It was a summer season day in June, however Daiyan Henley was dressed for a prime-time second. Fitted with lengthy socks, white pants and a sleeve on his elbow, the Chargers linebacker’s follow jersey was full with game-ready lightning bolts on every shoulder.
Different group’s follow jerseys are plain. They’re looser. They’re extra breathable.
“But this is us,” Henley mentioned, operating his fingertips over his crisp blue jersey. “This is clean.”
“This,” he added, “is the Harbaugh way.”
Coming into his second season on the helm as coaching camp begins Thursday, Jim Harbaugh is firmly woven into the material of the Chargers group. The coach liable for the franchise’s greatest single-season turnaround in 20 years was the mastermind behind the group’s new follow jersey patches. Already outfitted with their elevated follow jerseys, gamers now put on their greatest accomplishments on their chest with patches that remember private victories whereas pushing for collective success.
The patches characterize eight accomplishments: Playoff wins, Chargers information, NFL information, All-Professional seasons, seasons as a group captain, Walter Payton Man of the Yr, the NFL’s Ed Block Braveness Award, and the block of granite award decided by the Chargers power and conditioning employees.
Chargers security Derwin James Jr. talks concerning the patches on his follow jersey throughout a information convention in June.
(Michael Gonzalez / Los Angeles Chargers)
The one participant who has a minimum of one in every of every is Derwin James Jr.
The four-time group captain’s proper chest is plastered with three playoff appearances, three Chargers information, three NFL information, two nominations for man of the 12 months, 4 All-Professional honors and one every of the braveness and block of granite awards. He desires to gather sufficient patches to achieve all the way down to his ribs.
“At the end of the day, we’re all professionals, this is a professional league, but [the patches] kind of keep us connected and get a little bragging rights in the locker room,” James mentioned. “Guys want to compete for their jersey to look like that too.”
At Michigan, Harbaugh used helmet stickers to represent every participant’s accomplishments. The jersey patches remind the coach of the stripes on a common’s uniform.
“Some day, they’ll be able to put that jersey up in a frame, put it on a wall, say something really good about themselves,” Harbaugh mentioned. “It’ll be what they accomplished as a pro football player.”
The patches are Harbaugh’s newest culture-setting innovation. He outfitted the locker room with customized locker identify tags that checklist every participant’s hometown, faculty, highschool and recruiting rating to advertise group bonding. The coach handed out steel lunch pails and blue-collar work shirts custom-made with embroidered identify tags to represent the group’s hard-working mentality. Hoodies celebrated main victories such because the group’s thriller in opposition to the Cincinnati Bengals, a late-season Thursday night time victory over the Denver Broncos and the playoff-clinching win over the New England Patriots.
“He wants it to be close-knit, in house,” Henley mentioned. “Everything is love and football and family, and that’s how we go about our business. Now that we have another year under our belt, we’ve had bad games and good games and we’ve gone the distance and also didn’t accomplish what we wanted to, all of that wrapped into one, is what’s motivating us and pushing us forward.”
After going 11-6 in Harbaugh’s first common season, the Chargers gained’t be a sleeper playoff contender once more. With momentum from a profitable begin to the Harbaugh period, the group hopes to make consecutive playoff appearances for the primary time since 2009.
“We’re far ahead of where we were last year, but there’s still a lot of work to do,” quarterback Justin Herbert mentioned throughout minicamp. “I think guys have done a great job this offseason of showing up mentally prepared and being focused day in and day out.”
Herbert’s jersey patches require a number of rows of lightning bolt tally marks to show his quite a few NFL and Chargers information. But the quarterback is lacking a playoff win mark.
Not solely is he 0-2 within the postseason, each losses got here in spectacular disasters. The Chargers blew a 27-point lead in opposition to Jacksonville in a 2022 wild-card recreation. He threw 4 interceptions in opposition to the Houston Texans final 12 months.
Regardless of Herbert’s elite athleticism and arm expertise, the 27-year-old will stay an afterthought within the quarterback hierarchy till he finds the playoff success that follows contemporaries Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, Joe Burrow and Lamar Jackson.
The prize they’re all chasing is price rather more than a brand new jersey patch.
And so forth.
The Chargers positioned 5 gamers on the bodily unable to carry out checklist earlier than coaching camp: S Elijah Molden, WR Mike Williams, WR Jaylen Johnson, LB Del’Shawn Phillips and T Savion Washington. Molden, who signed a three-year extension in February, underwent offseason knee surgical procedure and missed the entire offseason program. He mentioned in April that he anticipated to be prepared for coaching camp.
