Denzel Perryman quickly listed name after name, delving into his mental list of 2015 winners. Chargers.
According to Chargers linebacker, Manti Te'o, Melvin Ingram, Cavell Conner and Donald Butler took Perryman under their wing. The 11-year veteran said that when he entered the NFL, he relied on his older teammates to help him adjust to the schedule and routine of professional football.
“When I was a young guy,” Perryman said, “my head was all over the place – just trying to figure out the NFL. They taught me how to be where I think I am.”
As the Chargers (10-4) enter the final stretch of the season and are on the cusp of a playoff berth heading into Sunday's game against the Dallas Cowboys (6-7-1), veterans have been instrumental in the team winning six of its last seven games.
A win over the Cowboys combined with a loss or tie to the Houston Texans on Sunday afternoon or a loss or tie to the Indianapolis Colts on Monday night would secure the Chargers' berth in the playoffs.
Perryman, who had a season-best nine tackles. Chargers win over Kansas City Chiefs last week, loans Philip Rivers and the rest of the Chargers veterans for showing him “how to be a pro” a decade ago. Now he's passing on those lessons to younger players, passing down generations of knowledge in the Chargers' locker room.
“When I came as a young guy, I thought this happens every year,” security Derwin James Jr. said in victory after starting his career with the Chargers at 12-4 in 2018. “Remember the standard. Remember, whatever we do now to maintain the standard, so that when guys change, coaches change, things change, the standard remains.”
Running off the field at Arrowhead Stadium, third-year safety. Diane Henley accused at the celebration Tony Jeffersona veteran mentor at his position who was waiting for teammates after he was ejected for an illegal hit on Chiefs wide receiver Tyquan Thornton.
After the game, Jefferson and Henley pranced around like schoolchildren on the playground. That's the kind of atmosphere the veterans want to create, Jefferson said, in which the younger players in the secondary can come to him.
“That’s what we’re here for,” Jefferson said. “For them to watch us and follow us and follow us and see us do our thing.”
It's not just veteran stars who are making a difference. Marcus WilliamsThe 29-year-old defensive end, with 109 games of NFL experience, replaced Jefferson against the Chiefs after being signed off the practice squad. The 2017 second-round draft pick played almost every snap in Jefferson's place, collecting four tackles.
“It just starts with a culture coach [Jim] Harbaugh says defensive coordinator Jesse Minter. “It’s actually a 70-person roster.”
Harbaugh singled out cornerback/defensive back. Scott MatlockBlocking technique – ba-boop, ba-boop, as Harbaugh put it and depicted it with his hands – on scheduled runs as an example of a veteran bolstering the offensive line trying to overcome a lack Joe Alt And Rashawn Slater.
Harbaugh said his father, Jack, taught Matlock ba-boop, ba-boop blocking technique during August training.
“He is greatly underrated as an athlete,” defender Justin Herbert Said of the 6-foot-4, 296-pound Matlock, who also catches passes in the flat as a safety.
With three games remaining in the regular season, Jefferson said the focus is on replicating the postseason-like efforts they put in with back-to-back wins over the Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles.
“It was good that they were able to feel it,” Jefferson said of his younger teammates who played against last season’s Super Bowl teams, “because those games down the stretch are what’s going to happen in the playoffs.”
