{"id":884593,"date":"2026-05-07T05:12:22","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T05:12:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/884593\/"},"modified":"2026-05-07T05:12:22","modified_gmt":"2026-05-07T05:12:22","slug":"chargers-justin-herbert-will-love-1-rookie-projection-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/884593\/","title":{"rendered":"Chargers’ Justin Herbert will love 1 rookie projection"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chargers’ Justin Herbert will love 1 rookie projection<\/a> originally appeared on The Sporting News<\/a>. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Los Angeles Chargers<\/a> quarterback Justin Herbert<\/a> took a lot of punishment in 2025 as he was sacked 54 times.<\/p>\n

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That isn’t any way for a perceived top quarterback to live.<\/p>\n

So, the Chargers made a couple of moves in free agency to fortify the offensive line, plus selecting three linemen in the NFL Draft. So, depth was greatly improved.<\/p>\n

The question now is, can those drafted be counted on to protect the franchise’s biggest and best asset?<\/p>\n

For Sports Illustrated’s Daniel Flick, he thinks Jake Slaughter can be L.A.’s best draft pick in 2026.<\/p>\n

“Los Angeles announced Slaughter, who started 33 games at center for Florida, as a guard,”\u00a0Flick wrote<\/a>. “He\u2019ll enter a three-man competition for the two guard spots with a good chance at getting the nod in Week 1.<\/p>\n

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“Slaughter is quick-footed and athletic, a good fit for new Chargers offensive coordinator Mike McDaniel, and he\u2019s a former team captain at Florida. That\u2019s a good blend of tools.”<\/p>\n

MORE:Skyler Bell prediction spells doom for Keon Coleman’s Bills future<\/a><\/p>\n

Herbert facing big 2026 season<\/p>\n

This is based on a couple of things.<\/p>\n

Firstly, Herbert, for some, is viewed as a top quarterback, but\u00a0hasn’t done anything when it counts in the postseason, being 0-3.<\/p>\n

The other is that Herbert now has adequate protection from his offensive line (we think), plus an offensive coordinator in Mike McDaniel who could bring out the best in him.<\/p>\n

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A coordinator who made Tua Tagovailoa<\/a> look elite for a short period, what McDaniel can do with Herbert will be a fascinating watch over the course of the season.<\/p>\n

After back-to-back 11-win seasons and no playoff wins, the time has come for Herbert to actually do something of note in the NFL.<\/p>\n

More NFL news:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Chargers’ Justin Herbert will love 1 rookie projection originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":884594,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2064],"tags":[241,40168,7,30256,1159,8100,1014,262,2444,2443,4836,6,1482,1257,3452],"class_list":["post-884593","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles-chargers","tag-chargers","tag-daniel-flick","tag-football","tag-jake-slaughter","tag-justin-herbert","tag-keon-coleman","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-chargers","tag-losangeles","tag-losangeleschargers","tag-mike-mcdaniel","tag-nfl","tag-offensive-line","tag-quarterback","tag-tua-tagovailoa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116531583241109503","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/884593","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=884593"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/884593\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/884594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=884593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=884593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=884593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}