Mamba's Game 1 Thoughts and Analysis

Offense
On offense, the Chargers looked below average up until the 4th quarter. I'll start with Philip Rivers. He missed a couple of throws over the receivers head, but for the most part, he was on target. His only interception should be credited to Antonio Gates, as the pass hit him square in the hands and deflected off of his hands into Michael Huff's arms. For most of the night, his offensive line wasn't giving him any protection, either. Rivers was whistled for a taunting penalty when he spiked the ball into the ground in front of a Raiders' defensive lineman after the lineman kept trying to tackles Rivers as the whistle blew. The penalty didn't really hurt us, so that is okay. Rivers hit Vincent Jackson for a 15 YD TD pass on his outside shoulder. He threw this ball with no room for error. It went under a defender and behind another one. Beautiful throw, but probably got lucky. The best part of the night was how Rivers executed the game winning drive with about 2:00 left in the game. He got the ball down field and sold the draw play that sprung Sproles for the winning TD beautifully. Overall, Rivers had a good outing. He was shy of 300 yards, 1 TD and 1 INT. When Rivers was rushed, he either ate it or threw the ball away, when he was given time to throw, he produced.

LT and Sproles were rather ineffective. I'll start with LT. He rolled his ankle on the play where he fumbled (his first lost fumble in nearly 1,000 touches) and towards the end of the game it tightened up on him. That is why he wasn't in the game for the final drive, according to Turner. LT had 55 yards on 13 carries, abotu 4.2 YPC. He put the ball in the end zone from 1 yard out, as well. I think LT had a good outing, for his limited touches. If he could have sustained that 4.2 YPC and gotten a regular amount of touches, he'd be at that 100 yard mark.

Sproles, even though he scored the game winning TD, disappointed me as a feature back. I don't like the fact that he is splitting carries with Tomlinson. Sproles is not a feature back. He is a back that you bring in to change up the pace, use on swing routes or over the middle check downs. You need to get him in the open and he'll make people miss. On the final drive, he accounted for about 33 of the teams yards, including the final two 5 yard runs that put the ball in the end zone. He had two big kickoff returns, but both times, he was basically stopped by the kicker. On special teams, Sproles bobbled the ball 3 times. I don't know, I felt like Sproles was trying to do too much last night. He wants a big contract and he wants to be an impact player. He already is an impact player though, he needs to realize that and not try to do stuff out of his capabilities.

The receivers, specifically Naanee, Jackson, and Gates were pretty good. Naanee came up huge in the game, especially on one play where he got a lob from Philip at his ankles and turned it into a big gain on the winning drive. The Chargers' have high hopes for Naanee; they are kind of grooming him to be a Gates type of player. If last night was a sign of things to come, keep throwing him the ball. Vincent Jackson had a dececnt night. He was covered by Asomugha all night, so his chances to get the ball were very few. He made a beautiful cut on the outside that shook Aso off of him for a 15 yard TD catch. Gates looked healthy last night and it helped us out a bunch. His only error last night was the pass that bounced right off of his hands and led to the interception.

The offensive line was god awful. There were barely any holes to run through and the protection for Rivers was abysmal. To go along with being horrible, they lost their rookie RG and their veteran C Nick Hardwick to injury, both of them looked worse than they were. The rookie RG Louis Vasquez suffered a sprained knee and Hardwick suffered a sprained ankle. If this line wants to get any better, Hardwick and Vasquez need to get back healthy ASAP. To pile on, the LT Marcus McNeil also suffered a sprained ankle, but stayed in the game because the Chargers were down to their last 5 OL. Protection is going to be vital this year. This group needs to step up and open holes for LT and Sproles and protect Rivers. If they can't do that, it is going to be a long year.

Defense
The pass rush was abysmal, as well. Merriman was dragging his leg a little bit, which was to be expected, and the other LB's and D linemen were getting no pressure on Russell in the 1st half. This group of LB's is going to be crucial to re-establishing our once feared pass rush. If they can't get the pressure, the pass defense is going to suffer as well.

Speaking of the DB's, they didn't look too bright, either. Jammer started the game with a brilliant interception, but the Chargers didn't capitalize on it. Later in the game, Cromartie and Hart didn't communicate and the result was a bomb from JaMarcus Russell on 4th and 15 to temporarily give Oakland the lead. Right away, they started pointing at each other, blaming one another. I tend to believe that Hart blew his coverage. Cromartie was responsible for the outside, Hart deep. Hart was playing too close up and the WR blew right by him. The team needs to figure this shit out.

Overall
Overall the Chargers looked pretty bad for 3 quarters against the Raiders. The Chargers are notoriously slow starters, so I'm not worried, we got the W and that is all that matters. I hope our defense improves, I'm confident it will, I just pray it happens soon. I hope Merriman can get back to form and can lead the pass rush. Baltimore is coming up. That is going to be a test for us. It is our home opener, so I'm expecting us to be pumped the fuck up. If not, Baltimore D is going to have a field day.

 

Pretty much nailed it Mamba. One thing I noticed in the game was that Jamaal Williams was practically invisible in this game. I only heard his name mentioned the one time Raiders' C Chris Morris blew a block on him and let him through the line in a split second. The Raiders were basically running up the middle at will all game as well. Do you think hes starting to decline harder this offseason?

 

Now that I think about it, you're right, Williams was extremely ineffective. He's getting old, but he supposedly had one of the best off-season's of his life. Hopefully he can turn it around because he is the key to stuffing the run.

 

Yeah I read he lost 25 lbs. but will that help or hurt him? Hes down to 325 lbs I think. I would imagine that helps his pass rush ability but its not too difficult for a big OL like the Raiders' to handle a 325 lb guy on running downs.

Its also worth mentioning that our head coach is an OL coach and we run a zone blocking scheme which is designed to combat a 3-4 defense.