Mike McDaniel stood up this week and took the blame for the Los Angeles Chargers offense. One correction before anybody runs with it: McDaniel is the Chargers’ offensive coordinator, not their head coach. Jim Harbaugh still runs this team, and has since January 2024.
The distinction matters, because an 0-3 start this ugly is bigger than one play-caller.
What McDaniel Said
“I’m not living in hope, I’m living in reality,” McDaniel said. He did not hide behind process language either, saying of one loss that the offense was the reason the team lost the football game.
Credit where it belongs. Taking the hit publicly in Week 4 of your first year running an offense is the right instinct from a coordinator. It is also not an accurate split of the fault.
The Offense Is As Bad As It Looks
The Chargers have scored 44 points in three games, their fewest through three since 2003. They average 14.7 points per game, 29th in the league, and rank 30th in expected points added per play at minus 0.21. They have six turnovers, 27th in the NFL.
Justin Herbert is in the middle of it with a 73.4 passer rating, a career low and 30th among quarterbacks. He went 20 of 34 for 226 yards with a touchdown and an interception against Buffalo in Week 3 and is 1 for 7 on throws of 20 or more air yards, with a pick. He already has three deep-ball interceptions in 2026, more than he threw in all of 2024 or all of 2025. He has gone four straight games without multiple touchdown passes while throwing at least one interception, matching the longest such run of his career.
Harbaugh’s public message to his quarterback was two words, repeated. “Be better. Be better.” He extended the same instruction to the position coach and to McDaniel.
The Blame Starts Above The Coordinator
The McDaniel narrative falls apart right about here. Los Angeles leads the NFL with 10 false starts. It has seven fumbles. CBS Sports called the Chargers the sloppiest team in the league and assigned half the blame to coaching in general, 35 percent to the offense and 15 percent to a defense that forces turnovers but rarely gets off the field.
False starts and botched snaps are not scheme failures. One fumble came on a snap fired directly into a motion man. Interior linemen are losing one-on-one, and receivers are dropping catchable balls, with Quentin Johnston singled out. A team can be out-schemed and still line up correctly. The Chargers are failing at the second part.
Harbaugh assembled this roster, hired this staff and sets the standard for how his team behaves on Sundays. He went 22-12 across his first two regular seasons in Los Angeles, which bought him real patience, and he is burning through it fast. Next up is Seattle, the defending Super Bowl champion, coming off its first loss in 12 games.
McDaniel can call better plays and probably will. He cannot stop a tackle from flinching or a receiver from dropping a slant. If Los Angeles is still this undisciplined in a month, the honest answer to who is to blame will not be the coordinator who volunteered for it.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.