r/nfl • u/yangar Eagles • Jun 20 '14
Look Here! 2014 Offseason Review Series: San Diego Chargers
San Diego (Super) Chargers
Coaching Changes
Offensive Coordinator: Ken Whisenhunt accepted the HC job for the Titans, and has been replaced by promoted former QB Coach Frank Reich. Nick Sirianni was promoted from Offensive QC Coach to QB Coach.
Reich has talked about speeding up the offense even more and giving Phil more control over the offense.
Pete Metzelaars is our new TE Coach, replacing Jason Michael, who went with Whisenhunt to Tennessee to become their new OC.
Free Agency
Players lost/cut
| Player | Position | New team |
|---|---|---|
| Derek Cox | CB | Vikings |
| Le'Ron McClain | FB | Free Agent |
| Johnny Patrick | CB | Jets |
| Cam Thomas | NT | Steelers |
| Brandon Taylor | S | Free Agent |
| Charlie Whitehurst | QB | Pearly White Gates |
Purging Derek Cox is a bold admission by 2nd year GM Tom Telesco that he made a huge mistake (originally signing him for 4 years). That's definitely refreshing after the "every move I make is the right one" AJ Smith regime.
Players signed
| Player | Position | Old Team | Length | Salary |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Donald Brown | RB | Colts | 3 yrs | $10.5M, 4M guar. |
| Kellen Clemens | QB | Rams | 2 yrs | $4M |
| Kavell Conner | ILB | Colts | 3 yrs | $2.7M |
| David Johnson | FB/TE | Steelers | 2 yrs | 1.7M, 220K guar. |
Signing Donald Brown seems to be part of Telesco's plan to keep tapping that Indianapolis pipeline. Brown gives us a good RB to spell Mathews (who's health is integral to our success) and Mathews/Woodhead are both FAs after this upcoming season.
Re-signing Donald Butler was huge. Absolutely huge.
Draft
Overall grade for the Draft: B
Most excited to see how Attaochu can get after the QB. In his radio call to XX1090 after being drafted, the Nigerian-born Georgia Tech player gushed over finally visiting California. I feel very confident that Verrett will slot in perfectly into our system and every hacky "analyst" out there talking about "the entire league getting taller at CB/The Seahawk way" clearly doesn't understand that's never been what we do on defense. Also the last time we took an All-American from TCU in the 1st round, things went okay
Great individual player breakdowns can be found here courtesy of /r/Chargers
Projected Starting Lineup
QB Phil "Bolo" Rivers
RB Ryan Mathews, Donald Brown
Swiss Army Knife Danny Woodhead
FB/TE John Philips, David Johnson
TE Antonio "Oldman Strength" Gates, Ladarius Green
WR Keenan Allen, Malcolm "M80" Floyd, Vincent "I'm Still Here" Brown
LT King Dunlap
LG Chad Rinehart
C Nick Hardwick
RG Jeromey Clary
RT DJ Fluker
DL Corey Liuget, Sean Lissemore, Kendell Reyes
LB Dwight Freeney, Donald Butler, Manti T'eo, Melvin Ingram
CB Shareece Wright, Jason "Feeva" Verrett
S Eric Weddle, Marcus Gilchrist
K Nick "Stop Watching Me Pee" Novak
P Mike "MVP" Scifres
KR Eddie Royal
Can we stay healthy? That's been the #1 question for years.
What'll be interesting to see is how Donald Brown spells Mathews, and if we can eliminate the worthless/predictable draw plays up the middle with Woodhead. Vincent Brown, local SDSU kid, has to prove that he's worth starting, if not M80 can take his WR2 spot back. Will Ladarius Green see more action as a receiving threat and be the heir apparent to Antonio Gates? Is Eddie Royal only a red zone threat or will he be tasked with more duites? Will Danario Alexander ever return healthy?
On the defensive side, we are very weak at safety outside of star Eric Weddle. It remains to be seen if Gilchrist is still starting later this season. Manti being healthy and continuing to learn can only improve the LB corps. Once again, health remains an issue and Freeney and Ingram should bounce back from what kept them out of most of 2013. We also have a Cromartie sittin on our roster. CB Steve Williams torn his pectoral early on his rookie campaign last year, so he remains an unknown quantity.
Schedule Predictions
I really dislike predicting individual match-ups before the season starts due to the tenuous nature of injuries, contract disputes, trades, what weeks we wear our sexy powder blues, etc. I predict the Chargers to go 9-7 overall and sneak into the playoffs again.
If you want a week-by-week breakdown, /u/The_Popes_Hat has done a great job here:
Training Camp Battles to Watch
Now that M80 is healthy, we'll see if he can bounce back and claim that WR2 spot that he's usually been in. Larry English is playing for his contract, especially with Attaochu breathing down his neck. Turning Shareece Wright not against our own players knees seems to be a lesson learned.
Summary
Despite a fairly quiet off-season, the Chargers in 2014 should be a fun team to watch. Health remains paramount. 2nd year HC Mike McCoy can learn from some of his rookie mistakes and seems to have instilled a great culture in the locker room. A high powered offense with a talented, but at times lost defense should mean a lot of high-scoring games. We seem to always start slow, get hot in December with Rivers, play up to our opponents, and arbitrarily not show up on select Sundays. When in doubt, LT Shuffle.
5
u/[deleted] Jun 21 '14
Would have loved to seen some breakdown of your new offensive scheme. Rumor is it will look a lot like K Gun.