{"id":305357,"date":"2025-08-21T07:45:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-21T07:45:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/305357\/"},"modified":"2025-08-21T07:45:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-21T07:45:11","slug":"why-jesse-minter-is-excited-about-the-defense-in-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/305357\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Jesse Minter Is Excited About the Defense in 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

We’ve reached the penultimate day of Chargers Training Camp<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Chargers will practice Thursday at The Bolt \u2014 their final one of camp \u2014 before Saturday’s preseason finale<\/a> on the road at the 49ers. Kickoff is at 5:30 p.m. (PT).<\/p>\n

Here is the Chargers Camp Report from Wednesday’s practice:<\/p>\n

1. Chargers defense ending on high note<\/p>\n

The Chargers defense was one of the league’s best units in 2024, finishing first in points allowed per game (17.7) and fifth in defensive EPA per play (-0.054).<\/p>\n

Chargers Defensive Coordinator Jesse Minter’s<\/a> group was also stellar in the red zone as they led the league with an opponent success rate of just 45.0 percent.<\/p>\n

That prowess was on display Wednesday as the Bolts first-team defense shined in a full-team red zone drill.<\/p>\n

Alohi Gilman kicked things off with an interception in the end zone before the entire defense rallied to the ball on a swing pass to force a short gain.<\/p>\n

An ensuing run play was also smothered up before Gilman and Derwin James, Jr. plastered Dalevon Campbell in coverage in the end zone to force an incompletion.<\/p>\n

Tarheeb Still then notched a tackle for loss on the fifth and final play of the drill that saw the first-team defense win in every way possible.<\/p>\n

Minter said after practice that he was excited to watch the entire unit do their thing in 2025.<\/p>\n

“Us playing together is the engine, playing team defense,” Minter said. “Not counting on one position moreso than the others.<\/p>\n

“There’s real weapons … [Khalil] Mack is a weapon for us, Derwin is a weapon for us. Guys that have certain skillsets that you can utilize to attack things,” Minter continued. “And then there’s guys who just kind of do everything well and fit in their spot.<\/p>\n

“It’s everybody buying into that and doing their job,” Minter added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We’ve reached the penultimate day of Chargers Training Camp. The Chargers will practice Thursday at The Bolt \u2014…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":305358,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2064],"tags":[23699,44577,37,45122,241,7,34,38,1014,262,2444,2443,6,56893],"class_list":{"0":"post-305357","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles-chargers","8":"tag-2025-training-camp","9":"tag-2025-training-camp-news","10":"tag-app-homepage","11":"tag-articles-camp-report","12":"tag-chargers","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-homepage-cp","15":"tag-homepage-headlines","16":"tag-los-angeles","17":"tag-los-angeles-chargers","18":"tag-losangeles","19":"tag-losangeleschargers","20":"tag-nfl","21":"tag-ucla-health-camp-report"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115065646882010031","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=305357"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305357\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/305358"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=305357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=305357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=305357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}