The Chargers opened the 2023 calendar year by blowing a 27-3 lead against Jacksonville on Wild Card Weekend and losing 30-27. Once they returned to the field to commence the next season, a 4-4 start was followed by a 1-8 finish, closing the season at 5-12. These eight losses to end the year involved a 63-21 beatdown suffered at the hands of the Raiders, an outcome that directly resulted in the firings of both head coach Brandon Staley and general manager Tom Telesco. The 5-12 record is Los Angeles’ worst since 2019.
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What Went Right
Khalil Mack and Keenan Allen stepped up once again to become 2023 Pro Bowlers for the Chargers. Mack enjoyed a return to form in 2023, recording 17 sacks, good for both a career-high season in the sacks category and fourth overall amongst defenders in the league. His best outing of 2023 occurred in a Week 4 win over the Raiders where he recorded six sacks. The rest of his teammates combined for just one.
Khalil Mack having another one of those games. 5 sacks of Aidan O'Connell..
pic.twitter.com/z4cDihYG0Y— Smart Football (@SmartfootbalI) October 1, 2023
For Allen, he recorded 1,243 receiving yards and seven touchdowns in 13 starts. His best outing of 2023 occurred in the aforementioned Week 3 game when Mike Williams went down for the season, where he caught 18 passes for 215 yards to help lead the Chargers to victory that afternoon. However, a heel injury ended the veteran’s season four games early.
What Went Wrong
Mike Williams’s torn ACL was the first significant injury the Chargers suffered in 2023. This injury occurred during the Chargers’ first win of the season during a performance where Williams hauled in seven catches for 121 yards and a score. Williams’s presence was sorely missed in an offensive unit that sank from being in the front half of scoring offenses in 2022 to the 21st-best unit in 2023.
But there were no worse injuries for the Chargers to suffer than Justin Herbert’s season-ending finger fracture in Week 14. Easton Stick had to assume control of the offense from then on and the Chargers plummeted, losing all of their final four games where they scored an average of 16 points per contest. Extrapolated over an entire season, the Chargers would have been a bottom-five scoring offense with Stick as their starter.
Team Award Winners
MVP – Justin Herbert
Herbert defines the Chargers. Despite having missed the final four games, the fourth-year quarterback from Oregon still put together a very solid season, throwing for 3,134 yards with 20 touchdowns and only seven interceptions. Those seven interceptions have him in a tie with presumptive MVP front-runner Lamar Jackson. Whoever steps up to become the next coach of the Chargers will have a future MVP in the making to work with.
Justin Herbert is so good that even when he makes a mistake it's a touchdown
— Jason Reed (@EatYourReedies) September 24, 2023
Rookie of the Year – Tuli Tuipulotu
Injuries were found all around the Chargers’ roster. The 54th pick of the 2023 draft rose from third-string linebacker to eventually being a solid force on defense. Tuipulotu made 11 starts, and in those starts, he recorded 4.5 sacks plus one fumble recovery. Just like his older teammate at linebacker, Khalil Mack, Tuipultou would often mystify opposing quarterbacks, as he finished with 51 pressures. Expect the USC alum to progress further in his second campaign with the Chargers.
Best Offseason Addition – Eric Kendricks
The UCLA product came home in 2023 after eight seasons with Minnesota. In his first season as a Charger, Kendricks turned in a solid output. He recorded 117 combined tackles and 3.5 sacks, numbers good enough to make his presence as a dependable face on the defense despite only starting 11 games.
Biggest Surprise – Easton Stick
The man who had to step up to replace Herbert actually had a serviceable four-game stint as the Chargers’ starter. Despite his five fumbles, Stick only threw one interception in the four-plus games he assumed the job. Stick also recorded 1,129 passing yards in these outings, but the three touchdowns he threw all came in the embarrassing Thursday night loss to the Raiders that ended with Staley and Telesco being fired.
Biggest Disappointment – Austin Ekeler
The biggest talking point of last summer was the discussion surrounding how much a team should pay their running backs. That will continue to be heavily discussed this offseason and in years to come. Ekeler himself negotiated a revised contract with the Chargers last summer but disappointed on the field. He regressed from his 2022 output in almost every category. This included a drop from the 13 rushing touchdowns he recorded in 2022 to only five in 2023, plus a similar drop in receiving output as he caught just one touchdown for the entire year.
I did not change the play speed of this video pic.twitter.com/0adSF7jXHE
— Hayden Winks (@HaydenWinks) November 19, 2023
One Burning Question
Can you find the right coach for Justin Herbert?
Most people immediately draw their eyes to Jim Harbaugh. The national champion coach with the Michigan Wolverines, as of this writing, is trending toward ditching the college ranks for a return to the NFL. Harbaugh would love such an opportunity to work with an NFL quarterback in the same way he did with Colin Kaepernick a decade ago, but leaving Michigan won’t be an easy decision, especially after he finally won a National Championship. Possessing the fifth pick in the draft would effectively guarantee the Chargers one of the three top receivers or tight end Brock Bowers, all very good options to supplement Herbert’s supporting cast.
Things are about to ramp up for Jim Harbaugh: It’s believed the #Chargers will speak with him next week, amidst ongoing internal debate in Las Vegas and negotiations with Michigan, which won’t give him up without a fight. Details from me and @RapSheet: https://t.co/MyD2onjoYv
— Tom Pelissero (@TomPelissero) January 13, 2024
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