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JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — At three minutes past midnight in the visitors’ subdued locker room, more than half an hour after the latest debacle in his franchise’s troubled history, Justin Herbert sat at his locker and faced his shocked teammates. He wore a thousand-yard look and was still clad to his bare feet in shoulder pads and the full Los Angeles Chargers uniform. He thought of the game that had just happened, a dream that had turned into a nightmare. He had only just begun to anticipate the consequences of an impossible collapse.
Across the room, teammates packed their bags and hugged goodbye. Equipment workers rolled out carts. They murmured expletives in low tones. A Charger blurted out to a teammate, “This is something we’re going to have to answer for for the rest of our damn lives.”
The Chargers suffered a heartbreak in the playoffs so ingrained they only need one image to open the wounds: Nate Kaeding’s lower leg, Marlon McCree’s fumble, Philip Rivers’ cruciate ligament rupture. Saturday night at TIAA Bank Field may have topped them all. The Chargers lost 31-30 to the Jacksonville Jaguars, despite building a 27-0 lead in the first half when they intercepted Trevor Lawrence four times. Blessed with Herbert’s ballistic quarterback, they only scored three points in the last 34 minutes. Armed with the pass-rushing power of Joey Bosa and Khalil Mack, they took 24 points at halftime.
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The Chargers immediately melted and collapsed under the weight of their own history. They committed a series of undisciplined penalties, including Bosa’s helmet slam that turned the game. They defended Jacksonville’s fast attack as if the Jaguars had performed alchemy. They missed a 40-yard field goal. They delivered a final drive highlighted by Travis Etienne’s 25-yard run on the fourth down that set up Riley Patterson’s 36-yard field goal that won the game. In the language that applies to them today more than ever, they charged.
“I’ve seen this movie too many times,” said Chargers tight end Gerald Everett.
The future is now a question for Los Angeles. Coach Brandon Staley came into the game under fire for choosing to play his starters in a Week 18 game irrelevant to standings, resulting in star wideout Mike Williams suffering a broken bone in his back and was ruled out for the game against the Jaguars. That decision, combined with Saturday night’s disaster, could convince Los Angeles to seek a new coach with the ability to coach Herbert to the top contenders, starting with Sean Payton.
Firing Staley would be easier said than paid, especially for a franchise that rents at its home stadium and is building a new practice facility. Staley has two years left on his contract. Securing Payton would not only require sending draft compensation to the New Orleans Saints, but also a contract that will likely reset the coaching pay market. What the charger owner wants to do is one thing. What it can afford could be another.
If Staley survives, he will enter the 2023 season under immense pressure. The gift of Herbert, a quarterback on a bargain contract who can throw shots even peers only dream of, went unfulfilled. He’s only in his third season. But quarterbacks of his pedigree, when properly supported, thrive at this stage. Patrick Mahomes won the Super Bowl in his third season. Draft classmate Joe Burrow made it to the Super Bowl as the runner-up. Herbert suffered a disastrous defeat in his only appearance in the playoffs. It’s an organizational failure, from team owner Dean Spanos to general manager Tom Telesco to Staley.
“It’s the hardest way to lose in the playoffs,” Staley said. “With the way we started the game, that’s certainly the team I know we’re capable of. We just didn’t finish the game.”
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The Chargers’ litany of self-inflicted damage could be repurposed as an instruction manual on how to waste a season. The Chargers should have built a bigger lead first — they hit two field goals from inside the Jaguars 5-yard line in the first half, including one after Herbert Keenan missed Allen wide open in the zone. And inflating that lane started with a seemingly harmless slip.
Towards the end of the second quarter, the Chargers, with a 27-0 lead, had the chance to control the ball until halftime. On the third and one, they called a play that involved a “kill” to another play: They would run to center unless Herbert saw a specific defensive alignment at the line, in which case he would switch to the second play – one end – around to a receiver that is in motion.
There was a problem and it made the game selection confusing. All week, the Chargers had been practicing the game, with veteran wideout DeAndre Carter taking over the handoff. But Carter was sidelined mid-game with an injury. So the Chargers instead tried to put an end to Michael Bandy, a 5-foot-10, 190-pound wide receiver from the University of San Diego who had never made a handover in his two-year NFL career.
Here the Chargers were in a nutshell: a misguided coaching decision based on a lack of depth in a premium position. Bandy collided with Herbert and swallowed the handoff by diving on the ball five yards behind the line. The resulting punt allowed the Jaguars possession with plenty of time remaining before halftime, which they used to score their first touchdown.
On the Jaguars’ first possession of the second half, which followed the Chargers’ faltering drive, Bosa lined up in the neutral zone in what would have been a drive-killing sack from Mack. Etienne grabbed a first-down reception in the next game and Lawrence hit wide receiver Marvin Jones Jr. three games later. A blowout had suddenly turned into a two-possession game.
“That’s the halftime swing right there,” Jones said. “It was all.”
The Chargers seemed to stabilize with a nearly seven-minute drive in the fourth quarter and held a 30-20 lead. Forgoing his trademark four-down aggression, Staley opted for a 40-yard field goal that Cameron Dicker hooked to the left of the goalposts.
“Time just freezes,” Everett said. “They start rallying, they come back, they build their morale. Your confidence grows. All we could do was sit back and watch.”
The Jaguars sped up the field again, capitalizing on the fast pace that changed the game until Lawrence found Christian Kirk for a 9-yard touchdown. Bosa slammed his helmet as he left the field, drawing his second personal foul of the game. The penalty convinced coach Doug Pederson to go for two. Lawrence jumped the line from the 1, meaning Patterson’s field goal would win it instead of sending the game into overtime.
The Chargers managed five yards on three and in response. The Jaguars used Etienne’s breakout at the right end as the linchpin of their game win. Until the very end, the Chargers had no answer to the Jaguars’ racy attack, which challenged Staley’s reputation as a defensive guru. Safety Drue Tranquill said it exposed Los Angeles’ underperforming conditioning and tackling.
“We have to be able to get our cleats in the grass and not have any punctures,” said Tranquill. “We gave them a couple of explosive games only on breakdowns. Coach Staley said earlier in the week: “We have to get them to beat us.” We beat ourselves.
“When it’s 27-0, you fully expect to win the game in defense. It shouldn’t matter what the offense is doing. If you’re 27-0, you should win the game defensively.”
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The Chargers’ mistakes met headfirst with Lawrence, a 23-year study of balance, resilience and the virtues of a quality conditioner. He completed four of his first 16 passes and threw four interceptions, three of them against cornerback Asante Samuel Jr., becoming the first quarterback since Craig Morton in the 1978 Super Bowl to throw four picks in the first half of a playoff game. After his fourth interception, Lawrence completed 24 of his last 31 passes for 258 yards and four touchdowns.
“I knew he was fine anyway because he’s that guy,” Jones said. “If he’s throwing four picks or throwing 500 yards, he’s the same guy. He has that calmness about him. So it’s easy to get behind him.”
The triumph will probably come for Herbert, but on Saturday evening he had to digest shock and disappointment. Finally he got up from his seat and put on a jogging suit. He walked into his post-game press conference with his head held high. “Sorry to keep you waiting,” he said.
“It’s really tough because we think a lot of our team,” said Herbert. “This is a special group of guys in this dressing room. They deserved better, and it didn’t go our way. Definitely hard to process but I have to keep going.”
The Chargers need to determine which coach will lead them next year, whether it’s Staley or someone new. Staley was wearing a black backpack with the Chargers logo on it late Saturday night. His wife squeezed his shoulder as he walked down the tunnel from the dressing room. He walked to the team bus, past equipment trucks and an ambulance, out of another Chargers fiasco and into an uncertain future.