“Chargers–Dangerous Issues Now”

-0-

Pick a team..pick a topic…always something to talk about.

CHARGERS…Lucky for them they get the battered NY Giants this weekend.  It’s a team that seems in a long rebuild.  They don’t have either of their top two QBs in Daniel Jones (neck) and Mike Glennon (concussion).  It means Jake Fromm, who has never started a game, has to likely start.

Add to that, star running back Saquon Barkley has yet to find his rhythm coming off last year’s knee surgery.  The G-men are also down their speed wide receivers, and pricey free agent Ken Golladay has been in and out of the lineup with injuries.  It’s a mess for second year coach Joe Judge.

I’d say this would be a walkover win but you know you can’t say that in the NFL, where emotion or turnovers or an injury can change the chemistry of a game.

The Chargers have issues though, this strange Covid outbreak.

First it was the defensive side of the football, its defensive front.  They had 3-lineman on that isolation list and the scary concussions questions swirling around pass rusher Joey Bosa.

Now it’s the offensive side of the football team, quarterback Justin Herbert’s best friends.

Wide receiver  Keenan Allen tests positive for Covid, but he has been vaccinated, and could get clearance on Saturday to play on Sunday if he has back to back clean tests.

But it’s complicated because the second best pass catcher Mike Williams goes on the Covid list for his ‘close contact’ with Allen in team meeting rooms.  But then we find out Williams is ‘unvaccinated’ and that means he must stay isolated for 10-days and test clean twice in a row.  It means he is out this week against the Giants, and likely next Thursday’s game.

As if the Bolts don’t have enough issues, add more problems to the battered secondary.  Now veteran Chris Harris has tested positive too, and he too is unvaxxed.

This is  defense without 3-of its other DBs, from Asante Samuel’s third concussion incident in two years, plus quad and hamstring injuries to the likes of Alohi Gilman, Michael Davis and Trevaughn Campbell.

The Bolts have 5-games left on the schedule but without a power run game, and having to rely on young wideouts Rod Palmer and Jaylon Guyton, you wonder how much more of a load Justin Herbert  can take on.

Sundays are always a challenge for Brandon Staley’s team, now it becomes even more with key guys out.

We sit here nightly and watch the news reports on CNN about Covid, the new Omicron deviant and the continued assault by the Delta deviants.  Hospitals are overwhelmed again.   We see more positive tests team by team in all sports, NFL to NBA to NHL.

And we sit here finding out Mike Williams and Chris Harris are not vaxxed, and you wonder how many other never got the shots.  And the bigger question, why not?

If the Chargers don’t make the playoffs, this could be a significant reason.  You wish it was different, but that’s up to the decisions some of the Bolts star players have made.

Will see what Sunday brings, a beat up Giants team against a suddenly ill Chargers team.

=============================

Please follow and like us: