The Chargers spent the offseason trying to fortify the wall in front of Justin Herbert, and Alex Harkey is one of the newer pieces in that effort. The sixth-round pick out of Oregon, taken No. 206 overall, won’t be handed anything in training camp, but he has a real chance to become useful depth if he develops the way Los Angeles hopes.
That’s the lane for Harkey right now: not a starter, not a headline grabber, but a rookie who could matter because the Chargers need bodies they can trust. General manager Joe Hortiz and head coach Jim Harbaugh made the offensive line a clear priority after injuries exposed how thin the group had become. The team added Cole Strange and Kayode Awosika in free agency, then used a second-round pick on Jake Slaughter before circling back for Harkey later in the draft.
For Harkey, the first hurdle is simply making the roster in a crowded room. What helps him is that he brings more than one answer.
He’s projected mostly as a guard, but he has tackle experience too, along with the movement skills to work in different blocking schemes. That kind of flexibility can be gold for a team trying to build game-day depth, especially when injuries start forcing backups into action.
His college path shows the same adaptability. The Austin, Texas, native started at Colorado, transferred to Texas State, and then broke through in 2024.
At Texas State, he played 876 offensive snaps and posted an 85.8 overall Pro Football Focus grade. He gave up just three sacks and 12 total pressures on 461 pass-blocking snaps, and he graded well in both pass protection and run blocking.
That season opened the door to Oregon for his final year, where the competition got tougher and the numbers came down some. Even so, Harkey still logged 887 total snaps for the Ducks, allowed two sacks on 467 pass-blocking snaps, and showed the kind of athleticism and position versatility that likely caught the Chargers’ eye. The rough edges were there too, including nine penalties, but the tools remained obvious.
At 6-foot-5 and 313 pounds, Harkey has the frame NFL teams want in a developmental lineman. He pairs that size with enough mobility to work in both zone and gap concepts, and his hand usage, balance and finishing ability have all stood out during the evaluation process.
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The challenge for Lambert-Smith is simple enough to understand and hard enough to solve: the Chargers may not have room for everyone when the initial roster is set. If the team trims the receiver group down to five or six, camp and preseason work will be the only way for him to separate himself from the pack, and that kind of pressure can turn a routine summer into a defining stretch for a young player. [Read more 🡒]