The Denver Broncos were the first team to announce the firing of a head coach (Josh McDaniels, 2010) in NFL history and have fully embraced the social media movement over the past two seasons.

The Broncos have been tweeting since 2007, but their social media movement was spearheaded by John Elway in early 2011, shortly after Elway returned to the team as a football operations executive.  Since joining Twitter, Elway has announced trades, signings and cuts over the social media platform — keeping fans in the loop with instantly updated timelines.

As of July 30, there are 42 players representing the Broncos on Twitter.  Fans get a unique look into the life of NFL players on Twitter, and hear about everything from where the players eat, players losing track of what day of the week it is during camp and their workout routines.  In recent days, several players have taken to the social networking site to thank fans for all of the support during training camp.

We really appreciate all the fan support thru camp so far! It’s been nice to get that extra adrenaline from y’all when the days get long!

— Eric Decker (@EricDecker87) July 30, 2012

Another day of ‘Hard Knocks’ in the Books! Was a great Sunday practice. The fans always make the Training Camp Practices better! #Thanks
— Mitchell J. Unrein (@MitchellJUnrein) July 30, 2012

I love this feeling.. Great first day of practice and had time to sign a few autographs afterwards.. #trulyblessed
— Robert Ayers Jr (@1_900_ayersjr) July 26, 2012

From midnight to 10 a.m. Monday morning, 33 fans have either been tweeted or retweeted by one of the 42 Broncos on Twitter.  And that’s the kind of interaction that the team encourages.

Other teams across the league haven’t been as quick to embrace social media, and one team has even banned player from using Twitter during training camp.  After Cincinnati rookie cornerback Dre Kirkpatrick confirmed reports of his injury over social media, Bengals Coach Marvin Lewis banned players from using Twitter.

“I think people have to have the maturity and wherewithal to be able to handle it,” Lewis said. “I don’t see how tweeting is going to help us win a football game.So it’s part of being selfless right now. It’s not best for our football team to be involved in that. It’s best that we just take care of ourselves and not announce what we’re doing or not doing, or who did this or who did that, and commenting on what’s going on in other spots. Let’s be football players.”

Lewis’ stance is understandable, but a far cry from the stance Denver’s John Fox has established.

In June, linebacker D.J. Williams tweeted an image of Denver’s iPad playbook with a play displayed on the screen.  Though unwise, the incident was brushed off by Fox.

“We’ve address that, and I think the players do a great job with social media,” said Fox.  “You’re not going to go get through a whole season unscathed, and the world has gotten a lot smaller, but overall our guys do a great job.”

When asked if the image would affect the Broncos defense, Fox said no before going on to praise the players for their interactions with fans via Twitter.

“Our guys do a great job keeping our fans informed, and you’re going to have a couple of mishaps.”

The Broncos, clearly not as strict as the Bengals when it comes to social media, encourage their players to use their platforms appropriately.  Thanks to that, fans can continue following their favorite players on a daily basis.