It was another dispiriting and uninspired loss for the Los Angeles Chargers on Sunday as they fell 24-9 to the Los Angeles Rams. Head coach Jim Harbaugh was asked yet again about offensive coordinator Mike McDaniel who has been under fire for weeks now and he said that McDaniel would remain the offensive playcaller after a question, and several follow-ups, from Noah Furtado of The Athletic.
At this point, Harbaugh may really have no other choice but to keep McDaniel in his current role just to use him as a scapegoat. He is in too deep at this point and after an 0-7 start in which the offense has been truly terrible, averaging under 300. yards per game and less than 15 points per game, Harbaugh’s fate may not be fully tethered to McDaniel. If he can turn things around then maybe that will get him another year as the head coach but if not then maybe McDaniel could also serve as a convenient excuse.
Perhaps the rationale is that if he keeps McDaniel all season and he is unable to get better results out of the offense, Harbaugh can fire him, maybe reunite with his usual offensive coordinator Greg Roman, who is currently with his brother John Harbaugh in the New York Giants organization, and try to get things back on track next season.
That would be a pretty bold gambit because one might argue that Harbaugh’s refusal to make any sort of change after such a bad start reflects poorly on him as a leader and a head coach. Such an awful season has to be truly strange for him, though. Harbaugh is a guy who has had success pretty much everywhere he has gone. He went to Stanford and turned that program around. He went to the San Francisco 49ers and turned them into a playoff team. He went to Michigan and turned them around immediately. He went to the Chargers and led them to two straight 11-6 seasons. An 0-7 start like this is just completely foreign to him so he’s never really had to deal with questions on whether to fire a coordinator midseason.
Jim Harbaugh is in uncharted waters right now
The Chargers are probably going to start trading players away soon which won’t exactly make it easier to turn things around. This is already a lot season so the Chargers might as well try to get some draft capital out of such an awful year, but there are going to be some major questions about the coaching situation going forward.
Maybe the Chargers decide to make McDaniel the scapegoat and fire him while retaining Harbaugh, but whatever confidence there was in Harbaugh entering the season will be completely gone. The real question will be whether he has lost the locker room. If he still has the support of the players then there’s a chance he can turn it around but if not then both he and McDaniel may be looking for a new job.
Jim Harbaugh’s Chargers Job Security Depends Entirely on Mike McDaniel