SURGEON GENERAL’S WARNING: The contents of the following article could be hazardous to the health of older fans of the bygone San Diego Chargers.
This coming weekend’s NFL playoff card unveils a pair of strong favorites, the Baltimore Ravens and the San Francisco 49ers, a pair of No. 1 seeds that have won seven Super Bowls combined.
But here’s one reason the NFL is a $19-billion industry: even when a team opens its Super Bowl tournament at home as a hefty favorite, it’s far from guaranteed that home fans will celebrate at game’s end.
Perhaps Baltimoreans will see their AFC-leading Ravens squash the visiting Houston Texans Saturday behind presumptive league MVP Lamar Jackson.
Perhaps in Santa Clara hours later in their own debut Saturday, the San Francisco 49ers will live up to the NFC’s top seeding and dismiss the Green Bay Packers, who as 9 1/2-point underdog stand half a point behind the Texans.
Three words of advice come from the scarred football elders here in San Diego.
Wait and see.
Seven San Diego Chargers clubs across a span of three decades went into their playoff openers as hefty favorites at home. On those winter days, crowds of up to nearly 70,000 filed into San Diego Stadium/Jack Murphy Stadium/Qualcomm Stadium expecting success from a Bolts team favored by five to 10 points in its Super Bowl tournament debut.
Just two of those teams won.
It was like going to a banquet and being told to leave after one bite.
Sorry, dinner won’t be served. Forget about dessert. Just go home. Now.
The Chargers’ two winners out of those seven: Don Coryell’s 1980 team that beat the Buffalo Bills as a 6-point favorite, 20-14, in the divisional round; and Norv Turner’s first Chargers team that prevailed, 17-6, as a 10-point favorite against the Tennessee Titans in 2008.
I’m sure the nuances of football chess contributed to some of those outcomes.
Philip Rivers, for example, looked confused in the second half of one of those losses. He was facing a Rex Ryan-coached Jets defense that Tom Brady said, after retiring, was as clever as any he faced.
But, the seven games served up lessons that, by and large, weren’t very complicated.
They affirmed football truths older than Bill Belichick, 71.
To win the football game, first don’t lose the football game. Protect the football as though your paycheck depends it.
Make your kicks. Avoid dumb penalties. Don’t panic.
Turning over the ball 15 times and never winning the turnover game factored into the Chargers’ five defeats.
The first of the seven games saw Hall of Fame QB Dan Fouts throw five interceptions in the 1979 club’s loss to the Houston Oilers as an eight-point favorite.
(As for a well-sourced Sports Illustrated report that the Oilers had figured out the Chargers’ sideline signals, Chargers players said even if that were true, the club should’ve been able to adapt.)
The seventh of the seven games served as a sadly apt bookend to the Houston loss.
Pairing the 2009 Chargers against the Jets as a 10-point favorite, it reprised the same outcome, a 17-14 defeat. Rivers threw consecutive second-half interceptions that afternoon against Ryan’s savvy defense headed by Hall of Fame cornerback Darrelle Revis. Turner’s club, his final one to reach the playoffs, committed 10 penalties, some of them silly. Once again, thousands of fans muttered as they descended the old stadium’s circular ramps.
It was the last home playoff game for the San Diego Chargers.
Ordinarily reliable, kicker Nate Kaeding’s misfires contributed to a few of the seven defeats. In the stunning three-point loss to the Oilers — 30 years before Kaeding had three misses against Ryan’s Jets — Houston blocked a short try by Mike Wood.
Kaeding’s game-winning attempt from 40 yards in overtime for the 2004 team went awry, and the Jets, a 6 1/2-point underdog, went on to win, 20-17, on Doug Brien’s 28-yard kick.
Marlon McCree’s fumble came two years later.
In that 24-21 loss to the Patriots, a stunner that homegrown Chargers linebacker Donnie Edwards said he’ll never get over, the home team lost all three of its fumbles and was intercepted once. Did Marty Schottenheimer panic that day, when he went for it on fourth-and-11 rather than have Kaeding try a 47-yard field goal in a stadium where he’d gone 15-for-15 that year?
Chargers sideline personnel wondered if he’d lost track of the down or was overly reacting to criticism of being too conservative in playoff games. The Patriots sacked Rivers on the fourth-and-11 try and drove for a 50-yard field goal that made it 3-0. Five-point underdogs, the Patriots would win by three points, Kaeding missing from 54 with 8 seconds left, a 14-2 season vanishing swirling down the gurgler.
And for the victories:
Ron Smith catching a 50 yard-strike from Fouts gave thousands of “Charger Power” fans a late go-ahead touchdown and an enduring happy memory. His fifth reception for the whole season, Smith’s TD rewarded Jackie Simpson’s defense that got two interceptions from safety Glen Edwards. It was an unusually fierce game. Two Chargers players suffered a broken bone. Others exited after hard hits.
The 17-6 victory by Turner’s first Chargers team affirmed the old reliables about protecting the ball and not panicking. The Chargers stayed poised despite trailing 6-0 at halftime. They ended up with fewer turnovers (one to two) and fewer penalties (five to six). With Jeff Fisher’s Titans stoning a formidable ground game, Rivers turned to receivers Chris Chambers (six catches, 121 yards) and Vincent Jackson (five catches, 114 yards). The Chargers’ Drayton Florence, who in the previous postseason nabbed one of the three interceptions against Brady, picked off a Vince Young . Scoring one TD was enough, even though Kaeding missed from 45.
Sounding off
Thanks to analytics, the NFL is more entertaining?
Yep — in this respect: coaches are far more apt to go for it on fourth down. Sorry, punt enthusiasts, if that bums you out.
- QB Baker Mayfield’s revival with the Bucs further confirms Tom Brady as a keen judge of football talent. The Bucs team Brady smartly ed in 2020 was loaded, and many of those players still rate as better than average.
- The Bucs showed Monday how to stop the Eagles’ “tush push” sneak near the goal line. Yank QB Jalen Hurts sideways by twisting his helmet while the officials don’t notice. A penalty would’ve levied only half a yard, so why not rough up the QB?
- I was wrong to write the Cowboys are the NFL’s quintessential “fool’s gold” franchise. Fool’s silver is more like it.
- Brian Flores did wonders with the Vikings’ defense. Someone should look hard into hiring him as a head coach.
- It’ll be awhile before Eagles offensive players pull out the golf clubs. The pounding Todd Bowles’ Bucs ‘D’ put on them Sunday night will linger.
- Props to Packers RB Aaron Jones. He’s helping to keeping the position relevant.
- First question an NFL owner should have for the team’s top scout, going into this year’s draft: why didn’t you take Puka Nacua last year?
