Joey Bosa is set to play for his fourth head coach in nine years of being in the NFL. While the other three did not pan out, Bosa has a great feeling about Jim Harbaugh being the Chargers’ head coach.
“We sat down and probably talked for 30 minutes, an hour a couple of weeks ago,” Bosa said. “Great first impressions. … I have a lot of confidence in him and the staff that he’s bringing around him.”
Harbaugh and Bosa are familiar with one another, as Michigan and Ohio State faced off in 2015, Harbaugh’s first year as the Wolverines’ head coach. The Buckeyes won 42-13. In that game, Bosa had a sack and an interception.
Now, Bosa will have the opportunity to be coached by Harbaugh, who guided Michigan to three consecutive victories over his alma mater and recently a National Championship title.
“I think he seems like a really genuine guy, which you don’t find that a lot in coaches all the time,” Bosa added. “He’s interesting. He loves football more than anything. I think all he wants to do is win. The way he talked about his feelings toward this job and toward the future was pretty exciting.”
Bosa has been riddled with injuries, as he has played just 14 games over the past two seasons. In his last healthy season in 2021, he posted 10.5 sacks and made his fourth Pro Bowl.
Bosa is a candidate to be released or traded, as he has a hefty cap hit of $36.6 million. The Chargers are currently $20 million over the salary cap, the fourth-worst situation in the league.
If Bosa sticks around, he will be amid all of the preseason storylines and projections of the Chargers making the Super Bowl with Harbaugh leading the charge. But for him, he would rather take it one game at a time.
“That’s an expectation for sure,” Bosa said. “I’d like to win Game 1 first, then we can talk about Week 2 and then Week 3. Sometimes getting caught up with all the Super Bowl talk and all the hype gets you unfocused and worrying about the wrong things when you should just be worrying about what’s in front of you.
“… There’s a lot of talk of Super Bowl every year, and every year I kind of have a similar answer like ‘alright, let’s see how the first week goes and then we’ll talk about that.’”
