It had been a long time since Riley Odoms was last in Denver, and he took the long way to arrive.

The tight end, who starred for the Broncos from 1972-83, is back in town for the first time since playing his final game for them. He will be inducted Sunday into the team’s Ring of Fame along with defensive back Steve Foley after driving more than 1,000 miles from his Houston home in a rented Ford Exposition.

Odoms chose to drive because he said his wife, Alnetia, has had two strokes and a heart attack and prefers to travel in that manner. They have been accompanied by Alnetia Odom’s cousin, Zack Glynn, a resident of a Houston retirement home.

“I’m going to see everybody,’’ Odoms said of former teammates during Alumni Weekend. “We’re going to chew and spit and tell lies and tell everything that you can think of.”

There will be plenty of memories shared. Before Sunday’s game between the Broncos and the Las Vegas Raiders kicks off at 2:05 p.m., the Ring of Fame pillars of Odoms and Foley will be unveiled at 11:30 a.m. outside of Empower Field at Mile High. At 1:40 p.m., former Broncos linebacker Randy Gradishar, who was inducted in August into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, will receive his Hall of Fame ring on the field.

Then at halftime, Odoms and Foley will be formally inducted, swelling membership in the Ring of Fame to 37.

The entire weekend also serves as the initial reunion for the 1977 Broncos, the franchise’s first playoff team in its 18-year history. It advanced to Super Bowl XII before losing 27-10 to Dallas. The team featured Foley and Gradishar starring on defense and Odoms on offense. And the Broncos on Sunday will wear 1977 throwback uniforms.

“It’s going to be a great honor,’’ Gradishar said. “It’s the first time we’ve been recognized in Broncos history as the first team going to the playoffs and going on to the Super Bowl. We’ll be able to relive and recount what we did years ago.”

It’s appropriate the Broncos will face the Raiders. In the 1977 AFC championship game, Denver defeated the Oakland Raiders 20-17 at old Mile High Stadium.

“It was a great time and our confidence was sky high,” Foley said. “It was a big turnaround for the franchise.”

Foley, 70, and Odoms, 74, will briefly address fans at halftime and Foley knows what he will say.

“I’ll say a few thank yous and tell the fans, ‘We’re going to thrash the Raiders in the second half,'” Foley said.

During their 12-2 regular season in 1977, the Broncos also beat the defending Super Bowl champion Raiders 30-7 in Oakland, forcing star quarterback Ken Stabler into seven interceptions. That raised their record to 5-0 and signified to many they were championship contenders.

“(Linebacker) Tom Jackson had it right that game when he yelled to (Raiders coach) John Madden on the sideline, ‘Hey, fat boy, do you believe in us now?’’’ Odoms said.

Odoms in 1977 was in the midst of a 12-year Denver career in which he caught 396 passes for 5,755 yards and 41 touchdowns. The 6-foot, 230-pound Odoms, one of the NFL’s first very big tight ends, made four Pro Bowls and was twice named first team All-Pro.

“I feel great about it,’’ Odoms said about making the Ring of Fame. “I came to a losing team and we started the winning tradition of Broncos football (with 7-5-2 in 1973 being the first winning season in team history). I played with a lot of great athletes and those guys are close to me. I played on the offense but I know the defense, they were better than the offense.”

By 1977, Denver’s famed defense was nicknamed the “Orange Crush.” The Broncos that season gave up a meager 10.6 points per game.

Foley had arrived in 1976 and became a regular starting cornerback in 1977. During an 11-year Denver career that took him through 1986, he moved to safety in the 1980s and remains the all-time franchise leader in interceptions with 44.

“It’s an incredible honor,’’ said Foley, who said it will be “surreal” seeing his name on the stadium façade for being in the Ring of Fame. “I’m extremely humbled and blessed. There’s a lot of guys that could be in here as well. The defense was a team effort. And I couldn’t think of a better guy to go in with than Riley Odoms, one of the great tight ends in all of the NFL.”

As for Foley, Odoms called him “outstanding” and said he “enjoyed watching him pick balls off.”

The leader of the “Orange Crush” defense was Gradishar, who played for the Broncos from 1974-83. He made seven Pro Bowls, was named first-team All-Pro twice and was the 1978 NFL Defensive Player of the Year.

Gradishar had to wait 35 years to be enshrined after he first became eligible in 1989 for the Hall of Fame. The Aug. 3 ceremony was in Canton, Ohio, and Sunday will mark the first time Gradishar is introduced at Empower Field as a Hall of Famer.

“It’s going to be a real blessing, having the opportunity to kind of finalize the Pro Football Hall of Fame with receiving my ring and doing that in front of our Broncos crowd,’’ Gradishar said. “That will complete (the process), but it will go on for years and years that Randy is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.”

Gradishar and Foley both long have lived in the Denver area, so they didn’t need to travel far for weekend festivities. As for Odoms, he wants one more thing to cap off his round-trip drive of more than 2,000 miles to attend his first Broncos game in 41 years.

“All I want now is a victory by the Broncos,” he said. “I don’t care how sloppy it is.”