Power Outage 2: The unwanted sequel

I've seen this movie before: The Chargers go down under .500 early in the season, inspiring panic, anger, frustration and calls for everything from firing Norv to benching LT. Rationalizations are made: injuries, a tough schedule, a few bad breaks. The thing we have yet to see is whether this is a sequel of last year, where a 1-3 start ended with a 11-5 trip to the AFC title game, or if it is, in fact, a sequel of 2005, which ended 9-7 with the Bolts watching the playoffs from their living rooms. Lets hope its the former, and we can all look back on this later and laugh at how silly our frustrations were.

Today's game sucked in many ways. For all the blame that's gonna get heaped on the defense, the fact is that they got zero help from the offense for most the game. In one sense, they did there job pretty damn well, as they gave up zero points in the second half. On the other hand there was no pressure on the QB whatsoever and no turnovers.

The real culprit today was the offense, which converted 3-12 on third down and had several 3 and outs. It was especially bad in the first half, and the problem was that they simply could not execute. Each failed offensive series can be pinned on blown execution. The facemask by Manumaleuna which made 3rd and 1 into 2nd and forever. A false start which makes it 2nd and 15. A blown blocking assignment on an LT run which made 2nd and 1 into 3rd and 5. Poor protection by the line. Poor throws by Rivers, including that overthrow of VJ. Everyone gets a piece of this blame. Except Scifres, he was awesome, but when the best performer of the day was the punter its not a good sign.

We need to start faster. We need to execute. We need to beat the Pats next week. Things are tough and they are gonna get tougher for a while: New England, then another cross country trip to 4-1 Buffalo, then the Transatlantic trip to play the Saints. The Bolts need to suck it up and get it in gear. If they can get to 4-4 or 5-3 before the bye week we should be ok, as the schedule gets more favorable after that.

It starts on Sunday. Protect the House. Beat the Pats.