Defensive Growth

Despite how unprepared the Chargers looked on defense to defend the Browns no huddle attack on Sunday, they are thrilled to have gotten the experience dealing with an uptempo offense. The Bolts would much rather have gotten their first look at the no huddle approach in the regular season than at crunch time when all of the chips are down and its lose or go home in postseason action. San Diego has many young guys on this defense that have been learning on the fly all year so notching up a victory against a team running the hurry up offense is just another positive experience for them to file away in their memory banks to use at a later date. One of the more experienced leaders on the Chargers defense Shaun Phillips offered these comments on the Browns rapid fire attack saying: “It gives us something we haven’t seen. I’m pretty sure some teams are going to try to go no huddle on us because of the fact that they had success. We look at it as another challenge, not an obstacle.” That’s the exact attitude that the team has to love hearing from its players seeing this as just another welcomed challenge rather than a detriment to their continued success.

There is no denying the fact that members of the Chargers coaching staff had to be a bit worried after the Browns opening drive of the game where they marched 72 yards for a touchdown. Bolts Head Coach Norv Turner offered some insight on some of the aspects that the Browns offense had to offer saying: “They did some very good things. I’m glad they did. There are things we need to work on from a defensive standpoint. There are a lot of good coaches in this league and they found some soft spots in us.” Of course this defense is still a work in progress, but some of the things that Cleveland did to the Chargers has to be worrisome for the coaches. Cleveland has been statistically one of the league’s worst offenses all year averaging just 242.4 yards per game. Against the Bolts on Sunday the Browns gained 372 yards and converted fifty percent of their third downs going 8 for 16.

Trends in the league have been for the most part however toward a passing oriented game especially among the AFC’s division leaders. Outside of Cincinnati who is 7th in the league on the ground, the rest of the current division leaders are a pass first group. San Diego allowed a very disconcerting 5.2 yards per carry to a Cleveland team on Sunday that hasn’t really mounted much offensively all season. Linebacker Stephen Cooper is confident that things will get corrected and that the Bolts will continue to get better in the weeks leading up to the playoffs as he commented: “We know as a defense we’ve got to get better. We’ve felt like we’ve improved each week and we didn’t take a step forward today. But the most important thing is we’re headed back to San Diego with a victory and that’s all that matters.” Another win does help to hide some of the statistical shortcomings that the Chargers experienced in Sunday’s game, but they definitely need to scheme something to slow down opponent’s ground games.

Although it should be remembered that the Bolts were a bit handicapped defensively in Sunday’s victory over Cleveland as they chose to sit three key components to their defense rather than have them play through the pain. Linebackers Shawne Merriman (foot), defensive end Luis Castillo (calf), and safety Eric Weddle (knee) all sat out Sunday’s lakeside game to rest their injuries and hopefully heal up for the home stretch which begins this coming Sunday in Dallas. Many unfamiliar faces were out on the field against the Browns that had yet to experience neither the spotlight nor the circumstances under which they were playing. Three rookies in fact took over for the missing starters for the Chargers as Larry English filled in for Merriman, C.J. Spillman took Weddle’s place in the secondary, and Vaughn Martin got some game action in place of Castillo. Overall Turner was pleased with the performances turned in by these youngsters saying: “Our young guys are being asked to play a lot of football. We’ve got to get better with our young guys, but they did a lot of good things today. I’m proud of the way they’re playing.” He went on to add: “There were some guys who were asked to play in the fourth quarter who will have a better understanding of what this league is about. They are some guys that just don’t have enough experience to know that it’s life or death on every single play. It’ll help us get better because we’re going to need every guy that we dress. We had a lot of guys play today.”

In addition to the three aforementioned rookies filling large roles on Sunday, fellow rookie safety Kevin Ellison and second year cornerback Antoine Cason also saw some significant action in the 4th quarter. This experience will certainly be useful for the future of the franchise and should there young guys be called upon again to fill in for a fallen comrade. San Diego has continued to take things one week at a time as the age old adage goes and Shawne Merriman sounded like a coach when he said: “I don’t even know who we have after Dallas, honestly. That’s how week-to-week we’re taking it. It’s really from week to week. One game is not bigger than the next. It’s cliché, but we’ve done a great job of taking it one game at a time and that’s what we’ll continue to do.” This attitude is what has propelled the Chargers on this streak of success is the don’t look to the past or the future, just look straight ahead and take care of what is in front of you from week to week. This team has had a great outlook since getting off to another sluggish start from mid-October on as they have been rock solid since.

Tags: Antoine Cason, C.J. Spillman, Cincinnati Bengals, Cleveland Browns, Dallas Cowboys, Eric Weddle, Kevin Ellison, Larry English, Luis Castillo, Norv Turner, Shaun Phillips, Shawne Merriman, Stephen Cooper, Vaughn Martin