The Los Angeles Chargers made their bed this offseason when they chose to prioritize the offensive and defensive lines over skill position players. And now they are feeling the consequences of their team-building strategy. They are sleeping in that bed.
This isn’t an indictment of this strategy. They 8-4 and are positioned to make the playoffs one year removed from having the fifth worst record in football. That is no small feat, but The Athletic’s Daniel Popper recently posted a startling variance in the team’s offensive output.
The Chargers Tight Rope Offense Relies On One Player
The Chargers are a top-five passing offense by success rate when targeting [Ladd] McConkey and a bottom-six passing offense by success rate when targeting anybody else on the roster.
Sorted by expected points added, the discrepancy is even more glaring. When the Chargers target McConkey, they average 0.55 EPA per attempt, according to TruMedia. When they target any other player on the roster, they average 0.08 EPA per attempt. In other words, the Chargers are producing nearly half a point more value per attempt when they target McConkey versus any other player on the roster.
As an early second-round pick McConkey represents the team’s only real investment into a playmaker. The remaining receivers and running backs are all signed to short and relatively small contracts or were on the team before the transition.
The result is stark. The Chargers are putting up bad offensive numbers, in large part against bad teams. Thier 311 yards per game is 9th worst in the league. No other winning team has fewer than 335 yards per game — the Houston Texans are have 335.3, have a record of 8-5, and are the 16th worst offense in the league, or in other words are league average. In thier losses to good defenses, (Chiefs, Steelers, and Ravens) they have been held to just 225 yards per game. With just Dobbins out, they managed just 187 yards against the Atlanta Falcons. That was the Falcons defense’s best performance by 83 yards.
To make matters worse, McConkey is currently dealing with a shoulder injury that may effect his availability and have lost JK Dobbins, the Chargers top runner, until at least Week 17.
Perhaps the more worrying part is that McConkey has been banged up since Week 6 with a variety of ailments. McConkey suffered a shoulder injury in the first half of the game against the Cincinnati Bengals. He first cropped up on the report after injuring his hip early on against the Denver Broncos in Week 6. He was limited and missed some practice for the next three weeks — not returning to full action until just before the Cleveland Browns game in Week 9, although he did play a full snap load in those games.
Between those two, they account for 46 percent of all the Chargers offensive yards from scrimmage this season.
This kind of team building is a kin to a high wire tight rope. If it goes well, it is impressive, but if it doesn’t it can be horrific.
Which, again, this is year one of a major franchise overhaul, but if McConkey misses several games a playoff bid could easily be out the window.
Over the next, three weeks the Chargrers play the Kansas City Chiefs, Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Denver Broncos. The Chiefs and Broncos both have top 10 defenses and the Buccaneer score the sixth most points per game.
