t quite enough. He had a few things to get off his chest, too.
Greenlaw told a San Francisco Chronicle reporter that Payton hadn’t spoken to him since Week 12 last season and that he learned about his release from his agent.
“He couldn’t be man to man and call my phone and say, ‘We’re going to cut you,'” Greenlaw said.
So, a guy who makes his living dealing with people couldn’t pick up the phone? Given how well Payton handles the media, you’d think communication would be one of his strengths.
If you’ve read my NFL columns, you know where this is going. I’ve been calling Payton overrated since before he took the Denver job, and Greenlaw being furious with him hasn’t changed my opinion; it only strengthens it.
Sean Payton is the most overrated head coach in the NFL.
If you’re tired of reading that, imagine how tired I am of hearing people call him a genius. Somehow, we keep having this conversation.
I made the same point during a recent appearance on “Don’t @ Me with Dan Dakich.” Payton is very good at playing the media game. He’s friendly with reporters, gives them access and makes them feel important. Those relationships buy him far more favorable coverage than his coaching deserves.
Remember the draft-night report comparing Payton’s excitement about Bo Nix to his excitement about Patrick Mahomes? That’s the kind of coverage I’m talking about.
Then there’s Mike Macdonald. Earlier this season, the Seahawks coach described a dispute with Payton that got ugly enough for Seattle to threaten a lawsuit.
Macdonald said Seattle studied publicly available fan videos of Broncos training camp to prepare for a game between the teams in 2024. Because of that, Payton accused the Seahawks of cheating. According to Macdonald, Seattle threatened to sue if Payton made those accusations public.
Payton later acknowledged that he’d reacted before checking where the footage came from. His explanation: “So obviously, I called shooting before I started looking.”
So, the guy who served a season-long suspension over Bountygate decided to play NFL hall monitor without doing his homework. That’s rich.
Macdonald apologized for his comments becoming public, called Payton a “phenomenal football coach” and said he respected him. Payton accepted the apology, and both said they’d moved on.
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Fine. They can settle it. That doesn’t make Payton’s original behavior any less ridiculous. Put that story next to Greenlaw’s account, and the version of Payton we get from his media admirers starts looking awfully incomplete. Being nice to reporters apparently doesn’t guarantee everyone else gets the same treatment.
Let’s start with the part that always seems to get flipped around. Payton didn’t find Drew Brees stocking shelves at a grocery store and teach him how to throw a football. Brees was already a Pro Bowl quarterback in San Diego.
In 2004, two seasons before he joined Payton, Brees completed 65.5% of his passes with 27 touchdowns and seven interceptions. Then, after his shoulder injury scared off Miami, New Orleans landed a quarterback entering his prime. That’s an incredible break for a first-time head coach.
Payton deserves credit for what they accomplished together. But I don’t understand why we’re supposed to assume he made Brees, rather than acknowledge how much Brees made him.
In Payton’s 15 seasons coaching the Saints, they made the playoffs nine times, reached three NFC Championship Games and won one Super Bowl. That’s a good résumé. It’s also six seasons without a playoff appearance, with Brees there for all but the last of those 15 seasons.
Then, after one season without Brees, Payton stepped away from the Saints in January 2022 and left the New Orleans roster in tatters. A year later, he was back in the NFL with Denver.
Payton wanted out of a bad situation, that he created, so he quit and simply waited for a better opportunity to come around. This part seems to rarely come up.
And yes, Denver reached the AFC Championship Game last season. I wrote about Payton then, too. The team had a good season in an unusual down year for the AFC where Lamar Jackson, Joe Burrow and Patrick Mahomes all suffered injuries.
Payton’s reputation seems permanently attached to that championship from the 2009 season. Meanwhile, the NFL suspended him for the entire 2012 season over Bountygate. That part gets considerably less attention when everyone starts gushing about what a great leader he is.
Then there’s the quarterback-whisperer stuff. Payton handpicked Bo Nix, and I still don’t think Nix is nearly as good as the coverage would have you believe. And he hasn’t gotten much better. If anything, he’s gotten worse. Nix’s completion percentage dropped from 66% as a rookie to 63% last year to 60% through four games this season.
His yards per attempt and passer rating have fallen, too, and his regular-season touchdown-to-interception ratio has also slipped, from 29 touchdowns and 12 interceptions as a rookie to 30 touchdowns and 14 interceptions since the start of 2025.
If Payton gets credit for developing his quarterback, he also gets scrutiny when his handpicked signal-caller starts going backwards.
Give me the offensive minds of Sean McVay, Kevin O’Connell and Ben Johnson. Those are the coaches I’d want building an offense today.
I’m tired of hearing about Payton as though the rest of the league hasn’t learned anything since he and Brees won a Super Bowl over 15 years ago.
Which brings us back to Greenlaw. The Broncos were entitled to move on after an injury-filled season. A phone call, though, seems like a pretty reasonable expectation, especially for a longtime NFL veteran like Greenlaw.
Payton offered a much warmer assessment publicly after Sunday’s game: “I think the world of him. I really love everything about him and he plays with that emotion.”
That’s a nice thing to say, but it doesn’t answer the complaint. It’s easy to praise a guy at a podium. After all, the podium is where Payton does most of his best work.
For his part, Greenlaw said his postgame message to Payton was to “get the f*** off the field.” Not particularly subtle, but after 12 tackles and a win, he clearly wasn’t interested in subtle.
And credit to Greenlaw for telling Payton to his face.
