The last time we saw Los Angeles, they notched a cathartic blowout victory over the Bears on Sunday Night Football. But the Chargers still sit at 3-4, with apparent issues plaguing them on both sides of the ball.
Here are four reasons to be concerned that those issues sink them against the Jets on Monday night.
Second half sleepiness
The Chargers picked their Halloween costume early in October: every second half, Los Angeles’ offense turned into zombies. Despite fast starts in most first halves over the past month, LA scored just four times in 21 second-half possessions this October. Just one of those scores was a touchdown. Seven of those possessions resulted in a three-and-out, the highest number in the league.
Many of those drives have been marred by penalties – nine in those 21 possessions. Something looms over the Chargers when they get into the second half. Whether that’s the specter of the Jaguars loss, a different locker room issue, or a curse placed on the team by an ancient being is unclear. No matter what it is, it’s put LA into bad positions week over week.
They broke the cycle against the Bears last week, a team who must also feel cursed the way the last few seasons have gone. But even in that game, LA stopped moving the ball in the second half – their first-half output was good enough for them to coast to a win. The Jets are a similarly unlucky franchise, but their floor is significantly higher than Chicago’s. It’s unlikely that LA can bury them in the first half and then hang on for dear life, which means they need to wake up coming out of the intermission on Monday.
Secondary playmakers
Double meaning here: the Chargers have an ongoing search for a secondary playmaker in the passing game behind Keenan Allen. Joshua Palmer is dealing with an aggravated knee injury, which could push Quentin Johnston into the WR2 role after his best game of the season last week. But that game was still just five catches for 50 yards. Austin Ekeler had nearly 100 receiving yards last week, the first time he’d come close to that threshold all season.
On the flip side, the Jets have playmakers in their secondary. One playmaker in particular: cornerback Sauce Gardner, who has cemented himself as one of the league’s best in his brief NFL career. Gardner does not typically travel with receivers, which could help the Chargers funnel more targets to Allen or Johnston to get a hot hand going. But the rest of New York’s secondary is nothing to sneeze at, either. Cornerback Bryce Hall is allowing a 49.3 passer rating when targeted. Safety Jordan Whitehead and corner Michael Carter II are in the top 50 in the league in percentage of targets caught.
The worst-case scenario here: Allen gets stuck with the Gardner matchup for most of the game and Johnston struggles to separate from one of New York’s other high-level corners. That would leave Ekeler as the only threat in the passing game, effectively putting a cap on the Chargers’ passing attack.
Pressure point
Justin Herbert has been unusually skittish under pressure since the bye week. There are several reasons that could potentially explain this: LA played Kansas City and Dallas, two of the best-rushing teams in the league. Herbert is trying to protect a broken finger that prevents him from extending plays like he usually would in the pocket. Herbert has also been given more responsibility at the line of scrimmage, an experiment that’s gotten off to a slower start to begin the year.
The Jets are in one of the best positions of anyone to exploit these problems. Edge defender Bryce Huff and defensive tackle Quinnen Williams are in the top 25 in pass rush win rate. New York has one of the deepest stables in the league on the edge, with Huff, John Franklin-Myers, Jermaine Johnson, and Will McDonald all getting a plethora of snaps. That leads to freshness, which could present issues later in the game, especially with Rashawn Slater and Will Clapp only a week or two removed from the injury report with minor nicks.
Williams, in particular, presents a problem for the Chargers, the same way he does for every team in the league. Los Angeles has struggled with interior pressure this season, especially on end-tackle stunts that bring an edge rusher to the inside. If Williams is diving outside, however, the natural reaction is to wall off the best player on New York’s line, which leaves ample opportunity for one of those fresh defenders to get after Herbert.
Instant offense
The Jets offense is not exceptionally high on the league leaderboard regarding explosive plays. But we’ve seen the Chargers defense turn frogs into princes already this season (hi, Tennessee), and there’s one reason in particular to be a smidge concerned that New York could break Monday’s game open.
That reason is running back Breece Hall, who leads the league in yards per carry despite coming off a torn ACL. Not only that, but Hall has two of the three longest runs by anybody this season. The Chargers run defense has been stout this season, but they allow 2.6 runs of 10 yards or more per game, a rate that ranks 20th in the league. LA gives up all of their yardage on the ground in a few plays, then forces you to grind the rest of your yards the hard way.
Against a back like Hall, however, that opens up the possibility that the Jets break a 50+ yard touchdown run or two. That would put the Chargers back into the bind they’ve been in for much of this season: requiring near-perfect execution from one of their units to bail out the other. Even in the case that Hall doesn’t break one, LA’s offense could very well struggle to create explosives on offense – only ten teams have allowed fewer total explosive plays than the Jets. That’s the flip side of the coin: then, you’re asking the defense to shut Hall out all night, a task that comes much easier said than done.
