QB Christian Ponder gives thanks to joining Broncos

Christian Ponder gladly gave up shopping for Thanksgiving groceries to join the Denver Broncos and add quarterback depth with Peyton Manning out.

The Broncos brought Ponder in Wednesday to work out and they signed him as Manning is expected to miss at least two games with a partially torn plantar fascia.

"I've been in Phoenix -- we live there for the offseason -- just working out, waiting for the call and fortunately I did yesterday when I was shopping for groceries for Thanksgiving," Ponder said Wednesday. "I had to drop everything and get on a flight."

The 6-foot-2, 230-pound Ponder is a fifth-year player who started 36 of 38 games during his first four NFL seasons with Minnesota after being selected by the Vikings in the first round (12th overall) of the 2011 NFL Draft out of Florida State.

Brock Osweiler will make his second consecutive start for the Broncos and rookie Trevor Siemian will be the backup as Ponder will not be up to speed to be the No. 2 quarterback for Sunday night's game against the New England Patriots.

"I have a little bit of background with this kind of offense and what I ran with (Raiders offensive coordinator Bill) Musgrave in Minnesota and Oakland," Ponder said. "There is a little different verbiage, but hopefully in a week or so, I'll start getting stuff down, maybe shorter than that. I'm going to put in the time and the effort to do it as quick as possible."

Ponder feels blessed to be joining the Broncos after being rescued from his shopping duties.

"I grew up a Bronco fan, a John Elway fan. I was No. 7 in Little League baseball through college and four years in Minnesota because of that. I'm excited to be here."

In March, Ponder signed with the Raiders, but was released on Sept. 5. He has completed 632 of 1,057 passes (59.5 percent) for 6,658 yards with 38 touchdowns and 36 interceptions during his career.

"There was a concern because we're sitting here with a guy who has one start (Osweiler) and a kid (Siemian) who doesn't have a play,'' Broncos head coach Gary Kubiak said Wednesday. "Me and John (Elway) started thinking about the concern if something happened. Good that Christian was out there. He has a little bit of a background in some of our verbiage playing for Billy Musgrave. He came, worked out well. Hopefully, we can catch him up a little bit."