Tom Krasovic: Just as Jim Harbaugh starts getting things done, Chargering bites back

Tom Krasovic, The San Diego Union-Tribune on Oct 7, 2025

Published in Football

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SAN DIEGO — Which relentless force will prevail — Chargering or Jim Harbaugh’s obsessive football genius?

That fascinating wrestling match began two winters ago, when Dean and John Spanos finally saw the light.

As top bosses of the Chargers, the Spanoses provided the power and money needed to hire Harbaugh. They also agreed to stop skimping on infrastructure.

This was franchise-changing stuff.

Harbaugh had won big everywhere he’d been a head coach, from the University of San Diego to Stanford to the San Francisco 49ers to the University of Michigan. The Chargers had won nothing big since Dean promoted son John to run football operations a decade earlier.

Behind the scenes, NFL power brokers rejoiced at Harbaugh’s hire.

Having enabled the Clampetts — errrrr, Spanoses — to move their football club into the lucrative Greater Los Angeles market and the privately financed Kroenke Dome rather than try to slug it out in small-market San Diego without public stadium money coming from local voters or Sacramento politicians, the NFL big shots couldn’t have been pleased with how the L.A. newbies were performing.

The Chargers weren’t awful as much as they were Charger-y. But Charger-y wasn’t what the NFL wanted for its second-biggest market, nor as a reward for its clever string-pulling in the stadium game.

The Spanoses did bring along their luck at football’s most important position, landing quarterback Justin Herbert in the draft.

Yet what the Chargers brought to L.A. was, predictably, more of the same.

And, as expected heading into the relocation north, Chargering stowed itself away in the team’s moving trucks.

(I can verify this. I saw San Diegans hand-wave the trucks through at a checkpoint north of Oceanside.)

Causing Angelenos to wrinkle their noses, there were pungent special teams boondoggles from several L.A. Chargers clubs.

There was the blown 27-point lead in a historic playoff loss in Jacksonville. There was a playoff implosion in New England, where a stunned Antonio Gates stared at the scoreboard for confirmation. Yes, Gatesy — the Chargers did allow 35 points in the first half, nixing that 12-4 squad’s bid to reach the Super Bowl qualifier.

John and Dean Spanos continued to whiff on head coaches they’d hired on the cheap.

But late in the 2023 season, things changed in a big way. The Spanoses fired coach Brandon Staley with a year left on his contract and hired Harbaugh, whose Michigan team had just won the school’s first undisputed national championship in several decades.

Harbaugh had conquered many foes.

Would Chargering become his next victim?

Harbaugh won Round 1, leading L.A. to 11 victories and a playoff berth in 2024.

With the 3-0 start to this season, Harbaugh started Round 2 fast.

But Chargering is stealthy in its lethality, like Inspector Clouseau.

And lately, Chargering has socked Harbaugh twice in his square jaw.

First came a Week 4 loss as 6 1/2-point favorites against the Giants and rookie QB Jaxson Dart. Then came Sunday’s setback as 3-point favorites against the Commanders.

Atypical for a Harbaugh-coached team, there was much sloppiness: 192 penalty yards all told, numerous missed tackles and stunning mistakes on defense, where the ’24 unit, also coached by Harbaugh protege Jesse Minter, led the NFL in fewest points allowed.

The Chargers’ next opponent is the Miami Dolphins. This is a bad team.

The Herbert bonus still exists, making Harbaugh’s club a 5 1/2-point favorite opposite the Dolphins and finesse QB Tua Tagovailoa. Harbaugh’s Chargers figure to be favored against the Raiders and Titans, too.

Yes, injuries have hit hard. But the 49ers are 4-1 despite greater injury attrition.

What happens if Harbaugh’s second team falls short of the playoffs?

It won’t be time to declare that Chargering has won this epic fight. Ali and Frazier, after all, fought three times. Harbaugh didn’t become a longtime NFL quarterback and a transformational coach by having a glass jaw.

But someone underneath Harbaugh would have to take the fall. That’s NFL 101.

The recent spate of injuries notwithstanding, I doubt Ben Herbert, the Chargers’ much-ballyhooed top overseer of players’ health-and-fitness preparations, would be moved out.

Another Harbaugh hire, offensive coordinator Greg Roman, must shore up the blocking and running back production.

Can Harbaugh can earn his top-tier salary by overcoming both Chargering and the injury issues?

It’ll be tougher than the Michigan Man’s teams beating Ohio State.

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