With Justin Herbert healthy and productive, Chargering may become a thing of the past
A lot has changed with the Chargers since they hired Jim Harbaugh.
But what hasn’t changed is the stunning good fortune the franchise has enjoyed at the NFL’s most important field position.
For the past two-plus decades, the Chargers have gone into most games with a better quarterback than their opponent.
It’s not a trend that gets much attention from the NFL’s media partners, but oddsmakers know better. This explains how the QB-gifted Chargers, over their 331 regular-season games dating to the 2004 opener, have been an aggregate favorite on betting lines by an average of 2.1 points. Only six of the other 31 teams rank above them during that span.
In most years, the standard media narrative is that injuries sabotage the Chargers. Injuries outside of the QB position, however, seldom move betting lines, and almost any big change in the point spread involves a franchise quarterback’s availability.
It just so happens that at QB dating to at least 2004, the Chargers have enjoyed a twin bonanza.
One, they employed good-to-very-good QBs in Drew Brees, Philip Rivers and Justin Herbert. Their top QB was available to start every one of those games until last December, when a fractured finger ended Herbert’s season with four games left.
That’s why they’re the Shamrock Chargers.
