Only the New England Patriots can take a huge upset against the Buffalo Bills that was right in their hands and let it fall out of their hands by their own self-inflicted mistakes. At one point, the Patriots were ahead 14-0 in the first quarter and led by seven at halftime, but three costly turnovers in the final thirty minutes resulted in a 24-21 defeat. Josh Allen only threw for 154 yards and scored fourteen points, yet he still managed to win the game by three points.
The one silver lining for New England is that they have the second overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft, but it would have felt even sweeter to see this team beat the Bills in front of the Mafia.
The Patriots will head back home for a Saturday afternoon matchup against the Los Angeles Chargers, a team that needs just one more victory to officially clinch a playoff berth. If Brandon Staley can shut this team out in Gillette Stadium last year, then it would be surprising if new head coach Jim Harbaugh does not motivate the team to do the same.
Perfection is required for the Patriots to have a shot of making this competitive, let alone winning the football game, so there is no need to point out what they need to do in all three phases. Instead, let’s take a look at the five biggest things to expect on Saturday afternoon from the Chargers and understand what type of game it will be for New England.
Patriots Week 17 Preview: Los Angeles Chargers
#1: Justin Herbert is Still a Bad Man
It has been over a year since Justin Herbert signed a five year contract extension worth $262.5 million. In 2023, he totaled over 3100 passing yards with twenty touchdown passes and just seven interceptions, before suffering a fractured index finger that ended his season. Right now, he has totaled 3200 passing yards with eighteen touchdown passes and just three picks. Those might not be the best numbers compared to Joe Burrow or Lamar Jackson, but he is still proving that he is incredibly efficient with the football, and it is the stat-line that Harbaugh can live with if they continue to win football games.
However, that does not mean that Herbert is going to automatically have a pedestrian or average performance on Saturday. This is the same quarterback that set the rookie touchdown pass record with thirty-one in 2021 and then threw for 5000 yards the following season.
This is also a man that just overcame a 21-13 deficit against the Denver Broncos at halftime to win the game by seven points thanks to a 21-6 scoring run in the final thirty minutes of play. One of the reasons why Herbert is not putting up the most eye-popping numbers this year is because he has not been asked to pick up a huge chunk of the load the way that Brandon Staley has forced him to do in the past.
Harbaugh and offensive coordinator Greg Roman have successfully implemented a run-first oriented offense, while their defense has dramatically improved, so Herbert is finally getting the help that he has been waiting for his entire career. To reiterate, Los Angeles only needs one more win to punch their ticket into the playoffs, so it is absolutely more than likely that Herbert will put the team on his back and lead them to victory. However, one key decision might play a huge role in the overall strategy of the Chargers offense.
#2: No Gus Edwards But a Potential JK Dobbins Return
There is good news and bad news for the Chargers offense. Let’s start with the latter. Running back Gus Edwards will not be active for Saturday afternoon because of an ankle injury. The silver lining is that counterpart JK Dobbins might make his return to the lineup after missing the last four games due to an MCL sprain. Before being placed on Injured Reserve, the former Ravens running back was having an incredible season with over 760 rushing yards and eight touchdowns.
For a man that suffered two season-ending knee injuries in three years, Dobbins was a highly ranked candidate for the Comeback Player of the Year award. Right now, Dobbins is listed as questionable, so it is not a guarantee that he will be healthy enough to play on Saturday. But if he does make his return, then maybe Herbert will not have to throw for over 300 yards and three touchdown passes to beat the Patriots on Saturday, and Harbaugh could instead defer to another heavy-run strategy to get the job done.
#3: Ladd McConkey: The Receiver the Patriots Could Have Drafted
On April 26, the second round of the 2024 NFL Draft opened for all thirty-two teams to select highly touted college prospects and add them to their rosters. To set the context, there were a bunch of teams that needed to add to their wide receiver room, and there were plenty of candidates that were available to draft. The Patriots and Chargers were two of those teams. New England decided to take a gamble and trade a few spots down with Los Angeles, thinking that it would be a win-win for both franchises. Spoiler alert, it was not… so far. The Chargers selected Ladd McConkey out of Georgia, while the Patriots picked Ja’Lynn Polk out of Washington.
Take a strong guess as to which receiver worked out well. McConkey is on pace to total 1000 yards, the first Chargers rookie to do that since Keenan Allen in 2013. Polk, on the other hand, has only caught twelve passes for eighty-seven yards in fourteen games played. Now, it would be conjecture to say that McConkey is seething at New England for passing him up, but it still stings that New England passed up an incredibly reliable pass option for Drake Maye.
Elite cornerback Christian Gonzalez will have the opportunity to line up against McConkey for most of the afternoon, so it will be interesting to see how much the rookie will be involved in the game plan, but it will still leave Patriots fans a little bitter to see yet another incredible wide receiver thrive with another football team.
#4: The Chargers Defense: Number One in Points Allowed
One thing that Jim Harbaugh has done that Brandon Staley never accomplished in his tenure with the Los Angeles Chargers was improve the state of the defense. This group is the definition of “bend but do not break.” They have allowed a lot of yards, especially against the run, but they are second in points allowed at just 18.3 a game. The only team that is better is the Kansas City Chiefs at an even eighteen.
LA is also 10th in takeaways with 19, while the Patriots have the sixth worst turnover differential in football. There are an abundance of playmakers that the Chargers defense has that the Patriots offense will have a tough time slowing down. One of the biggest surprises of the season has been second-year linebacker Daiyan Henley, who leads the team in total tackles with 142, which is also the fifth most out of any other defender in the National Football League.
LA also has five guys with more than five sacks, which includes their two best pass rushers Joey Bosa and Khalil Mack, but another defender that has been under the radar is rookie cornerback Tarheeb Still. The reason why the first-year player out of Maryland has gotten significant minutes is because the top guy on the depth chart, Asante Samuel Jr., has only played four games because of a shoulder injury.
However, the young man has been a huge bright spot as he has totaled ten passes defended and four interceptions, one of them a pick six in a Week 13 victory over the Atlanta Falcons. Still’s style of play is very similar to that of cornerback JC Jackson, who also went to Maryland and played for both the Patriots and the Chargers. He is not an elite shutdown cornerback like Jalen Ramsey or Stephon Gilmore, but the quarterback better be careful throwing the ball in the direction of Still, because he is a ball-hawk that will make the opposition pay.
#5: Dicker the Kicker Made History Last Week
Towards the end of the first half against the Denver Broncos on Thursday night, Cameron Dicker made a fifty-seven yard field goal to cut the LA deficit to eight points before the halftime break. However, this was no standard kick that he made. Instead, the Chargers decided to run onto the field in a free-kick formation to attempt the field goal, a strategy that has not succeeded since 1976.
Dicker has easily been one of the best kickers in all of football with just five misses of the season, so the only way that New England can keep him off the field is to actually play defense, but one can only wonder how many points they will let up on Saturday.
Main Image: © Tina MacIntyre-Yee/Democrat and Chronicle / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images
