Culture
Chargers’ Justin Herbert falls short to remain winless in postseason: ‘I let the team down’
HOUSTON — Justin Herbert sat in a chair at his locker, motionless, hands on his knees, a blank stare on his face. It did not look like it, but he was listening.
Defensive lineman Morgan Fox was sitting on the floor to Herbert’s right. Fox was talking in a hushed tone to the Los Angeles Chargers quarterback.
“I just told him I’m proud of him,” Fox said. “No one else I’d rather go to war with. That he’s probably the best quarterback I’ve ever played with. He’s great. He’s incredibly talented. Just told him to keep his head up.”
After about a minute, Fox popped up, gave Herbert a hug and walked to his locker on the other side of the room.
Then Herbert was alone. Left with his own thoughts. Left with the irrepressible stinging of another early playoff exit.
The Chargers lost to the Houston Texans 32-12 on Saturday at NRG Stadium. A dramatic turnaround engineered by coach Jim Harbaugh ended with a whimper in the wild-card round. Herbert threw four interceptions. He had never turned the ball over more than twice in any game in his professional career.
“I let the team down,” Herbert said.
GO DEEPER
Texans pick off Herbert 4 times in 32-12 wild-card blowout: Takeaways
Herbert always takes the blame after losses. Most times, he is just being a good teammate. This time, his assessment is accurate.
He played the worst game of his career in the biggest game of his career.
“No one feels worse than I do,” Herbert said.
What awaits is an unavoidable avalanche of questions and criticism. It is the nature of the position he plays. It is the nature of the immense contract he signed.
He will hear the noise for at least another 12 months, until his next potential chance at a playoff win.
Herbert is outrageously talented. No quarterback in NFL history has thrown for more yards through five seasons. He does things on a football field that few humans, if any, have ever been able to do. But athletes are ultimately judged on how they perform when the lights are brightest, when a championship hangs in the balance. Herbert wilted on the grand stage, and he is now 0-2 in the playoffs.
Herbert’s last postseason appearance came in 2022. He helped build a 27-0 lead over the Jacksonville Jaguars in the wild-card round. The Chargers collapsed. Herbert missed a wide-open Keenan Allen in the end zone late in the first half of that game. But Herbert played well enough for the Chargers to win. They could not run the ball in the second half. They committed backbreaking penalty after backbreaking penalty as part of a defensive unraveling.
Saturday was different. No amount of nuance or context can explain this one away. Herbert looked tight. He made uncharacteristically bad decisions. He made uncharacteristically inaccurate throws.
Herbert had thrown three interceptions on 504 attempts in the regular season. His four interceptions against the Texans came on 32 attempts. He completed just 14 passes. His 43.8 completion percentage was the worst of his career. He averaged minus-0.59 expected points added per dropback, according to TruMedia, the lowest mark of his career in any game he started and finished.
Harbaugh said Herbert played “like he always does.”
“Complete beast,” Harbaugh added.
But that is just not true.
Early in the second quarter, the Chargers led 6-0. Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud floated a throw down the left sideline to no one in particular. Cornerback Deane Leonard was waiting and came down with the interception, tapping both toes inbounds along the sideline.
The Chargers took over at the Texans’ 40-yard line. On the first play of the possession, the Chargers rolled Herbert out to the right on a designed bootleg. There was pressure in Herbert’s face, as there was all game long. He threw off balance to receiver Quentin Johnston on a corner route, all the way across the field. It was an unnecessarily risky throw. It was underthrown. Texans cornerback Kamari Lassiter picked it off. The Chargers needed fewer than five yards to get into Cameron Dicker’s field goal range. This throw took points off the board.
“Got to be better about that, throw the ball away, throw it further,” Herbert said. “Got to do a better job of not putting it in harm’s way.”
The @HoustonTexans take it right back! Kamari Lassiter with the pick.
📺: #LACvsHOU on CBS/Paramount+
📱: Stream on #NFLPlus pic.twitter.com/Up3GcnjfrY— NFL (@NFL) January 11, 2025
The Chargers were on the right hash for this snap. Harbaugh said after the game that this play should have been called only if the Chargers were on the left hash, shortening the throw.
“I take accountability for that one,” Harbaugh said, even though it is offensive coordinator Greg Roman calling the plays.
Late in the third quarter, the Chargers took over at their 28-yard line, trailing 13-6. Herbert took the shotgun snap. He looked left at receiver Ladd McConkey, who ran a comeback route out of the slot. Herbert double-pumped. He did not fully reset his feet. And Herbert’s throw sailed high and through McConkey’s hands. Texans safety Eric Murray picked it off and returned it for a touchdown.
“That’s on me to make a better throw,” Herbert said.
Took it to the crib! @HoustonTexans extend their lead.
📺: #LACvsHOU on CBS/Paramount+
📱: Stream on #NFLPlus pic.twitter.com/FZbCiIeG7u— NFL (@NFL) January 12, 2025
Herbert was intercepted again on the next drive, though this was not his fault. Will Dissly dropped a ball that was in his hands. It squirted through, and Texans cornerback Derek Stingley Jr. intercepted it.
Herbert threw a fourth interception late in garbage time. Receiver DJ Chark was open on a go route. Herbert did not put enough on the pass. Stingley, an All-Pro, came down with his second pick of the game.
“It’s on me as a quarterback to be able to deliver the ball,” Herbert said.
The Chargers offense was given opportunity after opportunity through the first three quarters. The unit squandered every one.
Most of these were on Herbert, but not all of them. The Chargers were overmatched on the line of scrimmage. The Texans defensive line, including edge rushers Will Anderson Jr. and Danielle Hunter, dominated the game. Right tackle Joe Alt played one of his worst games of the season. Right guard Jamaree Salyer was bullied on multiple pass-blocking snaps. Herbert was running for his life or taking shots on many of his dropbacks.
“We can’t let Justin get hit that many times,” left guard Zion Johnson said.
But Herbert has weathered this kind of pressure before. He did it as recently as Week 16 against the Denver Broncos, when he was pressured on 54.1 percent of his dropbacks.
The Chargers were desperate for playmaking from their best playmaker. And Herbert fell disastrously short. He did not have a rushing attempt. The game was begging for a scramble to keep the Houston pass rush off balance.
“He’s got to be able to finish a throwing motion,” Harbaugh said. “We didn’t put him in the position to do that enough.”
Herbert needs more weapons. McConkey caught nine passes for 197 yards and a touchdown. No other Chargers player caught more than two passes. That must be a focus for the organization this offseason. It has to add receivers and a tight end.
Dissly had a commendable season, but he had two crucial drops. The interception was his second drop. The first came on a second-and-19 in the first quarter. Safety Alohi Gilman had just forced a fumble on the Texans’ opening offensive play, setting the Chargers up in opposing territory.
Herbert escaped pressure and found Dissly near the left sideline. Dissly would have been close to first-down yardage. A catch would have at least made the ensuing third down more manageable. The Chargers settled for a field goal.
“We got to score,” said J.K. Dobbins, who had nine carries for 26 yards, including only one carry in the second half.
There were other missed opportunities, in all three phases. The Texans trailed 6-0 late in the first half and faced a third-and-16, backed up inside their own 20. Stroud dropped the shotgun snap. The ball was loose. But Stroud was able to pick the ball up, escape to his right and find receiver Xavier Hutchinson for a 34-yard gain. That sparked a 99-yard touchdown drive, capped off by a Nico Collins touchdown reception. Collins had seven catches for 122 yards. Cornerback Kristian Fulton struggled to match up with the big-bodied receiver.
Safety Derwin James Jr. said the coverage was “a little off” on Stroud’s scoop-and-sling because of the fumbled snap.
“It kind of turned the game,” James said.
“It went his way,” Gilman said.
“JUST LIKE THEY DREW IT UP!”
C.J. Stroud makes things happen after the bad snap 😱
📺: #LACvsHOU on CBS/Paramount+
📱: Stream on #NFLPlus pic.twitter.com/II2oMnkbM1— NFL (@NFL) January 11, 2025
Early in the second half, the Chargers faced a fourth-and-2 from the Texans’ 34-yard line. They had gotten the ball back on another turnover, this one a forced fumble and recovery from safety Tony Jefferson. Harbaugh went for it. Herbert took an under-center snap and faked a handoff to running back Hassan Haskins. Johnston was running a whip route to the right side, feinting to the inside before cutting to the flat. Herbert threw to Johnston, who was jammed at the line by Stingley. The pass fell incomplete. Johnston did not run his route to the first-down marker.
Harbaugh said the design of the play called for Johnston “to be deeper.”
“Sometimes the release, the coverage affects that,” Harbaugh added. “I would have liked to have called a different play or kicked the field goal there.”
It was a game littered with missed opportunities. The Chargers had a punt blocked and an extra point blocked on special teams. The extra point was returned for a Texans two-point conversion, turning a McConkey 86-yard touchdown into just a four-point swing.
The end result was Herbert missing the biggest opportunity of his career so far.
“He’s the best quarterback I’ve ever played with,” Alt said.
“Our heart beats through 10,” center Bradley Bozeman said. “He’s the leader of this team. He’s a damn good football player.”
Herbert is now following the early career trajectory of Peyton Manning, the player he passed for most passing yards through his first five seasons.
Manning made the playoffs three times in his first five seasons. He went 0-3. In his fifth season, his Indianapolis Colts lost 41-0 to the New York Jets in the wild-card round. Manning completed 14 of 31 passes for 137 yards and two interceptions.
The next season, Manning won the MVP. The Colts won two playoff games and made it to the AFC Championship Game.
There is precedent for an ubertalented quarterback struggling early in his career before getting over the hump.
But just like Manning, Herbert will face questions and criticism.
Until he shows up.
“I put the team in jeopardy,” Herbert said. “That’s on me to get better and keep pushing forward.”
(Photo: Brandon Sloter / Getty Images)
A strong sense of place can deeply influence a story, and in some cases, the setting can even feel like a character itself — or have a lasting influence on an author. With that in mind, this week’s literary geography quiz highlights the final stops for five authors after a life of writing. To play, just make your selection in the multiple-choice list and the correct answer will be revealed. At the end of the quiz, you’ll find links to the books if you’d like to do further reading.
Whatever you do, don’t think of a bird.
Now: What kind of bird are you not thinking about? A pigeon? A bald eagle? Something more poetic, like a skylark or a nightingale? In any case, would you say that this bird you aren’t thinking about is real?
Before you answer, read this poem, which is quite literally about not thinking of a bird.
Human consciousness is full of riddles. Neuroscientists, philosophers and dorm-room stoners argue continually about what it is and whether it even exists. For Wallace Stevens, the experience of having a mind was a perpetual source of wonder, puzzlement and delight — perfectly ordinary and utterly transcendent at the same time. He explored the mysteries and pleasures of consciousness in countless poems over the course of his long poetic career. It was arguably his great theme.
Stevens was born in 1879 and published his first book, “Harmonium,” in 1923, making him something of a late bloomer among American modernists. For much of his adult life, he worked as an executive for the Hartford Accident and Indemnity Company, rising to the rank of vice president. He viewed insurance less as a day job to support his poetry than as a parallel vocation. He pursued both activities with quiet diligence, spending his days at the office and composing poems in his head as he walked to and from work.
As a young man, Stevens dreamed of traveling to Europe, though he never crossed the Atlantic. In middle age he made regular trips to Florida, and his poems are frequently infused with ideas of Paris and Rome and memories of Key West. Others partake of the stringent beauty of New England. But the landscapes he explores, wintry or tropical, provincial or cosmopolitan, are above all mental landscapes, created by and in the imagination.
Are those worlds real?
Let’s return to the palm tree and its avian inhabitant, in that tranquil Key West sunset of the mind.
Until then, we find consolation in fangles.
When the director Rob Reiner cast his leads in the 1986 film “Stand by Me,” he looked for young actors who were as close as possible to the personalities of the four children they’d be playing. There was the wise beyond his years kid from a rough family (River Phoenix), the slightly dim worrywart (Jerry O’Connell), the cutup with a temper (Corey Feldman) and the sensitive, bookish boy.
Wil Wheaton was perfect for that last one, Gordie Lachance, a doe-eyed child who is ignored by his family in favor of his late older brother. Now, 40 years later, he’s traveling the country to attend anniversary screenings of the film, alongside O’Connell and Feldman, which has thrown him back into the turmoil that he felt as an adolescent.
Wheaton has channeled those emotions and his on-set memories into his latest project: narrating a new audiobook version of “The Body,” the 1982 Stephen King novella on which the film was based.
A few years ago, Wheaton started to float the idea of returning to the story that gave him his big break — that of a quartet of boys in 1959 Oregon, in their last days before high school, setting out to find a classmate’s dead body. “I’ve been telling the story of ‘Stand By Me’ since I was 12 years old,” he said.
But this time was different. Wheaton, who has narrated dozens of audiobooks, including Andy Weir’s “The Martian” and Ernest Cline’s “Ready Player One,” says he has come to enjoy narration more than screen acting. “I’m safe, I’m in the booth, nobody’s looking at me and I can just tell you a story.”
The fact that he, an older man looking back on his younger years, is narrating a story about an older man looking back on his younger years, is not lost on Wheaton. King’s original story is bathed in nostalgia. Coming to terms with death and loss is one of its primary themes.
Two days after appearing on stage at the Academy Awards as part of a tribute to Reiner — who was murdered in 2025 alongside his wife, Michele — Wheaton got on the phone to talk about recording the audiobook, reliving his favorite scenes from the film and reexamining a quintessential story of childhood loss through the lens of his own.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
“I felt really close to him, and my memory of him.”
Wheaton on channeling a co-star’s performance.
There’s this wonderful scene in “Stand By Me.” Gordie and Chris are walking down the tracks talking about junior high. Chris is telling Gordie, “I wish to hell I was your dad, because I care about you, and he obviously doesn’t.”
It’s just so honest and direct, in a way that kids talk to each other that adults don’t. And I think that one of the reasons that really sticks with people, and that piece really lands on a lot of audiences, and has for 40 years, is, just too many people have been Gordie in that scene.
That scene is virtually word for word taken from the text of the book. And when I was narrating that, I made a deliberate choice to do my best to recreate what River did in that scene.
“You’re just a kid,
Gordie–”
“I wish to fuck
I was your father!”
he said angrily.
“You wouldn’t go around
talking about takin those stupid shop courses if I was!
It’s like
God gave you something,
all those stories
you can make up, and He said:
This is what we got for you, kid.
Try not to lose it.
But kids lose everything
unless somebody looks out for them and if your folks
are too fucked up to do it
then maybe I ought to.”
I watched that scene a couple of times because I really wanted — I don’t know why it was so important to me to — well, I know: because I loved him, and I miss him. And I wanted to bring him into this as best as I could, right?
So I was reading that scene, and the words are identical to the script. And I had this very powerful flashback to being on the train tracks that day in Cottage Grove, Oregon. And I could see River standing next to them. They’re shooting my side of the scene and there’s River, right next to the camera, doing his off-camera dialogue, and there’s the sound guy, and there’s the boom operator. There’s my key light.
I could hear and feel it. It was the weirdest thing. It’s like I was right back there.
I was able to really take in the emotional memory of being Gordie in all of those scenes. So when I was narrating him and I’m me and I’m old with all of this experience, I just drew on what I remembered from being that little boy and what I remember of those friendships and what they meant to me and what they mean to me today.
“Rob gave me a gift. Rob gave me a career.”
Wheaton recalls the “Stand By Me” director’s way with kids on set, as well as his recent Oscars tribute.
Rob really encouraged us to be kids.
Jerry tells the most amazing story about that scene, where we were all sitting around, and doing our bit, and he improvised. He was just goofing around — we were just playing — and he said something about spitting water at the fat kid.
We get to the end of the scene, and he hears Rob. Rob comes around from behind the thing, and he goes, “Jerry!” And Jerry thinks, “Oh no, I’m in trouble. I’m in trouble because I improvised, and I’m not supposed to improvise.”
The context for Jerry is that he had been told by the adults in his life, “Sit on your hands and shut up. Stop trying to be a cutup. Stop trying to be funny. Stop disrupting people. Just be quiet.” And Jerry thinks, “Oh my God. I didn’t shut up. I’m in trouble. I’m gonna get fired.”
Rob leans in to all of us, and Rob says, “Hey, guys, do you see that? More of that. Do that!”
The whole time when you’re a kid actor, you’re just around all these adults who are constantly telling you to grow up. They’re mad that you’re being a kid. Rob just created an environment where not only was it supported that we would be kids — and have fun, and follow those kid instincts and do what was natural — it was expected. It was encouraged. We were supposed to do it.
They chanted together:
“I don’t shut up,
I grow up.
And when I look at you I throw up.”
“Then your mother goes around the corner
and licks it up,”
I said, and hauled ass out of there,
giving them the finger over my shoulder as I went.
I never had any friends later on
like the ones I had when I was twelve.
Jesus, did you?
When we were at the Oscars, I looked at Jerry. And we looked at this remarkable assemblage of the most amazingly talented, beautiful artists and storytellers. We looked around, and Jerry leans down, and he said, “We all got our start with Rob Reiner. He trusted every single one of us.”
And to stand there for him, when I really thought that I would be standing with him to talk about this stuff — it was a lot.
“I was really really really excited — like jumping up and down.”
The scene Wheaton was most looking forward to narrating: the tale of Lard Ass Hogan.
I was so excited to narrate it. It’s a great story! It’s a funny story. It’s such a lovely break — it’s an emotional and tonal shift from what’s happening in the movie.
I know this as a writer: You work to increase and release tension throughout a narrative, and Stephen King uses humor really effectively to release that tension. But it also raises the stakes, because we have these moments of joy and these moments of things being very silly in the midst of a lot of intensity.
That’s why the story of Lard Ass Hogan is so fun for me to tell. Because in the middle of that, we stop to do something that’s very, very fun, and very silly and very celebratory.
“Will you shut up and let him tell it?”
Teddy hollered.
Vern blinked.
“Sure. Yeah.
Okay.”
“Go on, Gordie,”
Chris said. “It’s not really much—”
“Naw,
we don’t expect much from a wet end like you,”
Teddy said,
“but tell it anyway.”
I cleared my throat. “So anyway.
It’s Pioneer Days,
and on the last night
they have these three big events.
There’s an egg-roll for the little kids and a sack-race for kids that are like eight or nine,
and then there’s the pie-eating contest.
And the main guy of the story
is this fat kid nobody likes
named Davie Hogan.”
When I narrate this story — whenever there is a moment of levity or humor, whenever there are those brief little moments that are the seasoning of the meal that makes it all so real and relatable — yes, it was very important to me to capture those moments.
I’m shifting in my chair, so I can feel each of those characters. It’s something that doesn’t exist in live action. It doesn’t exist in any other media.
“I feel the loss.”
Wheaton remembers River Phoenix.
The novella “The Body” is very much about Gordie remembering Chris. It’s darker, and it’s more painful, than the movie is.
I’ve been watching the movie on this tour and seeing River a lot. I remember him as a 14- and 15-year-old kid who just seemed so much older, and so much more experienced and so much wiser than me, and I’m only a year younger than him.
What hurts me now, and what I really felt when I was narrating this, is knowing what River was going through then. We didn’t know. I still don’t know the extent of how he was mistreated, but I know that he was. I know that adults failed him. That he should have been protected in every way that matters. And he just wasn’t.
And I, like Gordie, remember a boy who was loving. So loving, and generous and cared deeply about everyone around him, all the time. Who deserved to live a full life. Who had so much to offer the world. And it’s so unfair that he’s gone and taken from us. I had to go through a decades-long grieving process to come to terms with him dying.
Near the end
of 1971,
Chris
went into a Chicken Delight in Portland
to get a three-piece Snack Bucket.
Just ahead of him,
two men started arguing
about which one had been first in line. One of them pulled a knife.
Chris,
who had always been the best of us
at making peace,
stepped between them and was stabbed in the throat.
The man with the knife had spent time in four different institutions;
he had been released from Shawshank State Prison
only the week before.
Chris died almost instantly.
It is a privilege that I was allowed to tell this story. I get to tell Gordie Lachance’s story as originally imagined by Stephen King, with all of the experience of having lived my whole adult life with the memory of spending three months in Gordie Lachance’s skin.
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