Overview:
The Broncos, Nuggets and Avs victories represent a rare Denver sports moment, and 104.3 (AKA The Fan) is doing its best to cover it all.
This past weekend, Denver sports dominated across the country. The Denver Broncos, Nuggets and Avalanche played on the same day for only the eleventh time, and for the first time in history, all three teams won.
For the first time in years, the city feels surrounded by victory. The Broncos are experiencing a resurgence, the Nuggets are mounting another championship run, and the Avalanche are off to one of the strongest starts in franchise history. Meanwhile, the Colorado Rapids, a soccer club, are gaining fan and media attention, which has only accelerated as the NWSL League prepares to join Denver in 2026.
Fans and journalists have noticed the shift, including Jake Shapiro, a sports analyst for Denver Sports 104.3 The Fan, the youngest professor at CU Boulder and faculty advisor for the university’s Sko Buff Sports club. He says the change is visible everywhere: in arenas, in the studio and even out on the streets.
“Our job is to react to sports,” Shapiro said. “So, obviously people are going to be reactionary about the things that happen in sports. If you show up to work, everyone’s gonna be talking about Murray’s 15-point game. That’ll be the conversation on air, off air, between colleagues.”
Shapiro has spent his entire life dreaming about this moment. “I’m working at the radio station I grew up listening to,” Shapiro said. “And before that, I worked at the newspaper I grew up reading. I simply get to do whatever story or whatever thing I want to do at this radio station. It’s a pretty phenomenal opportunity, and I don’t take it lightly.”
A typical day for Shapiro consists of covering Broncos’ practice, writing, editing and then covering an NBA game, among other tasks. It’s a schedule he admits can be exhausting but also deeply rewarding.
“I can’t mess up, that’s for sure,” Shapiro said. “There’s more pressure on me to perform. You know, there’s more people in the press box that you’re rubbing arms with, there’s more people you’re competing with to get quotes, there’s more people you’re competing with to just simply get a spot and talk to these guys.”
That rising interest—both from longtime fans and newcomers—has reshaped the job. Analysts like Shapiro now have to break down complex seasons for die-hards while welcoming suddenly curious bandwagon fans.
“You become pretty irrelevant sometimes in the eyes of the public relations director and/or the athletes themselves when they can talk to a local person like myself or they can talk to a national outlet,” Shapiro said.
And while the Nuggets and Avalanche consistently make playoff runs, Shapiro says one truth in Denver never changes: it’s still Broncos Country.
“When the Broncos are good, everyone wants to talk about the Broncos,” Shapiro said. “When the Broncos are bad, everyone wants to talk about the Broncos. Everyone cares about the Broncos there, and it’s really Broncos heavy, but when the Broncos are good like they are now, I would say there’s a more positive attitude from everyone.”
It hasn’t always been this way and Shapiro is no stranger to bad teams. Starting with covering the Colorado Rockies, he had to work through covering one of the worst MLB teams in the country.
“I covered them every day and I cared, and I love baseball,” Shapiro said. “It was easy for me to do, even though, you know, it was covering the 95th loss of the season. It’s the same story as the 92nd loss.”
But the hard years taught him something. “It pays off in terms of all the hard work you do when the team is losing,” Shapiro said. “When they start winning, the fan’s attention quickly goes to your site. I want to prove to them each and every day that I’m gonna be responsible with that opportunity and that I care as much about the teams that I’m covering and the athletes that I’m covering as a fan of that team.”
The fandom starts young in Colorado. Ryland Scholes, a Colorado native and beat reporter at The Ralphie Report covering Colorado Buffaloes sports news, as well as a multimedia journalist at Bucket List Community Cafe, grew up around sports.
“I’ve been a sports fan for as long as I can remember,” Scholes said. “I got indoctrinated when I was a young kid to be an Avs fan. I was probably one or two at the time when I got sucked into the rabbit hole.”
He admires The Fan’s dedication, and despite being a Minnesota Vikings fan, he has always supported the Denver Nuggets and the Colorado Avalanche.
“I’m on Twitter a lot, and I do listen to the radio a lot,” Scholes said. “I’m always listening to someone talking about sports. (The Fan) does great work. They don’t mind telling the pure, unadulterated truth to the audience, which is something that you don’t get all the time.”
He appreciates that voices like Shapiro aren’t afraid to ruffle some feathers and will talk to fans as they see it. “You can tell when someone is BSing you and when they are trying to make a false narrative,” Scholes said.
Shapiro doesn’t hold back about the stakes of this moment.
“I would say that the expectation from all three fan bases right now is that they’re gonna win a championship this year, which is pretty insane to think about,” Shapiro said. “The most likely outcome is that none of the three do, but the Denver Broncos fans, I don’t think, had championship aspirations coming into the season.”
Although Denver fans don’t take their teams for granted, they do tend to swing between extremes—either “the sky is falling” or “we’re going to win it all,” as Scholes puts it.
And the stakes are even higher when you consider the market itself.
“If you count Major League soccer as the fifth major professional League sport in this country, which metrics would say it is, this is the smallest market in the country that has all five major professional sports leagues in it,” Shapiro said. “And when you consider that we’re getting an NWSL team next year as well, we will be in the smallest market with all six.”
What’s happening now feels different: not alternating success, but overlapping momentum. Fans are listening harder, showing up louder and expecting more.
And as the critics, analysts and everyday sports lovers collide in the same conversations, there’s a growing belief that Denver might be experiencing something rare. Even if the championships do not come, the moment is notable for the city.
“I love covering the sports teams here,” Shapiro said. “I love the people here. I love the city.”
