The Chargers are walking into a brutal setup in Week 3. They’re 0-2, they’ve dropped back-to-back 26-14 games, and now they have to go to Buffalo and face a Bills team that’s 2-0 and rolling with confidence. If Los Angeles is going to get its first win, it can’t afford another sloppy afternoon.
The path is pretty clear: keep Josh Allen from taking over, get the offense moving in the same direction, and stop giving away possessions.
Allen is the biggest problem on the board because he can wreck a game in so many different ways. In two games, he’s thrown for 582 yards and five touchdowns without an interception, and he’s added 92 rushing yards and four more scores on the ground.
That’s the version the Chargers cannot let loose. They have to keep him contained, force him to operate from the pocket and shut down the kind of broken-play explosions that can flip everything in a hurry.
If he starts freelancing and creating with his legs, Buffalo can make this ugly fast.
On the other side, Los Angeles has to find some kind of rhythm. The offense has looked completely out of sync through the first two weeks, and that’s a major issue in a new system under Mike McDaniel.
There are going to be growing pains, but at 0-2, the Chargers can’t sit around waiting for the timing to magically show up. Justin Herbert and the rest of the unit need to start functioning like a group.
That task gets tougher with the injuries, too. David Njoku is on injured reserve, Charlie Kolar was also injured, and that leaves Oronde Gadsden as the only tight end on the active roster heading into the week.
Then there’s the turnover issue, which might be the most dangerous one of all. The Chargers have already been burned by turnovers and poor execution through the first two games, and against Buffalo those mistakes could snowball.
The Bills can score in bunches - they put up 41 points against Detroit last week and found the end zone on five of their first six possessions. Handing them short fields or extra chances would be asking for trouble.
So the assignment is simple, even if the execution won’t be: slow down Allen, get Herbert and the offense on the same page, and protect the football. At 0-2, the Chargers don’t have much margin left for another bad night.
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The expectation in this one is that Herbert can put together a big passing day and help push the offense into a more comfortable place after an uneven opening stretch. It is still just a prediction, but it has the feel of the sort of game that could change the tone around the Chargers quickly if Herbert finds his timing and the passing game starts clicking. [Read more 🡒]