We’ve just released Episode 89 of the Thunder Down Under Chargers Podcast.
Our synopsis for Episode 89 is below:
The Jim Harbaugh era is in full swing! Justin Herbert threw only 20 passes. The Defense allowed a miserly 84 passing yards. And the team CRUSHED the Panthers 26-3 becoming the first Chargers team since 2012 to start the season 2-0. Join us today for a comprehensive breakdown of it all. Don’t miss it!
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Hope you enjoy the episode! Thanks so much for listening 🙂
Alister (@TDU_Alister)
OK, I just watched Harbaugh’s post-game presser and have one comment…..how in the hell, especially given the way that Salyer handled the LT duties after Slater got IR’d 2 years ago, you can say Pipkins is your third tackle is beyond me.
I’m fully supportive of this staff and am in no way overreacting to this loss. I just don’t agree at all with the assessment of Pipkins.
Oops…wrong thread. 😆🤣😂
Started to, but then resisted the temptation to respond again about Staley. 🙂
Today we saw some injuries strike and now we’ll see how this coaching staff responds. The real test has begun.
Perhaps more relevantly to season 2024, in the comments above I referred to some questionable 4th down calls. Then today on 3rd & 10 in the two minute drill before the half we call a run up the middle around midfield. Essentially waved the white flag. It shocked the broadcasters.
It was a uniquely conservative decision, to the extent that I can’t think of a recent example where an NFL team has done something like that in a two minute drill with an elite QB, and it wasn’t ideal when the Offense was having some success and could’ve scored leading into the half.
If we’re going to sing the praises of Harbaugh/Roman, that is an example of a poor and costly decision/momentum killer.
I think the team and coaches will respond next week. But that was a tough one. From that cowardly moment onwards, the team got beaten soundly.
It will be interesting….and, IMO, telling….to see the responses on and off the field going forward. Haven’t watched any pressers yet.
Again, my opinion based on the eyeball test….the first half went pretty much as expected. The second half we were outcoached and outmuscled.
How spellchecker can change gametime to Sametime in my previous post is nonsensical to me. Didn’t notice until after the edit window closed.
Disappointing loss and the injuries are of course concerning. Some questionable coaching decisions. BUT….we all knew that this is a rebuilding season, like it or not.
I’m not saying we have or will, just a caution. Let’s please not let this disappointment cause this community to devolve into the negative troll farm that continues to thrive at BFTB. I lurked for a bit this morning and wished I hadn’t. 🤢
I disagree with your “other factors” as being particularly relevant in terms of defending Staley. You could have stopped at “There’s no denying it.” But you couldn’t resist going further to deflect blame from Staley. At least that’s how I read it.
So I started to respond but decided it wasn’t worth the energy. Nothing you or I write about it is going to change anyone’s mind at this point.
I think people generally listen to or read my opinions because they are not conclusory and try to acknowledge different angles.
I don’t see ‘stopping there’ as being much different to someone writing ‘QJ did a terrible job last year and is bad at football. Period.’
Listeners of our show will know we are particularly interested in sports organisations holistically and exploring the delicate mix of parts and pieces that affect each other in the quest for success.
For people who prefer analysis of the conclusory kind, there is no shortage of Rex Ryans or Michael Lombardis out there willing to give it 🙂
#4 :
I believe Staley had input and ultimate approval of every player acquired during his tenure. If he had said he didn’t want any one of them, I expect that player would not have been acquired. There has never been any indication that I am aware of that Staley did not get the players he wanted, or that he, Telesco, and the front office were not aligned. You acknowledge this, but in such a way as to minimize Staley’s influence/approval in order to blame Telesco.
As you know, McCoy and Lynn each coached 4 seasons with Telesco as GM. The average defensive rankings of their teams were considerably better than Staley’s, even though both of them were offensive head coaches, not defensive geniuses.
You know that I am no apologist for Telesco, there is no doubt that Hortiz is much better. But IMO you completely gloss over Staley’s role in building the roster. We even heard that storyline before year 2 that the year 1 defense wasn’t with defensive players he had picked for his system, but that had been corrected before year 2. That obviously didn’t lead to great results.
#5 :
You mention injuries. Every team has injuries. Every single one. So every coach is by necessity charged with overcoming them. The intellectually honest way to account for this is to address whether Staley’s teams were disproportionately affected by injuries to a degree that skewed its results compared to other teams. Were they? I don’t know. Do you?
Anthony Lynn’s last team missed 43 regular season games from defensive starters including James (16), Ingram (9), and Bosa (4), arguably their 3 best defensive players… yet finished #10 in yards allowed… with a roster built by Telesco with Lynn’s input. That was the roster Staley substantially inherited.
#6 :
You mean like Van Noy, Harris, Covington, Kendricks, and Nick Williams? I’m sure these were all guys Staley wanted. Was that group as good as Fulton, Molden, and Tart have been in a 3 game sample? Doesn’t seem like it, but, if Staley wanted them, then he bears some responsibility for that.
As I said before, I doubt anything I wrote here changed anyone’s mind about it, just as I doubt your posts did.
I admire your dogged determination to hold as close to your original position as possible despite the dismal results. And I do very much enjoy your posts and our interactions. I respect your opinions even when we differ, as we do here.
On to 2024 subjects.
And those are all good retorts! I’m texting from work and for everyone’s sake I think it’s best not to go back on each point.
From memory the Chargers had a ‘good injury’ year in 2021, and were below average in 2022 & 2023. But those total games lost metrics also aren’t always perfect as sometimes it’s ’who you lose’ and not how many. Did Staley have so many ‘key players’ on both sides of the ball injured during parts of 2022-2023 that it muddied part of his evaluation? Maybe? Probably not? I think the JC Jackson debacle was a killer for the locker room and the cap but that happens in the NFL elsewhere too.
What I’ve liked about Hortiz is his willingness to make moves from June onwards in response to what’s happened during the preseason. Bringing in Tart, Molden and Heinicke to bolster areas that were looking shaky is something Telesco never quite got the hang of. That’s where an experienced GM should be helping out a less experienced HC whose hands are already full coaching the team. But other than the rumours about Staley wanting Flowers and not QJ (which I can’t confirm as fact) I would have to agree that the choice of who comes into the building would have heavily involved Staley.
I don’t know if I’m any more or less likely to cling to my original position on a subject as the next person. My opinions on Staley have evolved, to an extent, over time and I never hesitated to criticise certain aspects of his personality and approach on our podcast last year. And how I’ve set it all above is basically where I land on it now.
He had some leadership potential. He’s bright. He was stubborn. He made mistakes. His Defense didn’t work and never adjusted. He had some annoying injuries. His GM was a dud. He has two winning seasons and one losing season. The wheels seemed to fall off including culturally. If ownership ignored fans and kept him in 2024 it’s not a fait accompli that the results would have been dismal (particularly if paired with a better GM). It’s fair and good though for LAC fans that ownership fired him since what’s replaced him looks far better at the moment (except perhaps for the hyper conservative approach to game management). We move on.
Great show guys. Always entertaining. A few thoughts:
Herbert will be fine. He is in what his fourth or fifth offense and this one is probably the most different philosophically if not conceptually. I don’t think he is trying too hard or trying to be the star. just don’t think he has found his rhythm with this scheme which is much less reliant on him. Add in the missed camp time and virtually all new receivers I am not surprise and expect it will take even more time until he is fully comfortable
The Harbaugh calls not to go for it on fourth down felt right to me and I tend to be a bit more aggressive than the analytics suggest on fourth and short calls. They felt right because of the score and the inability of the Panther offense to do much of anything against the Chargers D. In that situation against a hapless offense a FG pass the score while preventing a potential momentum shift of the Panther D were to make a stop while giving the Panther O favorable field position. I don’t think the decision making will be very different against high octane offenses where you want to control the clock and keep the other O on the bench.
Finally, “Windy City” Alister when are you going to enter the public confessional and admit how wrong you were about Staley? 😜If Minter’s D the last two weeks shows us anything is that with comparable talent a competent D coordinator can do wonders. Minter may or may not be a defensive genius but Staley clearly was not just not a genius he was a well below average DC.
I won’t repeat what I said to Erick about Herbert above, but I basically agree with you. I think it’s less about ‘trying too hard’ and more about what you say. And it’s easy to overlook that with fewer pass attempts throughout a game, the QB isn’t going to be in the same rhythm that he might be if he were throwing the ball every snap and a half. He’ll get used to this new approach eventually (hopefully soon!).
On the 4th downs, I think I’d have a hard time being convinced that the “better” decision each time would not have been to go for it. It’s almost always the right decision to go for it on 4th and short around midfield IMO. But… I don’t think any of these were egregious decisions in the circumstances (ie, when you think you have a good football team and the opposition stinks), so I agree with you. Here were the calls:
2x punts on 4th and short (4th & 1 at LAC 49, 6-0, Q1 1:24 remaining; 4th & 5 at CAR 44, 6-0, Q2 12:54 remaining). Not going for these were arguably momentum killers for our Offense and momentum builders for Carolina, staying within one score for longer. That argument works both ways.
Taking a field goal to go up 23-3 (4th & 2 at CAR 28, 20-3, Q3 9:07 remaining). Keeping a two-score game a two-score game, when converting the 4th & 2 leads to a good chance to make it a three-score game, is not especially clever coaching.
Generally, my view is that if you think your Offense is significantly better than the opposition’s Defense, it would support going for some of these 4th downs. Also, if you think your Defense is a top-ranked Defense, plus you think the opposition Offense is paltry, that would be another reason to go for them IMO. Because if your Defense is elite, giving them a shorter field is something they can probably handle.
All of that said, I appreciate there’s two different schools of thought on this stuff. And I’ve come to believe that these types of decisions, albeit marginally relevant to win %, are probably secondary factors that lead to success, with the primary factor being how well coached overall the team is. I mean, Andy Reid has made dodgy 4th down decisions for years now, and he’s a 3x Super Bowl winner. If the football team knows the plan is to punt and play sound Defense, then it can work, and I’m prepared to accept this and watch how it plays out. I’m just a little nervous about how that approach might play out against Mahomes, Allen, Burrow, Lamar. But if we had a better stable of WRs, I would probably be more aggressive about my take. As the roster is presently constructed, I get the thinking behind punting.
Now, the big, old topic. Brandon Staley. I recognise that on this topic I might be as stubborn as the man himself, but that’s because I think my opinion on it has been gestating for longer, and considers more factors, than most other Charger fans. That doesn’t make me right, of course, but nobody could accuse me of not having thought carefully about it. Here’s my key takeaways on the whole topic:
Brandon Staley coaching the Rams Defense to #1 was not some fluke that was based on having Aaron Donald and Jalen Ramsey. Staley got better results from that team than Wade Phillips’ had with equivalent (or better) overall talent in previous years IMO. And, what made that Defense impressive was Staley getting high-level play from previously unknown quantities, like Darious Williams, Morgan Fox, SJD, Leonard Floyd, etc. Fans who say he lucked into a #1 Defense are biased and hate him. I do think Donald and Ramsey obviously help a great deal. But not so much that you can write off any responsibility Staley had for their success.
Staley failed the ultimate test as HC. He was too inexperienced, not ably supported, and was too stubborn. There were some glimmers of hope early, but it petered out badly. The decision to fire him for Jim Harbaugh made perfect sense. No qualms with that now.
Staley and his defensive staff did a bad, and probably ‘very bad’, job overall across their three years coaching the Chargers Defense. There’s no real denying it. But were there other factors at play?
I think “Yes”. Mainly because Tom Telesco is pathetic whereas Joe Hortiz is really good. The difference is in their abilities is, frankly, pretty ridiculous. Yes, Staley was involved in decisions about which players suit his scheme. But, it is the GM’s job to evaluate and manage talent acquisition and it wasn’t done well from 2021-2023. At least not from a depth perspective.
Importantly, it is very unfortunate that one of the marquee players for that regime, JC Jackson, suffered what has turned out to be essentially a career-ending injury almost immediately after signing. A big, salary cap draining, nasty injury like that torpedoed a lot of the plans for the team, and people overlook that three years is really not a very big sample size given the vicissitudes of the NFL, and close margins. In that three-year window window, if there is a ‘bust’ signing or two (remember, Austin Johnson also suffered a serious injury that impacted his availability and play), then you can be in a lot of strife as a DC, and quickly.
Where were the signings from Telesco of players like Fulton, Molden and Tart? That is, cheap veteran depth that give a HC/DC the ability to overcome injuries and not be forced to roll out hopeless cases to play starting snaps. Bosa and Mack also were rarely healthy together under Staley. It is what it is.
By contrast, Minter right now has almost every defensive player available and I would argue it’s a more talented overall defensive roster, because Hortiz and his staff have drafted very well and made good decisions in free agency. For Eboigbe, Still, Vidal and Rice all to be Inactive speaks volumes and highlights the differences. Day 3 picks under Telesco would see the field earlier in their career than would be ideal in a properly run team.
Staley could still be a good DC in the League. He’s learning about a different system at the moment in SF and will patiently have to bide his team for another chance.
Minter looks to be a much better DC than Staley. It’s been two only two weeks but it certainly seems that way. The heavy rotation of players, simpler system, game planning, unique modular call sheet, and quality assistant coaches have all looked great through two weeks. Maybe if Staley was only a DC (with no HC responsibilities) he’d be pretty good too. But that’s not the comparison here. It’s Staley as HC/DC v Minter as DC. And Minter is off to a dominant start.
So I’m sorry man, if you were patient enough to read all that, you didn’t get your public confession. But you got a lot of “wind” from the “Windy City Man”.
Thanks for listening!
“I’m just a little nervous about how that approach might play out against Mahomes, Allen, Burrow, Lamar”
If Harbaugh is not aggressive on fourth down against those QBs, we will be in full agreement.
As for Staley, I appreciate your stubborness. We can agree to disagree. The only further two issues i would take is the Wade Phillips reference. Wade was one of the great DCs of his era. Not a great HC but a phenomenal DC. If anything Staley benefitted from the capital built up under Wade. But to even put them in the same sentence as comparable DCs or suggest Staley was somehow better as a DC is beyond the pale to me. Not even in the same galaxy capability wise when it comes to the DC role. I would argue a better comparison was in their roles as an HC.
Secondly, I take your point on Telesco but Staley started a disastrous Murray all season and left Henley on the bench. That is one example and it is on him not TT.
I hated the Henley decision-making and it was one of my biggest critiques of Staley. But then this offseason I listened to Henley in an interview saying that he nursed a hamstring injury for the majority of last season that stopped him from moving at 100% and kept him to a Special Teams role. So now I don’t really know what to do with that information.
I really don’t mind discussing this topic by the way because it raises all the philosophical questions about sport that I find interesting: Do bad owners in the NFL fire coaches too quickly? Are fans too impatient for team success to be trusted when evaluating their own coordinators/coaches (Ravens fans online will say we are moronic for Greg Roman, for example)? Can coaches have a disastrous season and then turn things around if ownership ignores fans and keeps the faith?
I like those questions and enjoy considering the impact that recency bias and/or other cognitive biases have on our sporting opinions as fans (including my own!). So I’ve got no issues with the debating the topic.
I think the biggest concession I’m willing to make is that after the 2022 season I made a big public pitch to overlook the Jacksonville debacle, stay the course, and trust that Brandon Staley would bounceback in 2023 and show us he’s a good head coach with a third consecutive winning season and playoff run. That obviously never materialised and the data/insights I used to persuade readers that the team would be really good in 2023, all turned out not to be valid. I was wrong in my forecasting. I like getting predictions correct, so I’m pissed off I got it wrong. But I will never be on the side of the fans on Twitter who ridicule Staley, think he’s a college-quality sports coach, and talk about him being one of the worst coaches ever. I think he made his own bed to lie in with respect to 2023, but I also think he could have had a better support system at the ownership and GM level which can be particularly relevant for a younger, inexperienced coach. But he also did plenty of things wrong.
Loving the Harbaugh experience so far though. Seeing the puppet master at work surrounded by very good assistants and a much better front office has been a real treat.
Great Clips here to get a closer look at some portions of the game. a few things I have noticed from watching back the first game and some clips of the Panther game.
1. Herb looks a little shaky in the pocket and not decisive on when to tuck and run. His pick in the Raider game could have been avoided by taking the space in front of him for a 5-6 yard gain on the ground. In the clip you posted showing the tackle play, Herb has a clean pocket, yet he steps into trouble and then instead of tucking it and trying to push forward for a few yards, he elects to make a difficult, off target throw that is incomplete. Not sure if he is still gaining faith in his line, or he is not comfortable with the offense yet, but he has not looked completely confident in a game yet. I would really like to see him settle in and get into a rhythm in this offense, especially in the passing offense, because there will be a game where the rushing attack stalls and we will need to lean on it to win. I would feel better about that situation if I have seen it displayed for a few series first.
2. Fulton has been an unsung hero in this defense. He has made ton of unselfish plays where he is blowing up blocks or taking on bigger linemen in space to seal the edge for his teammates. Not every player’s impact is felt in the stat sheet and Fulton is an example of that. I am sure he has been praised for these plays in the film room as these are the types of under the radar plays that make the defense formidable.
3. Derwin has not really been used as a box safety as compared to past schemes. I have always felt that Derwin would best be used as the Steelers used Polamalu, where he lined up all over the LOS and had to be accounted for every play and could just as easily be blitzing as he would be dropping back into coverage. Maybe Minter has not rolled out all his plans for Derwin yet, or maybe he wants to get the defense more comfortable with the scheme before he gets more exotic? Either way, you cannot argue with the success of the defense the last two weeks, but hopefully there is more in the bag to deploy Derwin.
4. I wonder if the lack of a true pass catching RB is the reason we have not seen many screen or draw plays? It seemed like it would have been a logical way to slow Crosby down the first week and accentuate the athleticism of our OL. Maybe there is more to come in this phase?
5. This offense needs Chark to open up the field. McConkey has been great using his elusiveness and wiggle to get open on short to medium routes and QJ has been thrown a couple of 9 routes, but there does not seem to be enough pure speed on the field to threaten the defense vertically. You would think with the dominance of the run game, some of those verticals would be more open with PA passes, but even that has not gained us much separation vertically as would be expected.
Of course, everything I mentioned comes from a small sample size of two games, but as of now that is all we can measure against. I am sure as the season unfolds, there will be more to come in some of these areas. Great job with the pod as usual. Welcome Back Alister!!!
Herbert’s PFF Grade has been <60.0 in each of Wk 1 & 2 (which is the first time in his career with consecutive game grades below 60.0). And watching the film, I think those grades have been fair. If you follow Steven Haglund on X, he posted a clip showing that on Herbert’s INT v the Panthers he had McConkey wide ass open on a deep curl (where the play was designed to go), Herbert was staring straight at it, clean pocket, chose not to throw it, bailed and then forced the bad throw for the INT. And it was a 1st & 10. Uncharacteristic of him to make an error upon an error like that. And I also saw two other occasions from the Coach’s film that I didn’t post about, where Herbert turned down open intermediate throws (one was to McConkey again, the other was to a TE on a wheel off play action) and chose a short completion instead. On the podcast this week, we talked about the psychology of Herbert being asked to do less in this Offense, and whether having fewer pass attempts is impacting his rhythm and mindset. Ultimately, it’s too small a sample size to be concerned. He missed some time this offseason; it’s a new playcaller. He’s finding chemistry with some new receivers. I think he’ll be firing on all cylinders before too long. But…if he doesn’t…we can start to explore the role that Greg Roman’s playcalling might be having on Herbert. Roman called the “Hank” concept twice in the first half last week. The exact same playcall with Herbert hitting Dissly on a 6-7 yard sit route. When your playcaller calls plays that have a max. potential yardage of <10 yards, then naturally the QB may start to play more conservatively. But that is the philosophy of this style of Offense. And through two weeks we can’t make any sweeping conclusions, so we simply watch on with bated breath.
Superb start from Fulton. It begun at training camp, continued into the preseason, and he’s been excellent through two weeks of the regular season. Obviously, the team has faced two below average QBs and he’s also been allowed to play off the line of scrimmage in a scheme that isn’t asking him to play one-on-one against the opposition’s best receiver. But he can only do what he’s being ask to do, and so far, he’s played at a high-level. It really shows the value of short term “prove it” deals during free agency.
Agree on Derwin. Gilman’s injury impacted his utilisation this week I think. Although Molden was predominantly the deep safety, I thought Derwin also played further away from the LoS than he would have if Gilman was there. Slow(ish) start for Derwin this season. It’s interesting that the team’s two superstars (Herbert & Derwin) are each showing signs of frustration on the field (Herbert yelling at Matlock; Derwin punching the ground twice following missed chances to blow up the ball carrier). They need to start buying into the mindset that they’re no longer being asked to carry this football team. If they focus on doing their job on each snap, the big plays will come.
Kimani Vidal hasn’t been given a shot yet to catch passes out of the backfield. I think he will be good at that. But for now, the team clearly prefers the RB3 to be a Special Teams contributor and Roman is prepared to live with no true pass-catching RB. It’s limiting the passing game but they seem happy enough to hammer the running game instead. Again, it’s too early to be critical of Greg Roman but Herbert not having an outlet dunk the ball off to regularly is noticeable on the broadcast/tape.
Agree, agree, agree. Interesting that they use Derius Davis on orbits but never really try him on true vertical routes from the X. Chark should bring a fresh element to this Offense when he’s healthy
Thanks mate, had a great break for 4 nights down by the coast. Feeling refreshed and we’re expecting the baby to arrive sometime around mid-November, so not long to go now!
Posting a dozen Coach 217;s Film clips from the Panthers game that I thought were important or interesting:
Clip #1 :
Clip #2 :
Clip #3 :
Clip #4 :
Clip #5 :
Clip #6 : https://twitter.com/TDU_Chargers/status/1836188935866978395
Clip #7 : https://twitter.com/TDU_Chargers/status/1836192453948510306
Clip #8 : https://twitter.com/TDU_Chargers/status/1836192456695779384
Clip #9 : https://twitter.com/TDU_Chargers/status/1836194652019646726
Clip #1 0 : https://twitter.com/TDU_Chargers/status/1836197290773803010
Clip #1 1 : https://twitter.com/TDU_Chargers/status/1836199216894689606
Clip #1 2 : https://twitter.com/TDU_Chargers/status/1836202341223248061
Wow! thanks for these clips and commentary. I don’t think this last one expresses undo amount of “frustration.” It’s more like, “Aw, shouldda had that one.”
I won’t get up at 1 a.m. to watch, but will not look at any scores until after I’ve watched it. Tried that last week and it worked well. Will do the same for the Chiefs vs. Atlanta. Better to watch not knowing the outcome.