On Thursday, after wrapping up the second week of OTAs, special teams coordinator Joe DeCamillis said, “It’s a very dangerous thing” to decide who makes the team during OTAs, instead letting that process play out during training camp.

While it may be too early to decide who makes the team, apparently it isn’t too early to replace starters that left in the offseason. During the second week of OTAs it became very clear that the Broncos have found their replacement for inside linebacker Danny Trevathan.

On Wednesday, fellow insider linebacker Brandon Marshall broke the news on who has the significant upper hand to start along side of him in 2016.

“Right now it’s Todd Davis … Todd is playing extremely well,” Marshall said. “He has high intensity and he’s very instinctive.”

While there are still many months for this to change and for others, specifically Corey Nelson, to overtake Davis, on Thursday it became very clear that Davis is the starter heading into training camp.

“Todd Davis is really doing a tremendous job for us,” said defensive coordinator Wade Phillips on Thursday after OTAs.

Although there has been a lot of concern this offseason in Broncos Country on finding Trevathan’s replacement, the Broncos have been calm, knowing his replacement the entire time.

“He’s a good football player. He played well for us last year,” said Phillips. “He played a lot of plays last year. He played in all of our short-yardage and goal-line plays and all that. Obviously, he substituted when Danny [Trevathan] was out, too. He had some playing time, and he played well when he played.”

Even Davis’ back up, Nelson, acknowledged that the coaches have given Davis the nod ahead of him.

“When things got underway and coach told us how everything was rolling, I was still kind of content with everything being the way that it was because I knew I would have my shot and I would have my chance to be able to go out there and perform,” said Nelson.

What is even more surprising is that the coaches already had decided this once OTAs got underway. The Broncos had enough confidence in Davis from the limited playing time — 11.77 percent of defensive snaps in the 2015 season — that he did have that they didn’t even bother to wait out the offseason to decide.

Most of the nation seemed to view the inside linebacker position as a position of need for the Broncos entering the draft; however, the Broncos showed by their actions that it wasn’t.

“At the time [of the draft] I didn’t know what direction they were going in,” said Davis. “When they didn’t pick up anybody, [in the draft] it definitely felt good and it let us know that they have faith in the inside linebacker corps that they have now and that they believed in us and wanted to move forward with us for the rest of the season.”

What Davis didn’t know at the time of the draft, is that their confidence was placed in him.

An aspect of Davis’ game that helped him climb the depth chart was the intensity that he plays with on the field, which was mentioned multiple times by both Marshall and Phillips.

“He may not seem like it off the field, but he’s a really intense guy,” said Phillips. “I don’t know if I’ve been around — well, I’ve been around [NFL linebacker Chris] Spielman at Buffalo — but he reminds me of the same kind of temperament. He’s intense every play.”

Davis said the comparison to Speilman — who one of the most intense players to ever play in the NFL — was a “great blessing.” Davis also credited his improvement to studying the great Broncos defense of last year.

“I just really studied a lot of film, a lot of what the Broncos did and a lot of what the starters did from last year. I want to mimic that,” said Davis. “I feel like I learn a lot off the field … being able to understand what the offense is doing pre-snap.”

Davis isn’t complacent with having the edge for the starting role, though. In fact, he wants to keep the level of competition high with the other inside linebackers to continue to get better.

“I just compete everyday. Continue to compete,” said Davis. “We continue to push each other. And we all strive to be great.”

Just because Todd Davis isn’t a household name, doesn’t mean there should be reason to panic. In fact, the Broncos calm demeanor and high confidence in Davis should suggest they feel very strongly that there won’t be much of a drop off, if any, at the inside linebacker position.