The NFL in California in 2018: The Best Year Ever?

[Prime Time]

https://www.si.com/nfl/2018/06/18/nfl-california-teams-2018-best-year-ever

The NFL in California in 2018: The Best Year Ever?

• The Rams, Raiders, Chargers and 49ers all promise compelling storylines and exciting football in 2018, making this possibly the most anticipated NFL season ever in California. The MMQB is devoting a week in June to exploring what should make this season golden in the Golden State

By ANDY BENOIT

MICHAEL ZAGARIS/SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS/GETTY IMAGES

It’s supposed to be a tumultuous time for pro football in California. The Rams returned to Los Angeles from St. Louis two years ago after abandoning Southern California in 1995. Last year they were joined in L.A. by the Chargers, who’d been an institution in San Diego since 1961.

Both are vagabond franchises for now, the Rams playing in a venerable but creaky 94-year-old stadium and the Chargers in a pint-sized soccer arena until the completion of their shared Inglewood venue in 2020.

The Raiders face a similar limbo after this year, when their lease at Oakland Coliseum expires. They may or may not spend the next season or two in the Bay Area before moving to Las Vegas. Across the Bay, the 49ers in 2014 moved 40 miles south to Santa Clara, which is a lot closer to San Jose than to San Francisco.

It’s a four-team transitional period ripe for chaos, and yet few in 2018 will notice thanks to the old John Madden quote about winning being a great deodorant. A lot of winning is expected in California this year.

In fact, not since the early ’80s, when Joe Montana’s 49ers and Al Davis’s Raiders were claiming Super Bowls, and Eric Dickerson’s Rams and Dan Fouts’s Chargers were pushing for playoff spots, has the state’s NFL landscape looked so collectively promising.

The Rams burst into the NFL’s contender club last season with the arrival of wunderkind coach Sean McVay and an ascending roster. They’re now one of Vegas’s Super Bowl favorites. The Chargers won nine of their last 12 games and favored in the AFC West.

The Raiders are two years removed from a 12-win season, with franchise QB Derek Carr locked in long-term and deified coach Jon Gruden resurrected. The 49ers, after acquiring their prospective franchise QB in Jimmy Garoppolo one day before Halloween, won six of their last seven games, including all five of Garoppolo’s starts.

It’s not hard to imagine four California teams reaching this year’s playoffs. That’s never happened. Based on preseason odds, there’s an 18 percent chance a California team wins Super Bowl 53—the highest likelihood since such data tracking began in 1999.

Yes, individually, each franchise has been stronger before. The Rams won seven straight division titles from 1973 to ’79, culminating in a Super Bowl appearance. The Chargers were an early power in the AFL and in the early ’80s revolutionized the passing game with Fouts and coach Don Coryell.

The Raiders were one of pro football’s winningest teams from 1967 to 1978, winning the 1976 Super Bowl under John Madden. After that, Tom Flores led the Raiders to Lombardi Trophies in 1980 and ’83.

And, of course, the 49ers won four Super Bowls under Joe Montana and another with Steve Young during a nearly two-decade run of excellence. But always at some point in there, one California team was having a down year. Maybe we’ll see that this year, but none of the four fan bases believes it will be theirs.

This week we’ll dive deep into each team in the Golden State, to see what all the excitement is about. We’ll hear from the Rams’ new star cornerback tandem of Marcus Peters and Aqib Talib about being risk-taking playmakers. Chargers owner Dean Spanos and his staff will tell us about forging into their new L.A. market, and their seven-time Pro Bowl QB Philip Rivers will take us through a film study session.

New Raiders defensive coordinator Paul Guenther will reveal everything that happens in a coach’s life when he takes over a new unit. We’ll meet the best defensive lineman nobody talks about, San Francisco’s DeForest Buckner.

And we’ll examine what’s shaping up to be the NFL’s best coaching rivalry—Sean McVay versus Kyle Shanahan—and why their Rams and 49ers offenses are the two that other teams studied the most this offseason.

For harder core football nerds, we’re dipping into our summer 2018 team previews early, giving you the unabridged on-field outlook for the Rams, Chargers, Raiders and Niners.

You’ll find all the California Week stories here as they post. Enjoy.

 

[Adi]

Am I the only person that thinks the 49ers and raiders are extremely overrated ? I can see both hardly winning 8 games . Both have good but unproven qbs, Their defenses are no good .

Chargers will be competitive and are a good team .

 

[Loyal]

Am I the only person that thinks the 49ers and raiders are extremely overrated ? I can see both hardly winning 8 games . Both have good but unproven qbs, Their defenses are no good .

Chargers will be competitive and are a good team .

Agreed.
I never used to care about the Chargers, ever. But now they have insinuated themselves into the Rams area, and now I want them to die. I drives me wild to see the Chargers logo anywhere associated with Inglewood, and now we must gut stomp their presence in LA, and win 3 straight Super Bowls...as they slink off to become the London Chargers...

 

[ScotsRam]

It's a great year for Californian football because I'm coming over to watch some :yess:ball:

 

[OldSchool]

The teams in Los Angeles and Carson should make the playoffs, not sure about the rest.

 

[DeaconJ]

It'll be the best year after four California beatdowns happen.

 

[Prime Time]

https://www.si.com/nfl/2018/06/20/chargers-los-angeles-sports-market-dean-spanos

Chargers Are Ready to Claim Their Piece of the Los Angeles Sports Market
Ahead of the franchise's second season in Los Angeles, the Chargers want to find their own niche in their new home. The product on the field is expected to be there, so will the fans follow?
By ANDY BENOIT

COSTA MESA, Calif. — The Los Angeles Chargers headquarters is located in a nondescript leased office building amidst a white-collar industrial sprawl in Costa Mesa, Calif., about 45 minutes from downtown L.A. The building is located to the left of a circular courtyard. To the right of the courtyard is a vacant building, and straight behind the courtyard is a coffeehouse.

Inside the office building, Chargers owner Dean Spanos is seated at the head of the table in a second-floor conference room. Over his shoulder is a giant rendering of the team’s new stadium, which will be located in Inglewood, just shy of an hour’s drive from the current office. Under construction until 2020, it’s the mecca toward which this franchise is marching.

“It’s incredible—look at that,” Spanos says, turning to face the photo. “I mean, that’s massive. It doesn’t look like a football stadium, does it?”

No, and that’s because, in many ways, it isn’t. The nearly $5-billion venue, formally called Los Angeles Sports and Entertainment District (LASED), will include business parks and condominiums, a 6,000-seat theatre, luxury hotels and restaurants, an open-air shopping center and NFL Media’s nerve center.

Rams owner Stan Kroenke is spearheading the project, with the stadium itself a joint venture between the two teams—the Rams and Chargers will operate under equivalent leases, and the Chargers will receive 18.75% of the LASED non-football event revenue.

But underneath all of the hype of the new stadium and the glamour of the Los Angeles area, a hard truth remains: the Chargers are the newest team in a very crowded sports market—11 teams, to be exact. And even if the product on the field is up to snub—and it should be, as this team is a favorite to win the AFC West this year—is that enough for the Chargers to truly carve out its niche in Los Angeles? It will be a challenge, but the Chargers are up for it.

John W. McDonough

Moving to a new city before your stadium's completion is innately trying. After leaving Houston in 1997, the Oilers, waiting on their downtown Nashville venue, played home games at Liberty Bowl Stadium in Memphis. Attendance was abysmal, and when it wasn’t, opposing fans were extraordinarily prevalent. The next year owner Bud Adams moved games to Vanderbilt—a site he had initially rejected. The Oilers went 8–8 both years.

The Chargers faced similar attendance struggles last season. Playing at the 27,000-seat StubHub Center in Carson, Calif., the team often found that the fans enjoying the intimate atmosphere were actually cheering for L.A.’s opponent.

In Week 2 of the 2017 season, Younghoe Koo, the Chargers kicker at the time, missed a field goal at the end of regulation to lose to the visiting Dolphins, and QB Philip Rivers said that missed kick produced the loudest roar of the crowd all day. The following week, the red of the visiting Chiefs’ fans glaringly contrasted with L.A.’s fans' blue.

There are different thoughts in the Chargers office as to what was behind this enemy infiltration.

“Really, when you look at it on a percentage-base, it’s no different than any of the other teams,” Spanos says. “This is not something that is just unique to us. I think the Rams experienced it a bunch last year. Miami experiences it with all the New England fans there. It’s nothing new.”

GM Tom Telesco says it’s always going to be like that for teams in a destination city. “If you live in Buffalo and you’re going to go to one road game this year, [the fan typically thinks] ‘Hey let’s go to L.A. or Miami!’ At Qualcomm Stadium [in San Diego] let’s say we got 10,000 visiting fans. [In a stadium that holds 70,000 people] you notice those fans, but not that much. You get those same 10,000 at StubHub, it looks a lot different.”

Rivers issued similar sentiments following that early loss to Miami last season, saying, “It’s always been a little bit of something you battle. We battled it down in San Diego… the weather, the climate, lends to that.”

But traveling fans aren’t the Chargers’ only problem—finding and growing the team’s own fan base remains an issue. There are around 24 million people in Southern California, including many transplants who may have brought fandom with them, and with no team in town from 1995–2015, many Angelenos have adopted one of the NFL’s 30 non-LA teams as their own.

It didn’t help when, before the season, Los Angeles mayor Eric Garcetti said on the Dan Patrick Show, “We’re certainly happy to have the Chargers in L.A., but I think we could have been happy with just the [Rams] too.” Some in the Chargers’ building believe Garcetti was just trying to appease San Diego and the state’s other non-L.A. markets (rumor has it that he wants to run for governor or even president one day). Spanos believes Garcetti’s comments were misrepresented in the media, and he professes no ill-will.

But after those comments, mixed with opposing fan optics and the team’s heartbreaking 0–4 start to the season, it’s easy to see why the Chargers struggled with a loser narrative last season.

That shouldn’t be the case in 2018; this team is favored to win the AFC West. Head coach Anthony Lynn even recently lamented to The MMQB’s Albert Breer that someone had told him the Chargers had the second-most talented roster in the league. While maybe a tad hyperbolistic, the notion is not ridiculous. Rivers is a bona fide field general, and his receiving corps is loaded, even with tight end Hunter Henry out with a torn ACL.

The backfield and offensive line are improving, and the defense has what every team covets: perimeter cover corners (Casey Hayward and, if healthy, Jason Verrett) and dominant edge rushers (Joey Bosa and Melvin Ingram). The interior of the D was addressed in the draft, with safety Derwin James in Round 1, linebacker Uchenna Nwosu in Round 2 and defensive tackle Justin Jones in Round 3.

Lynn was praised for leading the Chargers to nine wins after entering October under the most difficult of circumstances. Now, nine wins would be disappointing. The rough start last year “just made us a tougher football team,” Lynn says. “We became more resilient. And now last year’s not even in the back of our heads anymore, we’re focused on this season.”

The fascinating question is, Just how much success will it take for the Chargers to move the meter locally?

“Everybody loves a winner up here and we have to put that product on the field,” says Spanos. “It’s a challenging market. We knew it when we came here. There are 11 other teams we’re competing against.”

A quick look at the 11 other teams to which Spanos is referring: The MLB’s Dodgers and Angels, which are both a little above .500, as of publish; the NBA’s Clippers, which just missed the playoffs and the Lakers, which are rebuilding; the NHL’s Ducks and Kings, which reached the Stanley Cup playoffs but were both swept in the first round; MLS’s LAFC, currently third in the Western Conference, and the Galaxy, sitting eighth; USC and UCLA, which both lost their quarterbacks to the first round of the NFL draft; and of course, the Rams—the team with which the Chargers will be sharing a stadium, and their most direct competition. Also, the WNBA’s Sparks currently lead the Western Conference.

Surprise winners of the NFC West in 2017, the Rams have had one of the most unique, aggressive offseasons in recent memory and are now among the early favorites to win Super Bowl 53. They’re slated for five nationally televised games in 2018. And yet they too are still trying to gain a foothold in the L.A. market.

After a record-setting year-over-year decline in attendance last September, the Rams averaged 63,392 in home attendance on the season, which ranked 26th int he league, and filled a league-low two-thirds of their venue (the L.A. Coliseum). Their local TV ratings were 8.0, meaning just eight percent of L.A. televisions were tuned into their games. The Chargers got a 6.0, though it should be noted that a ratings point in Los Angeles represents 5.2 times as many people as a ratings point in San Diego.

Legitimate concerns were raised about the Rams having had the opportunity to secure much of the available L.A. fans simply by arriving to town a year earlier. Spanos says his staff spends little time thinking about the Rams, but he’s rooting for their success.

“If I could line the stars up, it would be great if we—the Rams and Chargers—could play each other in the Super Bowl this year in Atlanta,” he says. “For this market, for sales, it would be exciting. You know, timing could be impeccably perfect.

But if we can’t win the Super Bowl, I’d probably say I’d want the Rams to win because it just helps the [stadium] project. We are part of this, we have equity in this, we’re an equal partner in this thing. And I think [Kroenke], if he was sitting here, would say the same thing. We wish each other good luck except when we play each other. The better I do is going to help him and vice versa.”

Though it’d be unimaginable in most markets, with Los Angeles, where fans have so many options for sports, as well as for pop culture entertainment and outdoor activities, one also must wonder what the team does in the event that it makes a deep playoff run but sees little rise in local popularity. Spanos doesn’t like looking away from the big picture. “Our goal every year is to win the Super Bowl … even if we make a deep playoff run this year, it’s about sustained success.”

Jeff Gross/Getty Images

Success on the field always comes first, but Spanos is a businessman who recognized the opportunities that Los Angeles could bring to his franchise.

“No. 1 is obviously the product on the field—and I can’t control that,” he says. “I can try to hire the best coach, the best GM to bring in the best players but there’s no guarantee on anything. But that’s one part of it. The other part is really how we as an organization, our family, integrate ourselves into this community.”

Spanos meets with small groups three or four times a week, building relationships piece by piece. And from July through December last year the Chargers participated in 150 community events and charitable programs, with an emphasis on causes promoting social justice. They partnered with the city’s most established media outlets and hired the area’s top afternoon drive sports talk radio host, Matt “Money” Smith, as their lead announcer. This year, their “Fight for L.A.” slogan will incorporate a “Fight for Each Other” slogan.

On brand growth, Spanos and his staff proceed as if it comes down to 50% winning and 50% business strategy. And the most obvious move that illustrates that? Hiring Lynn as head coach. Instead of splurging for a big-name head coach to galvanize the fan base, the Chargers’ brass hired one who was well-regarded within the NFL but largely unknown to fans outside the AFC East. Contrast that with the Raiders, who spent $100 million on Super Bowl winning celebrity coach Jon Gruden, perhaps partly with the hope of sustaining the Oakland fan base and, soon, igniting the Las Vegas one.

As John Spanos, President of Football Operations, explains, “At the end of the day, the driving force [behind hiring Lynn] was who will help us win games over who will help initially sell tickets.” When it’s pointed out that Bill Belichick was almost antithetical to a flashy hire in New England, Spanos says, “How ’bout that. He was the head coach of the Browns, got let go and was an assistant again. I don’t remember him at that point being a necessarily flashy guy, so it’s a good point.”

John’s dad has not prioritized a head coach’s marketability, either.

“I think that’s short-lived to go out and hire somebody flashy,” Dean says. “In either 2001 or ’02, I really wanted to hire Jimmy Johnson. We’re pretty good friends and I tried, but he was retired and he didn’t want to come back. That was the only time I really wanted to go after somebody. I believed in him and he was sort of a mentor to me so even that was more than, ‘Oh there’s a name out there, let me go chase him.’ I knew him. But he wanted to fish down in Miami.”

What hangs in the air when talking with anyone from the Chargers is the city of San Diego. Spanos, his family and employees are quick to emphasize how much the city still matters to them. The Chargers have maintained all of their existing community programs in San Diego, and they realize that many fans there are still loyal. But they also realize that many are still hurt.

As one staffer put it, emotions remain “too raw” to consider marketing the team to those citizens. Quick as Chargers employees are to laud San Diego, the conversation always quickly shifts back slightly north.

The obstacles may seem insurmountable for this Los Angeles team, but it’s nothing the team isn’t ready to face head-first. This team’s home is now Los Angeles.

“To go where we want to go it might take ten years,” Spanos says. “We are the new kids on the block so, you know, we are fighting our way in one fan at a time. But whatever it is, we’ll get there.”

 

[Prime Time]

https://www.si.com/nfl/2018/06/18/los-angeles-chargers-2018-nfl-preview

10 Thoughts on the 2018 Chargers

• With the rest of the division in transition, plus the strong leadership of veteran quarterback Philip Rivers and smart draft moves to strengthen the defensive spine, the Chargers are primed for a serious playoff run
  By ANDY BENOIT

Getty Images

1. After averaging 310 yards through the air in November and December, the Chargers finished 2017 with the NFL’s No. 1 passing offense. There were three reasons: A.) Philip Rivers was great. B.) Keenan Allen became a full-fledged No. 1 receiver. His route running mechanics are unmatched, particularly on in-breakers. C.) Offensive coordinator Ken Whisenhunt has a sharp scheme. The Chargers use a lot of pre-snap motion to undress the defense.

They are deceptive out of base two-back or two-tight end personnel. They out-leverage pass defenders with stack and switch releases that intertwine receivers’ routes. They run different types of route combinations on different sides of the field. With Allen more than a year removed from his knee injury, 2017 seventh overall pick Mike Williams healthy, and downfield weapons Tyrell Williams and Travis Benjamin back, this can again be one of the league’s most productive aerial attacks.

The only caveat is the loss of tight end Hunter Henry (ACL), which hurts, even if Antonio Gates is brought back. (Gates is crafty, but his depleted speed can change the way opponents defend this passing game.) Henry was becoming a more diverse receiver, capable of aligning anywhere in the formation. One thing this offense did well in ’17 was distort defenses by spreading the formation on one side and condensing it on the other side. That’s hard to do without a tight end.

2. Rivers has all the traits of an elite QB: accuracy, field vision, throwing anticipation (which can sometimes be a substitute for arm strength, not that Rivers’s is declining), pocket mobility and total control at the line of scrimmage. Rivers is just a tick less consistent than Brady/Brees/Rodgers, but on any given day—and most days, for that matter—he plays like those guys. Don’t be fooled by his 4-5 playoff record; Rivers can absolutely lead a team to the Super Bowl.

3. This team’s Super Bowl fate hinges on whether it finds an identity on the ground. Melvin Gordon often has a tad more juice than you’d guess, but he’s not innately nimble. He needs a scheme that consistently defines his point of attack. Head coach Anthony Lynn over the years has employed a lot of “gap scheme” runs, which feature pull-blockers and man-to-man blockers. Gordon at times has shined here.

4. No. 2 running back Austin Ekeler has sneaky value. He’s an excellent all-around receiver, including when he splits out wide in empty formations—something the Chargers love to do. Ekeler might play only 30 percent of the snaps, give or take, but his mismatch-making versatility will be a defining part of Los Angeles’s offense.

5. This will be a top-five offense if the O-line gets as strong in run-blocking as it is in pass protection. Russell Okung has stabilized the left tackle situation, and Mike Pouncey’s arrival injects athleticism at center. A lot comes down to the second-year guards. Second-rounder Forrest Lamp is coming off a torn ACL that wiped out his rookie season. Opposite him, the jury is still out on third-rounder Dan Feeney.

6. In the NFL, you need one of two elements for a quality defense: edge rushers or cover corners. The Chargers have both. On the edge, Joey Bosa and Melvin Ingram form as dynamic a pairing as you’ll find. Their lateral explosiveness is lethal on schemed pass-rush concepts like stunts and twists.

At corner, Casey Hayward is a true No. 1 and Jason Verrett, before losing the ’16 and ’17 seasons to a left ACL injury, was a premier cover artist. If Verrett isn’t the same, the Chargers still have quality depth in Trevor Williams and slot man Desmond King.

7. Defensive coordinator Gus Bradley is regarded as a pure Seahawks-style Cover 3 aficionado. In fact, he’s credited with originating parts of the scheme. Bradley likes its simple, straightforward approach, believing it lets defenders play faster and improve over the course of a season. But last year the Chargers were much more than just a Cover 3 D.

They played significant snaps of man-to-man, particularly on third downs, where Bradley liked to rotate a free defender (aka a “robber”) into the middle of the defense. They also employed Cover 2 zone in certain throwing situations, and on many of these they diversified their pass-rushing stunts, moving Bosa and especially Ingram all over.

8. Bosa’s and Ingram’s pass-rushing impact tailed off last year because they had to play more conservatively to help an L.A. run defense that ranked 32nd in yards per attempt. GM Tom Telesco addressed the run-D deficiency in the draft with first-round safety Derwin James, second-round linebacker Uchenna Nwosu (whom Bradley believes can fulfill this scheme’s high demands for speed) and third-round defensive tackle Justin Jones. That’s potentially three new defensive starters up the middle.

9. Where will the first-rounder Derwin James play? He’s best suited for the box, but so are incumbent safeties Adrian Phillips and the grossly underrated Jahleel Addae. Raw talent makes James the best option for free safety, but that could be putting your first-round pick in a suboptimal spot. Might the Chargers instead try their luck with Addae? For ranginess, what he lacks in speed he could (potentially) make up for with awareness.

10. An unsung hero is defensive tackle Darius Philon. Yes, he’s a backup interior player for what was 2017’s worst run defense, so this isn’t saying he’s a star in waiting. But Philon stood out on film a few times each game. The Chargers have an excellent rotation at 3-technique with him backing up Corey Liuget, who is suspended for the first four games.

BOTTOME LINE: With a loaded offense and potentially playmaking defense, this is the best team in the AFC West.

 

[LesBaker]

Rams owner Stan Kroenke is spearheading the project, with the stadium itself a joint venture between the two teams—the Rams and Chargers will operate under equivalent leases, and the Chargers will receive 18.75% of the LASED non-football event revenue.

The Chargers are getting 18.75% of the event revenue streams?

WTF??????????

How did he pull that off??????????

Anyone have any specifics because that is a HUGE amount of money going into Spanos pockets.

This is the first time I have heard this little nugget.

Holy crap, team value aside since that is meaningless because both of these guys are not selling, that is a significant amount of money.