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Welcome back to the snap report, a weekly feature where we look at the Chargers players involved in each offensive and defensive snap and track how players earn and lose playing time as the year continues. As always, these snap counts come from the NFL and the numbers are rounded to the nearest percent.
Well that was fun wasn't it? The Chargers controlled last Thursday's game against the Broncos, limiting them to 2-9 on third down and possessing the ball for almost two thirds of regulation. That's the type of Chargers performance fans are used to seeing against Peyton Manning. That kind of performance goes a long way in a locker room and should be a huge boost of confidence for both the players and the new regime going forward.
Let's take a look at the offensive snaps against the Broncos:
On offense, the personnel didn't change too much from the win over the Giants. Though the Chargers ran the ball effectively against the Broncos, they didn't receive too much help from guards Chad Rinehart and Jeromey Clary, who posted PFF run block ratings of -3.3 and -3.8, respectively.
It was also a game to forget for John Phillips, who run blocked for 19 of his 21 snaps but earned a -2.4 run block rating. It's beginning to look like each one of his snaps is just taking valuable experience away from Ladarius Green.
Unsurprisingly, the Chargers again found the most success when running behind left tackle King Dunlap, earning six yards per carry through the gaps involving that mountain of a man.
Now here are the defensive snap counts:
The injury to Johnny Patrick put the coaches in a conundrum when selecting their third cornerback, and they chose the route that involved the least amount of Derek Cox. Marcus Gilchrist returned to nickel cornerback, his initial role for the Chargers, with Darrell Stuckey and Jahleel Addae each receiving unprecedented amounts of playing time. Stuckey had never played in double digit defensive snap counts before his 32 snaps against the Broncos, and Addae played in 100 percent of the defense's snaps after never previously going over the 50 percent mark.
Someone more intelligent than me would have to go through the film, but I'd say holding Peyton Manning to less than 300 yards in a game this year is a pretty remarkable accomplishment for this secondary and coaching staff. Shareece Wright has had arguably the best two games of his Chargers career in back-to-back weeks. I'm looking forward to seeing how the defense builds on this performance to close out the season.
