Broncos: Peyton Manning gets big fan roar; Not Derek Wolfe

As adored as Tim Tebow was by much of the Broncos' fanbase, he never received a training-camp roar as loud as the one that greeted Peyton Manning on Thursday morning when he was the last quarterback to stride onto the field.

But for a fleeting moment, rookie DL Derek Wolfe thought the ovation was for him.

"When we came out here today, I was right in front of Manning and I didn't know it. They (the fans) made a pretty big fuss, and I was like, 'Why are they yelling so crazy for me?'" recalled Wolfe, the Broncos' first 2012 draft pick.

"Then I looked behind me and it was Manning standing there. That was my first introduction to, 'it's not just you out here.'"

What Wolfe did Thursday wasn't going to get noticed by the majority of the 4,000-plus fans on the knolls surrounding the practice fields here. Although drafted as a defensive tackle, he lined up at end with the second team. His day was highlighted by pressures on consecutive plays during a team period midway through practice.

But Wolfe's first day was also defined by a lesson: that the straight-on moves that worked to make him the Big East's Defensive Player of the Year at the University of Cincinnati won't do much good in the NFL.

"In college, I could bull-rush just about anybody. Out here, I'm not," Wolfe said. "You've got to rely on your technique more than you did in college. If your hips didn't get flipped all the way out, you could reverse with a bull rush. Here, it's not like that ... Pass-rushing is an art, so it's got to be perfect."

If he does it well, someday those camp-opening cheers might be his.

Follow Broncos reporter Andrew Mason on Twitter @CBSSportsNFLDEN.