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Our Chargers’ NFL draft preview series continues with the offensive line.
After taking a steady approach in free agency, signing just one external player in linebacker Eric Kendricks and re-signing a handful of their own, the Chargers now have their sights set on the draft where they will look to bolster their roster with their selections and make a deeper run in 2023.
Before, we’re going position by position to break down where Los Angeles stands entering the draft.
Next up is the offensive line.
Catch the previous previews here:
Brandon Staley said that Jamaree Salyer’s move to guard should better suit his skill set.
For the Chargers, offensive line play has never been more important as the team looks to maximize the contributions of quarterback Justin Herbert in 2023. In their pursuit of keeping their signal caller upright and operating in a clean pocket, the team is looking to reshuffle their front five next season to give themselves an edge over opposing pass rushers.
Brandon Staley spoke to the media on Monday about Jamaree Salyer, who will transition from the tackle position to guard. Staley told reporters Salyer is built to play the interior spots up front, and the third-year coach expects positive results from this latest shake-up to the team’s line.
“I think that’s his natural position,” Staley explained. “But as he proved last year, we know that Jamaree can play outside, but we kind of feel like he’s best suited to play inside. A lot of strengths as a player fit better inside.
To have him, Zion [Johnson] and Corey [Linsley] in the middle of your pocket, that’s certainly what you want to design from an offensive line standpoint. When you have that type of anchor in the middle, athleticism and then when your tackles are athletic like Trey and Rashawn [Slater] are, they have the range and the athleticism to kick to these rushers.”
Tom Telesco said the intention is to put Salyer at right guard and move second-year Zion Johnson to the left side.
Salyer started 15 games at left tackle in place of Rashawn Slater, who suffered a biceps injury in Week 3 that required surgery. Salyer entered the NFL as a sixth-round pick in the 2022 draft and found himself with more responsibilities than expected. Despite some struggles, he played reasonably well, especially given the circumstance he found himself in.
Whether this move will bear fruit for the Chargers or Salyer will remain to be seen until the 2023 season gets underway. Still, Staley’s conviction in changing the 22-year-old lineman’s position can’t be understated.
If Staley’s assessment of his game is accurate, Los Angeles may have converted a serviceable tackle into a Pro Bowl-caliber guard with this relatively minor offseason decision.
The Chargers will likely do some wheeling and dealing with some players under contract to free up some cap space.
At the moment, the Chargers are strapped for cash.
They are $23.5 million over the cap, marking the fifth-worst situation in the NFL. And with moves that need to be made, like extending Justin Herbert and signing their own free agents and their draft class, Los Angeles could let go of some players under contract to free up some cap space.
Pro Football Focus went around the league and named a potential cut candidate for each team, and for the Bolts, it was left guard Matt Feiler.
Feiler is entering the final year of a three-year deal signed in 2021 and coming off a career-low 54.6 overall grade. However, he maintained a high floor as a pass protector and Los Angeles may not want to get rid of anyone who can help keep Justin Herbert upright. Nevertheless, when left tackle Rashawn Slater returns next season, the Chargers could move rookie sixth-rounder Jamaree Salyer — who impressed in his first season — inside to Feiler’s left guard spot and save a ton of money on an otherwise expensive roster.
Signed two offseasons ago, Feiler was solid in his first season as a Charger. However, he took a step back this past season. Feiler allowed six sacks, 40 quarterback pressures and 31 hurries.
Feiler has a cap hit of $8.5 million. So if he’s cut pre-June 1st, the Chargers will only have to pay $2 million in dead money and get a cap savings of $6.5 million.
Should Los Angeles let go of the 30-year-old Feiler, the transition to fill the void would be seamless.
Jamaree Salyer is the presumed replacement at left guard. And from what he showed this past season as the starting left tackle in place of the injured Rashawn Slater, Salyer has the makings to be a dominant player from the interior.
The Chargers offensive line was in the bottom 10 of the NFL in sacks allowed this past season.
In their effort to keep quarterback Justin Herbert upright throughout the 2022 season, the Chargers offensive line struggled mightily, giving up the seventh-most sacks of any team in the NFL.
One of the primary factors to their struggles was not having left tackle Rashawn Slater, who missed 15 games due to a biceps injury he sustained in Week 3 against the Jaguars.
Slater’s replacement, rookie Jamaree Salyer, took over in Week 4 and remained there for the rest of the season, providing to be a viable pass protector to Herbert’s blindside.
There were more injuries, as center Corey Linsley and right tackle Trey Pipkins each missed three games. Pipkins showed signs of growth as a player, but there were moments when his sprained MCL hindered his play.
Left guard Matt Feiler proved to be a solid signing in 2021. But he regressed this past season significantly, allowing 38 pressures and five sacks.
Rookie Zion Johnson, who manned the starting right guard position, dealt with growing pains. While he was strong as a run blocker, Johnson had his fair share of struggles in pass protection, allowing 40 pressures and seven sacks.
When Pipkins missed time, Foster Sarell got the start at right tackle, and he did not show much to warrant the swing tackle job for the foreseeable future. Sarell allowed 18 pressures and two sacks on 186 pass-block snaps.
For once in a very long time, the Chargers won’t be in the market for starters along the offensive line, assuming that they re-sign Pipkins to remain as the starting right tackle. Feiler could be on the chopping block, but it’s presumed that Salyer is a candidate to be the starting left guard in 2023.
Nonetheless, Los Angeles still needs depth.
At center, Linsley’s backup from this season, Will Clapp, will be a free agent. Brenden Jaimes is the only backup guard. Also, bringing in competition for the swing tackle spot with Storm Norton and Sarell would be beneficial.
Kellen Moore oozed confidence when talking about his offensive line during his introductory press conference.
The Los Angeles Chargers have assembled a highly effective offensive line in recent seasons, and their new offensive coordinator Kellen Moore seemed almost giddy to work with his front five in comments made during his introductory press conference.
Speaking to the media on Wednesday, Moore made it clear to reporters that despite not having met with the offensive line group yet, he is well aware of the elite talent he has at his disposal.
“I’m still in the process of going through that,” Moore said when asked about his line. “I’m really excited. We haven’t had an offensive staff meeting yet to really dig into this stuff. Certainly, the investment has been huge. Having a guy like [C] Corey [Linsley] as the center — you guys certainly probably feel it, but some people I think don’t recognize the importance of a veteran center and a guy who really runs the show. Corey has been one of the best in the NFL for a number of years. That is really exciting.
“I think that helps the quarterback. It relieves some of the workload and the volume that a quarterback has to do pre-snap. Having a guy like Corey run the show has been great. Certainly, there has been a lot invested there from a youth standpoint. Tons of younger players have had an opportunity to play. I’m excited to just see those guys continue to develop. They’re young players. Their future is skyrocketing right now. I’m just really excited to work with those guys.”
Certainly, the benefit of having a capable offensive line to protect the Chargers’ franchise quarterback will prove to be a huge advantage to Moore in his first year in Los Angeles. Keeping Herbert upright and well-protected in the pocket should enable Moore to utilize aggressive play calls in his game plans and should help the Chargers become a force in the stacked AFC next season.
Reasons why the Jaguars might beat the Chargers on Saturday night.
Los Angeles heads to Jacksonville seeking survival and revenge after losing to the Jaguars 38-10 in Week 3. The Chargers, of course, need a win this time to continue in the AFC playoff bracket.
Here are four reasons to be nervous about the Bolts’ chances heading into Saturday’s contest.
Speed rush
Jamaree Salyer has played admirably in place of the injured Rashawn Slater. Still, as his rookie season has gone on, we’ve seen why NFL teams let him fall to the sixth round and why many of them, including the Chargers, saw him as a professional guard despite success at tackle for Georgia. One word is all you need here: speed. Salyer struggles against speedier rushers because of subpar length (his arms measure 33 ⅝” at the combine, ⅜” shorter than Zion Johnson’s). He’s built to be a power player, but the disadvantage of optimizing in such a fashion is that rushers can run around you if you can’t reach out to stop them, and Salyer lacks that ability. On the other side, Jacksonville’s Josh Allen and Travon Walker make up one of the more athletic pass-rusher duos in the league. Salyer has the benefit of having gone up against Walker in practice at Georgia, but it’ll have to be a gem from the rookie if the Chargers are going to keep Justin Herbert clean.
The Mike Williams issue
As of Wednesday, Williams has not practiced after suffering a back contusion in Sunday’s game with the Broncos, which is beginning to cloud his status for Saturday. At the top of the week, Brandon Staley said the plan was for Williams to practice at some point before playing on Sunday. There’s now one practice left on Thursday, and we’ll see what his participation status is. Regardless, it looks like Williams will be limited in some capacity on Saturday. 50 or 60% of the veteran is better than some of the other options on the roster, but Williams has pushed his luck like this earlier in the season to dismal results. This Chargers offense struggles mightily without Williams at his best because there’s nobody else on the roster who threatens opposing secondaries down the field. Like, at all. Williams’ presence, even if in name only, opens up the offense underneath, where Joe Lombardi wants his offense to do most of its damage. If he can’t go, Jacksonville can congest the shallow areas of the field even more than normal, and Justin Herbert will have to bail LA out.
Boat race
This is the only playoff game this week that pits two 4,000-yard passers against one another – Herbert has 4,739 on the season, while Trevor Lawrence finished the regular season with 4,113. In some ways, Lawrence profiles like the “next” Herbert, a funny concept considering LA’s quarterback is only in his third NFL season. Still, the similarities are certainly there: a big-armed signal-caller with all the tools which showed flashes in his rookie season before breaking out in a big way as an NFL sophomore. Lawrence and this Jaguars squad put up 38 points against this Chargers defense in Week 3, and yes, LA has become a much different team since then. Still, I think it’s safe to assume that this game will be closer to a shootout than anything else. The Chargers have only scored 28 or more points four times this season against the Texans, Browns, Rams, and Broncos. If the defense doesn’t show up on Saturday, do we trust this team to keep pace?
Defensive questions
Jacksonville isn’t built to launch the ball downfield, which is where the Chargers have struggled for the most part this season. They are, however, built to expose the holes in LA’s run defense on the second level. Brandon Staley is unlikely to adjust away from the lighter boxes up front, which raises the question of how they stop the run. Drue Tranquill, Kenneth Murray Jr., and even Derwin James have had issues diagnosing the run when they haven’t been kept clean. So, how do you keep them cleaner other than asking the defensive line to…play better?
Deeper in the defense, rotating Ja’Sir Taylor in for Asante Samuel Jr. on run looks hasn’t yielded results despite Taylor being the bigger body. Samuel has looked like a less confident player since Taylor started rotating in, which has partially contributed to Michael Davis overshadowing the rest of the secondary. So, you can keep Samuel on the field full-time, which may sacrifice some run defense benefits, and try to pump his confidence back up with a strong first half. Or, you can rotate Taylor in and stop the run at a higher clip but run the risk that Doug Pederson schemes up designed shots right at the sixth-round rookie because your top-50 pick is off the field.
There are a lot of questions to be answered, more than usual. How does the Nasir Adderley/Alohi Gilman split go? How much can you move someone like Kyle Van Noy around with Joey Bosa potentially still slowed by groin surgery? The playoffs are, generally speaking, not a good time to have all of these questions. Ideally, your team has an identity by now, one they can lean on and trust. Right now, it just doesn’t feel like LA has that. Maybe Brandon Staley comes out with the best game plan of the season, but maybe that feels like a tall ask.
Which players whose names you might now know could go off in the wild-card round of the playoffs? Here’s our potential Secret Superstars.
If your team is going to win a Super Bowl, at some point along that ride, your team will have to get at least one remarkable postseason performance from a player nobody saw coming. Yes, we all expect the big names to come up big in big moments in big games, and other attendant cliches, but somewhere along the line, you will need a Secret Superstar to get the job done.
If you expected Buffalo Bills receiver Gabe Davis to go off for four touchdown catches against the Kansas City Chiefs in the 2021 divisional round, you should probably be working for a team. Because, with all due respect to Davis, I don’t think even the Bills were expecting that.
The same could be said for Houston Oilers defensive back Vernon Perry in the divisional round of the 1979 playoffs against the San Diego Chargers of Don Coryell and Dan Fouts. The undrafted rookie from Jackson State picked off four of Fouts’ passes, and blocked a field goal for good measure. As the game ended 17-14 in Houston’s favor, that block was as important as any of the picks.
You get the idea. At some point in the wild-card round of the upcoming playoffs, there will be at least one player whose name you don’t know who will pop up on the screen, and grab your attention. Here are my most likely players to do just that on the offensive side of the ball; the defensive players on this week’s Secret Superstars team will be up shortly.
And here’s the wild-card schedule for all who are curious; I tried to focus on repeat matchups as much as possible.
NFL sets Super Wild-Card Weekend schedule: Times, days, and networks
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Rashawn Slater has been out since Week 3.
The Chargers are primed for the playoffs. They are red-hot, winning their last four games. But they’re still without a key player that could ensure they make some serious noise.
Left tackle Rashawn Slater has been out since Week 3 after rupturing his biceps. Slater’s injury was initially thought of as a season-ending blow, but there is a chance of returning.
“He is still working through his return to play,” Brandon Staley said. “He’s working through things and progressing well. If he returns to play, I think that you guys will sense that momentum, in terms of how we will handle it.”
Slater has been in the facility rehabbing from his injury.
Having Slater back would be pivotal, as L.A. will be relying on Justin Herbert heavily in the playoffs, and having his blindside protected is imperative. Additionally, Slater is a major component in the run game.
However, the Chargers have to factor in his long-term health, and they don’t want to take the chance of re-injury if Slater comes back too soon.
If the team ultimately plays it safe, it will continue to be Jamaree Salyer’s job. Salyer has played 100% of the offensive snaps since Week 4. While he has had rough moments, particularly against speed rushers, Salyer has been plenty reliable for a rookie.
We now wait and see if Slater will be designated to return off injured reserve ahead of their wild-card matchup, which will take place next weekend.
The Los Angeles Chargers Week 18 first injury report listed two players limited.
The Chargers held their first practice ahead of their Week 18 matchup with the Broncos on Wednesday.
Here is a look at the injury report.
Note: This is estimated because the team just had a walkthrough.
| Player | Injury | Participation |
| CB Bryce Callahan | Groin | FP |
| QB Justin Herbert | Left shoulder | FP |
| FB Zander Horvath | Ankle | LP |
| S Derwin James | Concussion | FP |
| LB Amen Ogbongbemiga | Ankle | FP |
| OT Trey Pipkins | Knee | LP |
| LB Troy Reeder | Back | FP |
| OT Jamaree Salyer | Shoulder | FP |
* DNP = Did not participate | LP = Limited participation | FP = Full participation | NIR = Not injury related
Justin Herbert did all he could.
The magic ran out on Sunday in the Chargers’ loss to the Raiders, as Justin Herbert and company could not produce any in the final minutes, like they did the week before in their victory over the Cardinals.
Herbert found little time to operate in the pocket, getting swarmed by the Raiders’ defensive front all game. He was sacked five times, hit 14 times and pressured 22 times.
“Yeah, they were getting after us today,” running back Austin Ekeler said. “We were trying to adjust, change some things up. We were able to give ourselves a chance at the end. But we knew it was going to be a battle and it was.”
L.A. was missing three starters from its offensive line, including Corey Linsley, Rashawn Slater, and Trey Pipkins, all dealing with injuries. This left Herbert vulnerable, and Las Vegas took advantage.
“I thought they did a great job of battling,” Herbert said. “It’s never easy going up against a front seven like that. I think they’re very talented, very well coached on that side of the ball. It was a tough day for us, but those guys stepped up, battled and I really respect that from them.”
Despite the constant pressure he faced, Herbert still performed well, throwing for 335 yards and a touchdown late in the fourth quarter. However, his coaches and supporting cast failed to help him in the must-win game.
The nightmare of a game has further complicated the Bolts’ playoff hopes, as Los Angeles is now 6-6 and has a 33.3% chance of making the postseason, down from 50.8% heading into Week 13.
