John Spanos

Chargers Interested In Jim Harbaugh; Latest On Team’s HC Search

December 23rd, 2023 at 5:48pm CST by Sam Robinson

DECEMBER 23: The Chargers will cast a wide net in their coaching search, Ian Rapoport of NFL Network reports (video link). Candidates with a background as a coordinator, along with those who fit the CEO-type profile will be considered as a result. Spending big on a coach (either Harbaugh or another high-profile option) will not be an issue, per Rapoport.

That sentiment is echoed by a report from Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio. The Chargers will consider any path during their bid to find not only a new coach, but also a general manager, per Florio. The order in which the HC and GM additions are made, along with the organizational structure as it pertains to reporting to Spanos is thus in the air at this point as the team remains one to watch with the offseason on the horizon.

DECEMBER 20: Although Jim Harbaugh wrapped his playing career after the 2001 season, his last NFL action came with the Chargers in 2000. Dean Spanos was in place as Chargers CEO at that point. More than 20 years later, the subject of a reunion continues to come up.

Harbaugh being connected to NFL teams is not exactly new, as the Michigan HC has regularly been tied to a return to the pros. He interviewed with the Broncos this year and the Vikings in 2022. The Chargers sent out a feeler to Harbaugh recently, and Bleacher Report’s Jordan Schultz follows up the team is indeed interested in bringing the successful HC back to the NFL.

It is not known if Harbaugh is interested in coming to Los Angeles, but even as he in talks with Michigan on another extension, aspirations of returning to the NFL continue to surface. As for the Chargers’ willingness to give Harbaugh or another high-profile HC autonomy they would likely seek, the organization appears to be at a proving ground during this HC hiring period.

The Bolts have a history of not authorizing big salaries for HCs, and John Spanos — Dean’s son — resides as the team’s president of football operations. Pointing to John Spanos not being eager to relinquish certain control that could be required to land a heavy hitter like Harbaugh or Bill Belichick, the Washington Post’s Jason La Canfora classifies such a hire as unlikely. An anonymous GM told La Canfora that Belichick would clash with John Spanos, while also casting doubt about Harbaugh’s fit.

Pointing to Chargers sensitivity about a perception they are unwilling to spend what it takes, SI.com’s Albert Breer notes a Harbaugh-to-L.A. scenario or a Belichick trade should not be dismissed. The Chargers have not landed a big-name coach in more than 20 years. After hiring Marty Schottenheimer in 2002, the Bolts have gone with Norv Turner, Mike McCoy, Anthony Lynn and Brandon Staley. Three of those were first-timers, while Turner went 1-for-9 in playoff berths while in Washington and Oakland. With Dean Spanos’ statement upon firing Staley and GM Tom Telesco indicating the organization wants to reimagine its process en route to building a hopeful championship team, the overhaul may need to include his son’s role.

After its batch of rookie HCs came up short, L.A.’s AFC team is believed to want a proven option. Harbaugh also may be viewed as a better fit internally compared to Belichick. The Bolts have been connected to Lions OC Ben Johnson, as other teams will be, but that would represent a similar hire to those on which the organization signed off under Telesco .

Although obviously buoyed by his name, John Spanos began his rise as a Chargers scout. After a stint from 2008-13 as director of college scouting, Spanos ascended to VP of football operations. He has been in the football ops president role since 2015.

“I would talk to Tom or Brandon almost every day. I think my background only helps me in sort of being able to kind of evaluate where we are and really helps me in working with the head coach and GM,” John Spanos said, via The Athletic’s Daniel Popper (subscription required). “But I’m not making the decisions on, ‘Hey, coach, you have to start this player.’ Right? I’ve never done that. My dad’s never done that. We’ve never gone down and said, ‘You’ve got to run this play.’ Or, ‘Hey, you have to draft this player.’

“I believe in working together with them. I’m very involved. Because of my background, and I’m very fortunate that I’ve been able to work on the lowest level of the organization to where I am now, I think it helps me in working with people.”

It is unclear if the Chargers are prepared to give their next head coach a significant say in personnel matters. A Staley-driven effort to reload the defense in 2022 brought in the likes of Khalil Mack, J.C. Jackson and Sebastian Joseph-Day. The Chargers indeed have spent the seventh-most cash over the past two years, per Spotrac, though defensive improvement proved elusive. Justin Herbert‘s $52.5MM-per-year extension is on the team’s books through 2029.

The Chargers will look into whether they need to be more transactional, per Breer, with regards to in-season trades or dealing picks for talent. Whether player expenses will lead to the team giving its HC more influence remains to be seen.

“Taking a step back and looking at everything and being willing to consider all possibilities, meaning consider setup, structure, qualities in coaches, qualities in GMs, backgrounds of coaches, backgrounds of GMs — reimagining, really, the entire structure and setup,” Spanos said (via Popper). “And reimagining doesn’t mean making a dramatic change and saying, ‘OK, we’re going to go in this direction and do the opposite of what we’ve done.’ It’s just really reflecting and self-evaluating and make sure we give ourselves the best chances for success.”

Coaching agents have contacted the Spanoses regarding their respective clients’ interest in the job and getting the best out of Herbert, according to The Athletic’s Dianna Russini. Staley’s attitude was also perceived in some league circles as cocky, per Russini. The defensive specialist became the first Chargers HC fired in-season since Kevin Gilbride in 1998.

Harbaugh, 59, would not exactly be a step back in that department. The strong-willed coach ruffled feathers consistently in San Francisco, engaging in a power struggle with then-GM Trent Baalke, and has been suspended twice during this latest Michigan season. Given the opportunity to coach Herbert, however, probably would entice the nine-year Wolverines HC. While Harbaugh has returned to Ann Arbor after two efforts to come back to the NFL, the Chargers represent an interesting opportunity. Would this lower-key team be the right fit for a Harbaugh comeback?

Latest On Chargers’ Upcoming HC Search

December 17th, 2023 at 10:24pm CST by Rory Parks

The Chargers fired head coach Brandon Staley on Friday after an embarrassing loss to the division-rival Raiders. Even before the firing, there was already plenty of speculation as to who the club’s next head coach would be, as it became increasingly clear that Staley would not be retained for the 2024 season. Now that Staley is officially out, that speculation has naturally ramped up.

Of course, legendary Patriots HC Bill Belichick has been rumored as a possible target for the Bolts, and Armando Salguero of Outkick.com acknowledges that the connection makes plenty of sense. The last three head coaches the club has hired were first-timers, and Salguero says the team wants a proven leader. Belichick certainly fits that description, and his hiring could generate excitement for a team that has struggled to create much of a connection to Los Angeles fans since moving from San Diego.

And assuming Belichick leaves New England at season’s end, he will not want to go to a rebuilding club or one without a top-flight quarterback. The two other teams who have fired their head coaches this year, the Raiders and Panthers, would not necessarily offer Belichick — who will turn 72 in April — the chance to win right away. The Chargers, on the other hand, have a Pro Bowl-caliber QB in place in Justin Herbert and a fair amount of talent on both sides of the ball, and as Salguero writes, the team wants to stop wasting Herbert’s prime years and wants to bring in a coach who knows how to maximize a signal-caller’s abilities.

However, Salguero hears that there is resistance to a Belichick pursuit within the organization, and one of the reasons for such resistance is the fact that Belichick would want to remake the franchise as he sees fit. That would include, perhaps, displacing president of football operations John Spanos, son of owner Dean Spanos. Salguero’s sources believe it is unlikely that Belichick would agree to leave the team’s current infrastructure in place and report to John Spanos, so the fit between Belichick and the Chargers may not be as perfect as it might appear.

Salguero also hears that Jim Harbaugh could be a more viable candidate for the post. A recent report said that a “Spanos family confidant” reached out to people connected to Harbaugh to gauge his interest, and while Harbaugh is rumored to want a great deal of control over football operations should he jump back into the professional ranks, Salguero believes the former 49ers HC may be more amenable than Belichick to keeping the Bolts’ current front office framework in place.

Ian Rapoport of the NFL Network (video link) says the Chargers’ job is a coveted one, primarily due to the presence of Herbert. He reports that the team will keep an open mind with respect to its impending HC search and will consider CEO-style coaches along with those who would double as the offensive or defensive coordinator. Rapoport names Cowboys DC Dan Quinn and Lions OC Ben Johnson — both of whom are expected to be among the hottest names in the 2024 hiring cycle — as realistic candidates.

Recent reports have suggested that there is mutual interest between Johnson and the Chargers, though it is worth noting that the 37-year-old has never served as a head coach before. Quinn, meanwhile, spent over five years as the Falcons’ head coach and came up heartbreakingly short of winning the franchise’s first Super Bowl during his second season at the helm.

Chargers Fire Brandon Staley, Tom Telesco

December 15th, 2023 at 10:22pm CST by Sam Robinson

Following the Raiders’ historic rout of the Chargers on Thursday night, the reeling team will drop the hammer early. The Bolts announced the firings of Brandon Staley and Tom Telesco on Friday morning.

The Chargers have since announced the promotion of Giff Smith and JoJo Wooden to respectively replace Staley and Telesco on an interim basis. The former has experience as a D-line coach dating back to 1999, and he has been in the organization since 2016. Over the past two seasons, though, he has worked as the team’s outside linebackers coach. This will be Smith’s first appointment as a head coach at the college or pro level.

Wooden, meanwhile, has been with the Chargers for the past decade. He has served with the title of player personnel director after working his way through the ranks in the Jets’ scouting department from 1997 to 2012. Like Smith, he will now oversee the conclusion of a highly disappointing campaign for the Bolts before potentially garnering consideration for the full-time role.

This is the first instance of the Chargers firing a head coach in-season since they axed Kevin Gilbride 25 years ago. But Staley has long been expected to be out, with the Bolts regressing in a season following a 27-point collapse in the wild-card round. Telesco spent 11 years as the Chargers’ GM. While much-hyped rosters formed under his watch, the team did not turn well-regarded transactions into sustained success.

Hired in 2021, Staley came over after one season as the Rams’ defensive coordinator. But the ascendant assistant could not establish success in this area with the Chargers. The Raiders dropping 63 on their rivals, 42 of those points coming in the first half, after the Vikings had held them scoreless in Week 15 prompted Bolts ownership to act early.

Telesco backed Staley following the Jaguars’ wild-card rally, which doubled as the third-biggest postseason deficit ever overcome, and the “what if?” involving Sean Payton is worth examining. The then-FOX analyst was linked to being interested in the Chargers job at multiple points last year. The move would have allowed Payton to stay in Los Angeles. But Telesco kept Staley, continuing a Chargers trend of keeping coaches beyond two seasons.

Staley is now the first Bolts HC to lose his job after less than four full seasons since the team fired Mike Riley following the 2001 campaign. Even Riley, who did not produce a winning season, lasted longer than Staley. But the alarming Week 15 performance opened the door to the Bolts needing to cut the cord now. As the team began to struggle this season, Chargers president John Spanos — a previous Staley advocate — began to distance himself from the embattled HC, Outkick.com’s Armando Salguero notes. The Spanoses will now begin to look for Staley’s replacement in an offseason that will remind of 2013, when the Bolts replaced both their HC and GM.

The Telesco news represents a bigger-picture development. The former Colts exec had hired Mike McCoy, Anthony Lynn and Staley during his run as GM. Telesco’s drafts brought difference-makers in Joey Bosa, Keenan Allen, Derwin James, Rashawn Slater and Justin Herbert. Telesco did well to leave no gaps between star quarterbacks, selecting Herbert sixth overall a month after Philip Rivers departed in free agency. Telesco, 51, also hammered out a through-2029 Herbert extension this offseason. The quarterback’s presence will make both the new Bolts vacancies attractive, but rampant underachievement has defined this team for much of the 21st century.

Even before the Raiders’ rout, Telesco was rumored to be on the chopping block. Dean Spanos will opt to not let Telesco hire a fourth HC. The three he hired combined for just three playoff appearances in 11 seasons. The Chargers, who had sustained success under Marty Schottenheimer and the early part of Norv Turner‘s ensuing HC run, have not ventured to back-to-back playoff brackets since the 2008-09 seasons. Despite Rivers playing his final seven Chargers seasons during Telesco’s tenure, the potential Hall of Famer only piloted the Bolts to two playoff brackets in that span. The Chargers won postseason games in 2013 and ’18 and were on track to eliminate the Jags last season, but success proved fleeting for squads that seemed to annually generate buzz.

After hiring offense-oriented coaches in 2013 and ’17, Telesco chose Staley’s defensive acumen to pair with Herbert in 2021. The Chargers managed to produce the AFC’s Pro Bowl starting quarterback and miss the playoffs. That had not happened in the AFC since the 1989 Bengals. Herbert put up dazzling numbers in 2021, but a Week 18 loss to the Raiders led to the budding superstar’s season wrapping early. A rib injury last September limited Herbert, and Staley fired OC Joe Lombardi following the playoff season. Two-year DC Renaldo Hill left to rejoin Vic Fangio in Miami this offseason.

Following a 2021 season that featured the Bolts ranking 29th in points allowed, Staley made a push for the team to equip him with better defensive personnel in 2022. The team traded for Khalil Mack and signed J.C. Jackson and Sebastian Joseph-Day. The Mack trade belatedly panned out, with the former Raiders and Bears standout rebounding for 15 sacks this season. The five-year, $82.5MM Jackson contract proved disastrous for the Chargers, who sent the underperforming cornerback back to the Patriots for next to nothing earlier this season.

The Chargers had made Jackson a healthy scratch in Week 3. Even after the round of defensive reinforcements, Staley’s 2022 defense ranked 20th; after last night’s Raider rampage, his third Charger defense ranks 29th. Last season’s Jacksonville catastrophe also featured the Bolts lining up without Mike Williams, who was injured in a meaningless Week 18 game against the Broncos. Staley and Telesco each defended the decision to leave starters in that contest deep into the second half, but the Chargers — who have struggled with receiver health over the past two seasons — suffered the consequences of Williams’ absence a week later. As the Chargers swooned in the wake of the playoff debacle, they lost Herbert to a season-ending finger injury.

Herbert’s status will naturally drive interest in this position, and some around the league are monitoring the Chargers as a Bill Belichick suitor. The Bolts would likely need to trade for the Patriots legend, and it would be interesting to see if this gains traction. A short-term Belichick-Herbert pairing would draw interest for a franchise that has struggled to establish itself in L.A., while such a move would also be a zag after Telesco made inexperienced coordinators — in Staley and Lynn — his HC choices. But we are still a ways away from the Belichick market taking shape.

Regardless of where the Chargers go from here, their next regime will be responsible for undoing some of the damage this era brought. The organization’s reputation for letdowns pushed “Chargering” into the NFL lexicon. In a division with Payton and Patrick Mahomes, the Bolts suddenly have more ground to make up despite striking gold with Herbert.

Adam La Rose contributed to this post.

AFC Notes: Bolts, Raiders, Dolphins, Joeckel

October 8th, 2016 at 9:08pm CST by Sam Robinson

After a second straight Chargers season faces the prospects of being overrun by injuries, the team is planning to expand its offseason studies in this area. The organization appears set to devote more resources to researching injuries come 2017, given what’s happened over the past month.

“I can assure you this year is going to be more in-depth and thorough than ever before,” Chargers president John Spanos said, via Michael Gehlken of the San Diego Union-Tribune.

This year’s Chargers have lost numerous key players, from the preseason injury to Stevie Johnson to the early-season carnage that’s taken out Keenan Allen, Danny Woodhead, Jahleel Addae, Manti Te’o and now Jason Verrett. Antonio Gates and Joey Bosa have also missed extensive time due to injuries. This comes after 2015’s spate of maladies that helped put the Bolts in the top five of a draft for the first time since 2004.

Gehlken points out the early portion of this decade did not bring the trouble the past two years have, with ACL and Achilles tears sparse before the ’15 season. Several within the organization said they’ve never seen anything like what’s happened to the Chargers on the health front the past two years, per Gehlken.

Here’s more from the AFC as most of its franchises prepare for their fifth games.

Al Davis‘ death staggered the Raiders and left them without a true GM for most of the 2011 season, but it ended up triggering the franchise’s steady climb back to respectability, Kevin Acee of the Union-Tribune writes. In addition to Reggie McKenzie drafting better than his predecessor, at least in the several years before his death, the Raiders hired a coach in Jack Del Rio who demanded facility upgrades, Acee writes.
The Dolphins aren’t sold on Ja’Wuan James‘ long-term potential at right tackle, Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald writes. A Dolphins source questioned the third-year player’s drive, noting the team hasn’t done enough to provide competition for him at that spot. Billy Turner replaced James against the Browns before James reacquired the job due to a Turner injury. “That was a wasted pick for a first-rounder,” former front-office executive Ken Herock told Jackson. “He should have been a third- or fourth-rounder. I questioned his strength, his recovery ability. Those are things I didn’t see.” Pro Football Focus rates James as the No. 44 tackle thus far in 2016 among the 75 who qualify as full-timers.
Jackson also notes Chiefs center Mitch Morse and Chargers inside linebacker Denzel Perryman drew support from members of the Dolphins front office during Day 2 of the 2015 draft, but Mike Tannenbaum opted to trade down and snag defensive tackle Jordan Phillips, who has not produced to this point, in the second round.
Luke Joeckel‘s surgery could make a return to the Jaguars more likely in 2017, Ryan O’Halloran of the Florida Times-Union writes. Although the former No. 2 overall pick has not panned out, a strong season at guard would have created a robust market for Joeckel instead of one that could well be tepid due to a small work sample at his second position. Joeckel proved ill-equipped at left tackle, prompting the Jags to bring in Kelvin Beachum, and played just 155 snaps at left guard before undergoing surgery to repair his ACL, MCL and mensicus. O’Halloran notes the team liked what they saw from Joeckel inside. He stands to be a UFA if not re-signed after the Jags declined his fifth-year option.
The Broncos are planning to give Paxton Lynch his first NFL start Sunday after deeming Trevor Siemian unfit to return.

Chargers’ Spanos On Joey Bosa Saga

September 1st, 2016 at 1:40pm CST by Zachary Links

Earlier this week, the Joey Bosa saga finally came to a close when the Chargers and the rookie’s reps compromised on a contract. As the talks dragged on, the tenor of the negotiations got uglier and uglier, including the Bolts’ unprecedented move of publicly releasing details of their contract offer. That press release raised eyebrows in the football world, but team president of football operations John Spanos says he has no regrets.

“Obviously, it was a difficult decision,” Spanos told Xtra 1360 Fox Sports Radio (via ESPN.com). “Any time you’re in a tough negotiation, everything you do is a difficult decision. And let me be clear: It’s certainly never our preference to make any public comments. It’s not how we’ve operated in the past, I would say, and only [on] the rarest of occasions. In fact, I’ve probably been involved in hundreds of player negotiations and contract agreements, whether it’s helping out or leading, throughout my lifetime, and that’s the first time I’ve ever said anything public.

“So that shows you how rare that is. It’s not what we prefer to do — only, I would say, when we’re forced to do it. The bottom line is if someone were to tell me that’s why we got it done, then, yeah, I would do it again, because our goal the whole time was we wanted him here. And we were going to do whatever it takes to get him here.”

Releasing the details of the offer probably rubbed Bosa the wrong way and some believe that it could give pause to rookies and free agents in the future. Spanos personally believes that free agents will not be deterred by the tenor of the Bosa negotiations and feels that sunny San Diego will continue to be a desirable landing spot for players. I can’t dispute the appeal of San Diego as a city, but I have my doubts as to whether players will turn a blind eye to the way the Bosa discussions went.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Spanos: Bosa’s Holdout “Absolutely Asinine”

August 24th, 2016 at 5:18pm CST by Connor J. Byrne

With the Chargers and first-round defensive end Joey Bosa embroiled in the ugliest contract dispute the NFL has seen since introducing the rookie wage scale in 2011, team president John Spanos expressed frustration about the situation Wednesday.

“I’m highly, highly disappointed in the path we’ve had to take,” Spanos told Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune. “It’s so overly clear we had no choice. It would have been more difficult if I felt they were being reasonable. But when you’re dealing with someone who isn’t reasonable, it makes it easy.”

Spanos’ words came in response to the decision Bosa’s camp made to reject the Chargers’ latest proposal, which was the best one the franchise has put forth in the three-plus months since drafting him third overall.

The Chargers offered to pay the ex-Ohio State star 85 percent of his $17MM signing bonus this year (up from the previous figure of 61 percent), according to Acee, but he turned it down and the club then pulled the proposal off the table Wednesday. Bosa’s agent, Brian Ayrault, is no longer requiring the Chargers to pay the full bonus up front, sources told the Union-Tribune’s Michael Gehlken, though it’s unclear how far he has come down from that demand. Not nearly enough, if you’re to believe Spanos.

“What you do is you compromise,” he stated. “We moved and we moved and we moved. They weren’t moving.”

Notably, this type of dispute isn’t foreign to the Chargers, who were in a similar dust-up with first-round quarterback Philip Rivers in 2014, as Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio writes. Then, on this date 12 years ago, Rivers signed. He remains the Bolts’ signal-caller to this day, of course, proving that a contentious holdout doesn’t have to ruin a relationship between the player and team.

Bosa’s fight with the Chargers goes beyond the payout of a signing bonus, as the 21-year-old and the organization have also been battling over offset language. If a player with offset language in his contract is released midway through the pact, the original team is only on the hook for the difference in salary between the two deals. Without offset language, the player can effectively collect two paychecks. Naturally, there are many agents – including Ayrault – who are disinclined to forfeit that potential earning power.

“I’m blown away. At all costs I wanted to avoid going down this road. They made it overly clear we had no other option,” continued Spanos, who referred to Bosa’s holdout as “absolutely asinine.”

Despite the acrimony between the two sides, they’re stuck with each other through the current season. The Chargers had until Aug. 9 to trade Bosa’s rights, but they opted to retain him. If Bosa doesn’t sign by the Tuesday after Week 10, he won’t be eligible to play at all this season. San Diego would then control Bosa’s rights up to next spring’s draft, at which point another team would be able to select him and try its luck in locking him up.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

West Rumors: Bennett, Bosa, Broncos

May 21st, 2016 at 3:16pm CST by Sam Robinson

Already announcing he won’t be a threat for a training camp holdout, Michael Bennett is not operating in a contentious manner toward his employer this offseason. The dynamic Seahawks defensive end, though, remains in pursuit of a redone contract as he enters his third season on the four-year, $28MM deal he signed in 2014.

The 30-year-old Bennett also acknowledges he does not reside atop the Seahawks’ figurative contract-extension queue, with contract-year receiver Doug Baldwin occupying that spot.

“I think [the lines of communication] definitely are [open]. I think John [Schneider is] definitely open to it,” Bennett told media, including ESPN.com’s Sheil Kapadia, of a contract extension. “Pete [Carroll‘s] waiting. Obviously, Doug’s up before me, and I understand that, and I want that to happen. I think Doug Baldwin deserves a new contract. So do I. So does Kam [Chancellor]. So it’s just all about waiting in line and not pushing it too far and understanding what’s up next.”

Seattle still has two of the best players at their respective positions on below-market-value deals, with Chancellor set to make $6.1MM this season. But while the team has multiple standouts longing for new deals for a while, this displays the Seahawks’ acumen for identifying talent. Baldwin, who could be one of the most coveted free agent receivers in 2017 if not extended, is entering the last season of a three-year, $13MM deal but expects to discuss an extension with the Seahawks soon.

Bennett has been one of the league’s best defensive ends for a few years now, yet his $7.13MM AAV ranks just ninth in the league. Olivier Vernon now more than doubles Bennett’s per-year wages, which would seemingly add to the fuel Bennett showed last year when he threatened to hold out, especially after he finished with a career-high 10 sacks last season. Set to turn 31 in November, Bennett may have seen his opportunity for a windfall contract pass.

Here’s the latest from the Western divisions.

Chargers GM Tom Telesco spent the offseason hoping to be in position to select Joey Bosa but didn’t think his team would be in position to do so until after the Browns-Eagles trade gave the quarterback-seeking Eagles the No. 2 pick. “Watching Joey play in the Fiesta Bowl, I left there thinking if he does declare, and if he is there at number three, we’ve got to take him,” Telesco told Ricky Henne of Chargers.com. “… [Football operations president John Spanos] got the text and told us about the trade, and we all high-fived in the room after that one because we knew if we stayed here and picked, we got him.” The Ohio State defensive end who finished his three-year career with 51 tackles for loss intrigued Telesco dating back to his 2013 freshman season, when the then-new Chargers GM traveled to an Ohio State-Purdue game.
To the amazement of Spanos, Bosa’s standing within the organization did not make its way toward pre-draft speculation, with the Chargers linked to Jalen Ramsey, Laremy Tunsil or Ronnie Stanley. “We would look around at each other and say, ‘Man, I can’t believe no one knows,'” Spanos said. “… Sometimes when you hear rumors, you can piece together where it came from. In the specific case of the Ronnie Stanley rumor, I have no clue where that came from. So I was really amused, and I didn’t feel a need to set the record straight. I just sat back and enjoyed the false speculation.”
The primary holdup in Von Miller‘s extension with the Broncos will be the guaranteed money over the first two years, Troy Renck of the Denver Post writes. Renck notes the Broncos’ penchant for frontloading contracts to protect themselves in case of down-the-line performance declines — Aqib Talib‘s six-year, $57MM deal that features just $3MM in guaranteed money after this season is a prime example — could bring Miller’s two-year guarantee total to $60MM. That would surpass Ndamukong Suh‘s $59.9MM for the most guaranteed dollars among defenders. Renck also estimates Miller’s per-year payments will be between $18-$20MM. Miller has already been linked to seeking $22MM annually and the Broncos have offered $17MM+, but Renck expects the Broncos’ exclusive franchise tag leverage will bring that number down since Denver isn’t negotiating against other teams like the Giants were with Vernon or the Dolphins were with Suh last year.

Chargers Notes: Policy, Barksdale, Spanos

May 18th, 2015 at 9:21pm CST by Zachary Links

The Chargers and Raiders have hired Carmen Policy to oversee the potential football project the two teams would share, according to Daniel Kaplan of the Sports Business Journal (on Twitter). Policy, who held senior roles with the 49ers and Browns and has been out of the NFL for over a decade, believes that the NFL will put the project “on the fast track.” Since leaving the NFL, Policy’s main occupation has been his winery in Napa, but he says he’s excited to be back in football in some capacity. Here’s more on the Chargers..

Right tackle Joe Barksdale is visiting the Chargers, as Michael Gehlken of U-T San Diego writes. The veteran started 29 games the past two seasons, all at right tackle, for the Rams.
Chargers Chairman of the Board Dean Spanos announced that his two sons will be elevated to President-level roles. A.G. Spanos has been named President – Business Operations and John Spanos has assumed the role of President – Football Operations. John held the position of executive vice president of football operations for the past two seasons.
Dean Spanos will now focus on the Chargers’ stadium situation, Jim Trotter of ESPN.com writes.