[et_pb_section admin_label=”section”]
[et_pb_row admin_label=”row”]
[et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Text”]
We’ve just released Episode 116 of the Thunder Down Under Chargers Podcast.
Our synopsis for Episode 116 is below:
Training Camp has begun and with it came the symbolic retirement of Philip Rivers and the shock retirement of Mike Williams! We dive into what this means for the Chargers Offense and share our other Training Camp Takeaways from the week. Afterwards, we continue our 2025 Opponents Series venturing deeper South within the AFC. Are the Texans a sleeping giant? Is Steichen one unsuccessful season away from becoming Bolts fans #1 Target for Chargers OC? Can Cam Ward pick the Titans up off the mat and in Duuuuuuuuvalll have the Jags hired another fizzer? Join us as we break it all down!”
You can also listen on Spotify below (or download on audio wherever you like to listen to podcasts):
As always, you can support us by doing any or all of the following:
– Rec’ing this post and leaving any thoughts/feedback you have in the comments section below.
– Following us on Twitter (and ‘liking’ our tweets) at @TDU_Chargers, or individually, at @TDU_Alister, @TDU_Jack and @TDU_Andy.
– ‘Subscribing’ to our YouTube channel, clicking the ‘Like’ button for today’s episode, and engaging with us in the comments section.
– Giving us a rating and leaving a review on the Thunder Down Under Podcast page on Apple Podcasts (and ‘subscribing’).
– Spreading the good word to all of your awesome Chargers friends and family and encouraging them to listen to our show (and engage with us on social media).
Hope you enjoy the episode! Thanks so much for listening 
Alister (@TDU_Alister)
Good show.
Nice comments on Rivers. He is the reason I am a Chargers fan. I don’t really agree with Al’s characterization that he played hero ball late in his career. I am reminded of his final Chargers press conference:
There are many great quotes in there, but this sums him up: “I ain’t quittin.”
@tau837 He’s simply the best. Love him to death.
Maybe the ‘hero ball’ characterisation was a little unfair. But hopefully you understood generally what I was referring to:
- That 2019 season was challenging for fans after a strong 2018 performance.
- Rivers threw 20 INTs (74.3 Overall Grade), had the highest Turnover Worth Play % of his career (4.5%, +0.6% higher than his next worst figure in 2007) and there was that stretch of games (the 3 INTs against the Raiders followed by 4 INTs the next week against the Chiefs) where it felt like he was forcing things and had lost faith in everything around him.
- He ended the season with 5 INTs in his final 3 games and it felt like the end for him as a Charger.
- Some fans even started to turn on him.
I wish his career with the team ended differently, but the end is rarely kind in professional sports.
Still. He was a stalwart and sensational servant of the sport.
@alisterlloyd Because I am such a huge Rivers fan, I have spent a lot of time analyzing and defending his play throughout his career wherever I post about the Chargers. For that reason, I have a lot of counterpoints to the popular narrative about him at the end of 2019, that he was washed. (Not saying you thought that.)
I enjoyed going back and reading some of my material, so I’m going to post some of it here.
Consider what he dealt with in 2019:
- Pass blocking ranked by PFF as #31 in the league.
- Also, consider that the LT pass blocking – Rivers’ blind side – was bottom of NFL level for most of the season. Per PFF:
- Okung allowed 5 pressures in 262 snaps
- Pipkins allowed 15 pressures in 251 snaps (245 snaps at LT)
- Scott allowed 48 pressures in 827 snaps (564 snaps at LT)
- Scott and Pipkins also combined for 13 penalties. They were practice squad players at best, starting at LT to protect Rivers’ blindside, and they did a terrible job at it, which affected his play.
- Okung played at least 80% of the offensive snaps in 4 games – weeks 8 (CHI), 9 (GB), 13 (@DEN), 14 (@JAX).
- Rivers was 76/108 (70%) for 1074 yards (9.9 YPA), 6 passing TDs, and 2 interceptions in those games.
- That is a 112.6 passer rating, and the Chargers were 3-1, losing by 3 points at Denver.
- Of his 32 incompletions, 6 were drops and 5 were throwaways.
- Also, consider that the LT pass blocking – Rivers’ blind side – was bottom of NFL level for most of the season. Per PFF:
- OC Whisenhunt was fired after week 8.
- The running game was weak — 28th in yards and anchored by Melvin Gordon, who averaged 3.8 ypc.
- Gordon’s holdout had a huge negative impact on the season. The coaching staff forced him into the lineup immediately upon his return, despite the fact that he clearly wasn’t ready and Ekeler was playing great. That disrupted the offense for several weeks.
- Lost #3 and #4 WRs early in the season. After Allen and Mike Williams, the WR with the most snaps was Andre Patton. If you said, who? the answer is, he is the WR who ranked #218 out of 220 graded WRs in PFF receiving grade.
- Also lost TE Henry for 4 games.
The popular narrative focused mainly on his interceptions, but consider that despite the stuff above:
- His on-target percentage was 76.7%, which was #10 in the league and better than Wilson, Rodgers, Brady, Ryan, Wentz, Jackson, and Stafford, among others
- His bad throw percentage was 15%, which was #7 (7th lowest) in the league and better than Mahomes, Wilson, Rodgers, Brady, Cousins, Wentz, Watson, Jackson, and Stafford, among others
- He was #7 in pass attempts but #3 in completions and #4 in passing yards
- He was #4 in deep passing attempts yet was still #10 in overall completion percentage
2018-2020 turnover breakdown:
- 2018: 13 interceptions, 2 fumbles, and 1 fumble lost = 14 turnovers in 18 games = 0.8 turnovers per game
- 2019 (first 9 games): 7 interceptions, 4 fumbles, and 1 fumble lost = 8 turnovers in 9 games = 0.9 turnovers per game
- 2019 (last 7 games): 13 interceptions, 4 fumbles, and 1 fumble lost = 14 turnovers in 7 games = 2.0 turnovers per game
- In addition to the details posted above about the 2019 season, note that starting LT Okung missed 3 of these games and starting C Pouncey missed all of them… their two best OL
- 2020: 11 interceptions, 2 fumbles, and 1 fumble lost = 12 turnovers in 17 games = 0.7 turnovers per game
The turnover narrative for Rivers in 2019 was popular but misleading. He had a 7 game stretch that was clearly an outlier, and there were reasons for it beyond his play alone.
Rivers was always a bit prone to interceptions. Certainly that is mostly his fault, but some of it also goes to coaching and teammates. And there is obviously luck involved sometimes. Off the top of my head, I know in 2019 1 of his interceptions was batted at the line and another was when Hunter Henry fell down coming out of his break. At least 4 others came in desperate end game scenarios, like 4th and 17, etc. In some of those situations, other QBs would take the checkdowns and let the clock expire, whereas Rivers is trying to make plays downfield.
I go back to Rivers’ press conference. He said: “Those that know, know.” I completely agree with his point, that his play in 2019 was considerably better than the media narrative. He proved it with the Colts in 2020.
Sorry for the long diatribe. That was a good visit down memory lane about my favorite player.
In conclusion, yes, I believe the “hero ball” characterization was inaccurate and unfair.
Sorry for the long diatribe. That was a good visit down memory lane about my favorite player.
Don’t apologise for what was a fun read! I’d forgotten how much you loved Philthy 😉
I suppose there are two types of ‘hero ball’:
- The one where a QB tries to do too much when he doesn’t really have to (I’m thinking Jameis Winston here).
- The one where a QB tries to do too much because they feel like that’s their only choice given their surrounding cast or game situation. I think Rivers did a bit of this.
BTW, I agree there was much blame to be shared in 2019. You’ve laid out all the issues.
But I do recall watching those 2019 games thinking that Rivers was more at fault than he ever had been in the past for the Chargers woes. And I think his TWP rate being as high as it was (4th highest in the NFL of QBs who played 50% of snaps that season behind only Kyle Allen, Daniel Jones and Jameis Windston) is difficult to completely explain away by surrounding cast (even if some of those were the late-game scenarios you mentioned).
I wasn’t as keen a watcher of All-22 back then, but it seemed to me watching broadcast at the time that Rivers would take greater risks post-snap in 2019 than usual, sometimes ignoring coverage rotation and chucking the ball up to his receivers, possibly due to his frustration at the pass protection and the way the season was unfolding. The Chiefs game, in particular, was brutal.
FWIW, I thought he did some of this early in the 2020 Colts season too (Jacksonville Wk 1 and Cleveland Wk 5 had some ugly turnovers).
I don’t think he ended his career playing quite at the level he once had. Not many do. But maybe you don’t agree with that and that’s fine too.
I suppose there are two types of ‘hero ball’:
- The one where a QB tries to do too much when he doesn’t really have to (I’m thinking Jameis Winston here).
- The one where a QB tries to do too much because they feel like that’s their only choice given their surrounding cast or game situation. I think Rivers did a bit of this.
I agree he did this. I guess it is the term “hero ball” I don’t like because it is typically used as a negative. As you say here, sometimes Rivers felt he had no choice. I don’t think taking greater risk in that situation should be viewed as negatively as it was.
Another thing I think contributed to Rivers throwing more interceptions than others at times was his trust that if he threw it up to Vincent Jackson, Malcom Floyd, Mike Williams, et al., they would make the play. I think Rivers was more inclined to do that than most modern QBs of his caliber. It led to a lot of big plays but also some interceptions. In 2019, for example, 8 of his interceptions were targets for Williams.
FWIW, I thought he did some of this early in the 2020 Colts season too (Jacksonville Wk 1 and Cleveland Wk 5 had some ugly turnovers).
I remember him getting heavily criticized after the Cleveland game in week 5 in 2020. But I also remember he played without his LT1, WR2, WR3, and RB1 in that game.
He was criticized for an intentional grounding safety, when he threw it out of bounds in the area where his receiver would have ended up on his corner route, but pressure accelerated his clock, and the receiver wasn’t there yet.
It was evident after the play that Rivers was telling the refs that his receiver was running a corner route; they didn’t care (not criticizing them, they penalize the result, not what it might/should have been).
That was an unfortunate outcome, but understandable with context. I would put that particular issue more on the play call, with a long developing corner route on a play where the dropback was in the end zone against a pass rush that had been consistently generating pressure.
I don’t think he ended his career playing quite at the level he once had. Not many do.
I completely agree with that. Rivers’ peak was 2008-2010. He played well in most of the seasons from 2011 to 2020, but not like that peak.
However, the Colts were 11-5 in 2020, the only time they have reached 11 regular season wins and only the second time they made the playoffs in the past 10 seasons. They were very competitive in their playoff loss to a very good Buffalo team.
The QB play Rivers provided for the Colts in 2020 is the best they have had since 2018 (Luck’s last season) and counting. I doubt that will change this season, and it’s difficult to predict how many more years it will be before they find a QB that good.
@tau837 Good discussion. Love Rivers. I was at the Charger/Falcon game with my dad at the old Georgia Dome (which was much nicer than Qualcomm) when Phil led the Chargers to an OT win – last game I saw Rivers play in person (and last game I went to with my dad).
Good points by you and Al. I think it highlights how Telesco and John Spanos let Phil down for his entire career. In 2019, the coaching was horrible, the OL was horrible and, as per usual, there was no depth and no plan for adversity.
I thought Lynn, in particular, threw Rivers under the bus. He blamed Wisenhunt and then convinced TT/JS to kick Rivers to the curb in favor of Tyrod Taylor, which is an all-time bonehead decision. In 2020, Phil lead he Colts to their only playoff appearance this decade (and was easily their best QB this decade), while Taylor was and is still a backup. For as much shit that (deservedly) gets thrown at Staley, I thought Lynn was equally terrible (and maybe worse). I can’t believe that Telesco hired, McVisor, Lynn and Staley. Three very bad, not good, poor coaches. Such a disservice to Phil.
I remember a story circulating in 2013 where someone saw Andy Reid at the airport and asked him if he had interest in coaching the Chargers (I think Reid was on his way to meet with the Chiefs). His response was essentially fuck no. Asked why, he said Charger ownership. He then took the Chiefs job and has dominated the division ever since. Wonder what Andy could have done with Phil. If I ever find a portal to alternate universes, I’m going to find the one where Reid took the Chargers job and he and Phil won 7 consecutive super bowls.
[/et_pb_row]
[/et_pb_section]
