Charger Power Rankings / Ratings going into Wk 5

[Bolt-O]

Final blurb and summary:

---
The Athletic 6 (LW 11)
https://theathletic.com/2870280/2021...ootball-story/

With the smoke from the garbage fire in Jacksonville distracting so much of the NFL news cycle, it's such a cleansing breath of fresh air to see one of the league's best young quarterbacks paired with a head coach who empowers him. Justin Herbert has been sensational, but shares the love with Austin Ekeler, who is second to Derrick Henry in running back yards from scrimmage; and Derwin James, who iced the game with his first interception since 2018.

Kid character inspiration: Herbert is the witch from "Room on the Broom" because he's magical but at some point, he's going to need some help from his friends to slay the dragon.

----

[dmac_bolt]

Around 7 feels about right. Beating the next two best teams in arguably one of the best divisions is a separating fact from all of the mid-pack teams but the loss to Dallas still stands as a limiter due to small sample size. Sure, we should have won that game too and really lost to these guys but we didnt.



Ranking going into week 5 has exactly zero value anyway. Too much runway ahead to even care or worry about it, power rankings are polls and polls don’t win playoff spots.

[Bolt-O]

Ranking going into week 5 has exactly zero value anyway. Too much runway ahead to even care or worry about it, power rankings are polls and polls don’t win playoff spots.

I have to go back in my archive and see how the rankings look after real early successes then the flop afterward. I agree on the power rankings as near useless in the long run, but casual fans tend to filter out the news on the non-contenders, and the real bad teams fans start to concentrate on the draft as they realize there isn't much hope for the playoffs. Hopefully the team hasn't yet peaked and continues to improve, which is the hope for every other team as well.

[Jagged]

Look, the Chargers had an impressive win versus the Raiders, but the constant ESPN nonsense of "they're the team to beat in the AFC West" is nonsense. It's still the Chiefs, who would've defeated the Chargers if they didn't commit so many sloppy turnovers in Week 3.

The Chargers have no fans and Raider fans took over the stadium.

These are the two narratives that I have been constantly seeing lately. I'm pretty sure the writer of the first quote can't see alternate realities so to put that into his opinion of the rankings is asinine. The second one has a little truth to it, they don't have as many fans as other teams for obvious reasons. That being said, the Chargers should be pointing out how much money these invading fans spent to see their team lose.(hopefully losing in So Fi becomes a trend for visiting teams)

[Bolt-O]

The quote from Walterfootball might be just out of frustration on his bets. Browns shudda beat the chiefs too, but didn't. No look passes shudda work, but didn't. Tyreek Hill shudda not fumble, but he did.

We know the owners of the team are only concerned about the bottom line, and maybe the goal of the championship, but they care little about legacy fans, and gladly will take the money of anyone going to the games.

[Heatmiser]

Teams that lose due to turnovers. Or missed FG. Or a blocked punt (geez, sound familiar) can always say they shoulda won. But the thing is, they didn’t.

[richpjr]

Teams that lose due to turnovers. Or missed FG. Or a blocked punt (geez, sound familiar) can always say they shoulda won. But the thing is, they didn’t.

We do it here too - if Keenan doesn’t fall down we score a TD in a game lost by 3 points. It’s understandable why fans do it.

[Bolt4Knob]

Teams that lose due to turnovers. Or missed FG. Or a blocked punt (geez, sound familiar) can always say they shoulda won. But the thing is, they didn’t.

Chiefs fan on twitter was saying they only lost to the Chargers because of four turnovers.

Well I used to be that fan that was in denial because I was a "what if" guy. I have since learned that bad teams make bad plays. Good teams don't make bad plays. Or good teams make fewer bad plays rather.