{"id":394541,"date":"2025-09-25T00:31:12","date_gmt":"2025-09-25T00:31:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/394541\/"},"modified":"2025-09-25T00:31:12","modified_gmt":"2025-09-25T00:31:12","slug":"how-rookie-oronde-gadsden-impressed-the-chargers-in-his-nfl-debut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/394541\/","title":{"rendered":"How Rookie Oronde Gadsden Impressed the Chargers in His NFL Debut"},"content":{"rendered":"

The rookie tight end stayed patient knowing his time would come, and was ready to go whenever that would be.<\/p>\n

“I always knew I would go in at some point,” Gadsden said. “The first two weeks I wasn’t active, then that third week came up and Coach Harbaugh told me I would be in.<\/p>\n

“I was ready to step up and not give up the spot,” Gadsden added.<\/p>\n

Gadsden flashed the receiving ability he displayed throughout the offseason, both getting himself open over the middle and making some contested catches as well.<\/p>\n

He impressed Harbaugh as well, as he showed it all off in an all-around performance.<\/p>\n

“He got out there and makes the tough catch on the boundary, contested catches, challenging-type catches, two on the field goal drive,” Harbaugh said. “Ran a really good route and caught a tough ball with guys swiping at it, in between two guys he’s catching a slant.<\/p>\n

“His blocking was good, too, in a good place to ascend from,” Harbaugh added.<\/p>\n

Even it being his first regular-season game, Gadsden’s rapport with quarterback Justin Herbert<\/a> looked as if the two had played a lot together.<\/p>\n

His seven targets were tied for the third-most on the afternoon, with Herbert even targeting him on the first two plays of the game-winning field goal drive which went for 15 yards.<\/p>\n

After not seeing many throws from the quarterback over the last couple of weeks, the rookie said he made it his mission to gain some of Herbert’s trust in the practices leading up to the game.”<\/p>\n

“The first three weeks preparing for Kansas City and the Raiders, I wasn’t active so I wasn’t really getting any passes with him at all,” Gadsden said. “Going into the week, just catching every ball that was throwing at me.<\/p>\n

“Just giving him some trust that in the game I was going to be open and if I’m open, you could look at me and throw it to me,” he added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The rookie tight end stayed patient knowing his time would come, and was ready to go whenever that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":394542,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2064],"tags":[37,241,7,34,38,1014,262,2444,2443,6,2028],"class_list":{"0":"post-394541","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles-chargers","8":"tag-app-homepage","9":"tag-chargers","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-homepage-cp","12":"tag-homepage-headlines","13":"tag-los-angeles","14":"tag-los-angeles-chargers","15":"tag-losangeles","16":"tag-losangeleschargers","17":"tag-nfl","18":"tag-oronde-gadsden-ii"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115262120656282810","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394541","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=394541"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394541\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/394542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=394541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=394541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=394541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}