The Chargers moved to 4-2 on Monday night with a 19-16 overtime win against the Broncos.
While it may have been ugly, a win is a win, and Los Angeles now has positive momentum, especially in the division, where their victory brought them into a tie for first place with the Chiefs.
On Sunday, that momentum will be tested when the Seahawks come to SoFi Stadium.
Here are four reasons to be optimistic that L.A. hits the bye as a 5-2 football team.
Porous pass defense
Seattle is giving up 245 passing yards per game, 22nd in the league. That number is also helped tremendously by last week’s performance against what looks to be a fundamentally broken Cardinals offense, who the Seahawks held to 171 yards through the air. Rookies Tariq Woolen and Coby Bryant are the starters at cornerback for Seattle, who are running a variant of the Vic Fangio defense. That scheme requires a lot of DB talent and a lot of knowledge. Woolen and Bryant have played well this season in stretches, but an elite quarterback like Justin Herbert should be able to exploit their stumbles. If Seattle employs more nickel and dime packages on Sunday, as they did against Arizona, Herbert will be fast enough through his progressions to find an open man against Seattle’s third or fourth corner.
Third down woes
Seattle is also starting two rookies at offensive tackle: top-ten pick Charles Cross and third-rounder Abraham Lucas. Like their teammates at corner, Cross and Lucas have shown flashes, helping Seattle’s offensive line to a sack rate of just 2.2% on 1st down and 1.4% on second down. Both marks are well below the league averages of 5.0% and 5.1%, respectively. However, on third downs, the Seahawks have collapsed. Their sack rate allowed skyrockets to 20.7%, more than twice the league average of 9.8%. Whether that’s because it’s a line full of rookies learning to communicate about blitzes or not is unclear, but we do know Brandon Staley is no stranger to dialing up exotic pressures on third down. Given how well it worked on Monday, I’d expect more of the same from Drue Tranquill and Derwin James on Sunday, with likely the same results.
Special teams trajectories
Pete Carroll said on Monday that Seattle’s special teams are “bugging the heck out of all of us” after another week of miscues against Arizona. Perhaps the most costly was punter Michael Dickson losing control of the ball in the end zone, leading to a fumble recovered for a touchdown by the Cardinals. Seattle has had one mistake of this nature seemingly every game, a contributing factor in their special teams being ranked 23rd by DVOA. Compare that to the Chargers, whose special teams are the number one reason they won the game on Monday. When’s the last time fans of this team could say that? The Chargers are 15th in special teams DVOA, buoyed by the steady presence of Dustin Hopkins (when he’s played) and rookie gunners Ja’Sir Taylor and Deane Leonard, who combined to finish the muffed punt play that put LA in field goal range in overtime against Denver. Hopkins will miss this week, but backup kicker Taylor Bertolet was perfect on six kicks in Week 5 when he filled in for the veteran. All this to say: Los Angeles is getting their special teams unit in sync, while Seattle is still searching for answers.
Failure to capitalize
Seattle has forced ten turnovers in their six games and turned their opponent over on downs four times. That’s a pretty good clip! The Seahawks are tied for 5th in takeaways per game. But when the defense gives their offense the ball back, Seattle has struggled to turn it into points. Of those fourteen occurrences, Seattle has scored on the following drive just three times, four if you count Tariq Woolen’s pick 6. After receiving the ball due to a big play by their defense, Seattle has turned it right back over four times, punted five times, and gone to halftime once if they’re unable to score. LA only turns the ball over 0.8 times per game, the second-best mark in the league. If Seattle can’t capitalize on their likely only shot at a turnover on Sunday, there’s reason to believe the Chargers will be able to right the ship.
