A year after ACL injury, Broncos ILB Alex Singleton working to get fully comfortable: “It’s good to have our captain back”

It’d be difficult to blame Alex Singleton if he felt cursed. Confused. Just plain mad.

Instead, he felt nothing but some pain in his left thumb and a sense of irony.

On July 28, the Broncos inside linebacker reached a day he’d been dreaming about through months of rehab: His first practice in pads since tearing his ACL on Sept. 22, 2024, against Tampa Bay.

The fun didn’t last a full camp practice. Singleton was mid-practice when he tried to punch at the ball, but instead caught position-mate Dre Greenlaw’s brace.

Broken left thumb. A plate and a screw inserted to help heal the fracture.

It didn’t shelve Singleton for long, but it did change the trajectory of his training camp.

It also could well have spooked the 31-year-old, who this weekend hits the one-year anniversary of his knee injury while also enjoying a homecoming to Los Angeles when the Broncos take on the Chargers at SoFi Stadium.

After all, Singleton never missed so much as a practice, let alone a game, in his first nine seasons as a pro.

“It was literally the next time I put pads on,” Singleton told The Denver Post last week. “Like, ‘Oh my god. Of course.’ The two most recent days I put pads on both ended with surgeries.”

That doesn’t make a guy feel snakebitten?

“Once I came back from that, it was just back to practicing,” he said. “Now it feels routine. It was just such a freak thing, and thankfully it was a one-week freak thing.”

Well, sort of. The hits haven’t stopped coming since. Singleton actually broke that same left thumb in a different spot Week 1 against Tennessee and now sports a cast. Then there was a rough outing Week 2 at Indianapolis in which he and Strnad each were exposed in coverage and targeted by a Colts offense that racked up 447 yards and operated extensively through running back Jonathan Taylor and tight end Tyler Warren.

Still, the Broncos are happy Singleton’s back on the field and healthy — well, except the thumb — after he was forced to watch the final 14 games from the sideline last year.

“He is getting better every single week,” Joseph said Thursday. “It’s good to have our captain back on the field, making the checks for us, and keeping everyone in position to make plays. Obviously, it takes time to get your total movement back from the ACL, and he’s working every day, and it’s getting better and better each day.”

Singleton previously said the rehab from his injury was unique because he didn’t feel much pain when it originally happened, so he didn’t have to deal with the mental block of what it would be like the first time he ran or cut in a real game.

Instead, it just felt like a really long wait to the start of this season.

“It just feels like it’s never coming back,” Singleton said. “You just assume you’re never going to play another season when it was Week 3 last year and you have to watch the whole season.”

Singleton wanted to help the other inside linebackers as much as possible, but said at some point he had to stop making a point of going to every game-planning meeting as the season progressed.

“All they’re doing is preparing for a game that week, we’re not really installing new plays for camp or learning like in OTAs. It’s focused week to week, and it’ll kill you to sit there and listen,” Singleton said. “I’d sit in a meeting last year and you’re almost in tears because it’s like, ‘Oh, they’re not talking to me.’

“(Head coach Sean Payton) says it the best. The train keeps moving and you’re not on the train. So you’re just watching it go by.”