CARSON – The way Philip Rivers saw it, losing the game wasn’t the problem.
What the Chargers did Saturday night was add a game. Or another rung on the ladder.
“We’ve got one more game to win now, to win the whole thing,” the Chargers quarterback said. “And it’s not going to be here.”
Any thought, or worry, about getting a bye week and then squeezing an NFL playoff game into StubHub Center disappeared when Baltimore’s Tavon Young scooped a fumble by Antonio Gates and pranced into the end zone.
That sealed the Ravens’ decisive 22-10 victory that lowered the Chargers to 11-4 and denied them a chance at the AFC West.
Fame in the NFL is almost as fleeting as that. The Chargers, who have been widely ordained as (A) the AFC’s best team and (B) the best team in Los Angeles because of how they crafted an 11-3 record, returned to the scrum Saturday night at StubHub Center.
The crab that pulled them back into the pot wore a Ravens uniform and was usually sitting on top of Rivers, who was engulfed by a four-sack pass rush.
“We were one play from getting some running plays going,” center Mike Pouncey said, “and on the pass rush they were running some stunts, nothing special, and we couldn’t get the job done.”
The Ravens hogged the ball from the beginning, they covered the Chargers receivers with glaring ease, and they never stopped attacking Rivers. They did with a lot of unknown names like Patrick Onwuasor, Brent Urban and Za’Darius Smith following in the footsteps of Haloti Ngata, Ray Lewis and Ed Reed, but defense tends to stick in Baltimore, and this outfit gives up only 18.3 points per week.
Now 5-1 as a starting QB.@lj_era8's highlights from the @Ravens' win over the Chargers! #BALvsLAC #RavensFlock https://t.co/IkcQb0b4As
— NFL (@NFL) December 23, 2018
It’s the only unit in the NFL that holds the opposition under 300 yards per game. The Chargers stopped at 195, and their only touchdown came on a 17-yard drive that followed a fumble recovery by Melvin Ingram.
“We had stupid penalties that stopped our drives,” coach Anthony Lynn said unsparingly. “This (Baltimore) is a team that doesn’t do much, but they do it well. We knew what was coming and we didn’t play well.”
This seemed an ominous game for the Chargers, and there were several reasons.
The Chargers had been the NFL’s Flavor of the Week ever since they won at Kansas City nine days ago. That tends to sour in the weekly reality of the league.
Plus, Baltimore came in with new quarterback Lamar Jackson and a deep devotion to the football.
Jackson is the 2016 Heisman Trophy winner from Louisville whom the Ravens daringly took in last year’s draft. He wasn’t expected to replace Joe Flacco because then the Ravens would have to alter their whole offense.
But after the Ravens lost to Pittsburgh and dropped to 4-5, they used the bye week to do exactly that. Jackson got the job and the Ravens rotated their tires and began hitting the road.
Jackson only carried it 13 times for 39 yards Saturday, but he showed he is progressing as a passer. He floated a deep ball to tight end Mark Andrews, the Oklahoma rookie, and when Chargers safety Jahleel Addae missed him, Andrews took it 68 yards for a score.
That was significant because the Chargers had just taken a lead that they would hold for only two plays. Apparently Jackson isn’t as helpless when he falls behind as everyone said. He also might become something very special.
“When it’s 11 on 11, you can’t always account for the quarterback,” Lynn said.
Rivers was still kicking himself for throwing an interception to Brandon Carr on the game’s first play. The Ravens snapped the ball on 20 of the game’s first 27 plays. Such domination kept the Chargers from finding a rhythm. They ran the ball only 16 times. More tellingly, their longest play went only 17 yards, a pass to Keenan Allen, and that didn’t happen until the fourth quarter.
Baltimore’s defensive backs and linebackers suffocated San Diego’s receivers. Some of that was due to safety Eric Weddle, who spent years reading Rivers’ mind at practice when both were in San Diego.
“It seemed like we were just a touch off, all night, and maybe that was some of the things they were doing,” Rivers said “They did a nice job disguising, getting into different things after the snap.”
The Ravens pushed the lead to 16-10, but in the fourth quarter, Nick Dzubnar downed a punt on the Baltimore one, the defense stopped Jackson, and Desmond King returned the answering punt 24 yards.
Rivers finally had the Chargers moving. But when he hit Gates over the middle, Onwuasor forced the ball out, and Young was off to the races, with the ball under one arm and the Chargers’ trendiness under the other.
