Brandon Staley and Tom Telesco should’ve been let go of a lot earlier.
The Chargers cleaned house on Friday after parting ways with GM Tom Telesco as well as HC Brandon Staley. This comes on the heels of an embarrassing 42-point loss to the Raiders on Thursday Night Football.
JoJo Wooden and Giff Smith were promoted to interim GM and HC respectively. Wooden has been the Director of Player Personnel since 2013. Giff Smith has served various roles from 2016-2023, including defensive line and outside linebackers coaching stints.
Before moving on to coaching and GM candidates for replacement content, it’s time to truly look back on the Telesco-Staley era as it comes to an end. After having plenty of cap space in 2021, a stud quarterback on a rookie deal, and plenty of big names on the roster, the Chargers sit here today with nothing to show for it. The Telesco-Staley era was defined by “all in” promises with more flash than substance.
Let’s start with Telesco. With a relatively slim playoff resume and mediocre regular season success in his 11 years, it was past time for him to go. Dean Spanos and Chargers’ ownership could not willingly let him hire a fourth head coach. His last shot was Staley.
Frankly, he got the opportunity to hire a third coach because of the selection of Justin Herbert in 2020. Had that not happened for this organization, I think it’s safe to say that he would’ve been gone sooner. But the Chargers wanted to keep some sort of structure at the top to bring along their rookie QB. At the time, there was a core of the fanbase and media that believed Telesco should’ve been relieved of his duties with Anthony Lynn after 2020.
And it’s clear that is the direction the franchise should’ve gone in. Telesco has struck out on finding requisite depth for the team in the draft. He’s spent all of the teams’ financial resources and their future capital on poor investments. The Chargers are $42 million over the projected cap in 2024. That stems from four max contract restructures for a losing season and J.C. Jackson dead cap money.
The retention of drafted players over the Telesco tenure was generally bad. Consistently, guys like Kyzir White and Drue Tranquill left the team on the cheap after their rookie deals while the Chargers would choose the worse team-building plays instead.
Letting Telesco manage another season would’ve been untenable. To be honest, the short-term damage he’s inflicted on the team in 2024 is enough to deal with. It was well past time to go.
For Staley, he leaves Los Angeles after three years on the job. He finishes 24-24 after 9-8, 10-7, and 5-9 seasons. While Staley showed promise in his first season, his downfall primarily occurred for a plethora of reasons. After promises to build the offense around Justin Herbert and “throw that sh*t downfield”, the Chargers’ head coach never fully figured out the offensive staff/personnel side of the ball. From Joe Lombardi to Kellen Moore, one thing remained consistent on offense: football that was never fundamentally sound.
And when the Chargers did manage to score 30 or 40 points, Staley’s defense managed to give up more. Herbert bailed out the former Chargers’ head coach in a number of games. Staley harped on the lack of complementary football all year and it presented itself in largely every game LA played. Even some of their wins were relatively ugly.
Staley’s defense and special teams combined units ranked bottom 10 in EPA in every season he was the head coach. Simply put, he was hired as a defensive coordinator who never fixed the defense. LA’s unit was plagued with poor tackling fundamentals, bad player development, and convoluted personnel decisions on gamedays. While Staley had good ideas in theory like the style of defense he intended to play, it was the execution of the concepts that were lacking.
Truthfully, there are plenty of more platitudes and moments I could mention on why both Staley and Telesco are finished in LA as we sit here today. But what’s more pressing is the future. While the Chargers will likely still be a hot destination with Herbert viewed as a top franchise cornerstone around the league, the damage has been done. There’s the cap situation. There’s deep player unhappiness rooted in the current situation. There probably will be a decent amount of turnover with not just coaching personnel, but many of the Chargers’ franchise figure players who have been present over the last half decade or longer.
Staley was hired by Telesco to make a run and build off the Herbert window. But whatever GM and coach pairing is hired next will be brought in to clear the wreckage “all in” venture that completely collapsed.
