Jim Harbaugh could hardly have imagined a more difficult opening to his Los Angeles Chargers tenure.
Los Angeles suffered an embarrassing 26-14 loss to the Las Vegas Raiders on Sunday, one week after falling to the Arizona Cardinals by the same score.
The back-to-back defeats also handed Harbaugh an unwanted place in the history books.
According to the CBS Sports broadcast, this marks the first 0-2 start of Harbaugh’s head-coaching career at either the college or professional level.
Harbaugh, 62, has spent 20 seasons as a head coach—13 in college and seven in the NFL. Never before had one of his teams opened a season with two straight losses.
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The situation would look different if the Chargers had been beaten by two of the NFL’s top contenders. Instead, Los Angeles has lost to the Raiders and Cardinals, two teams many experts expected to rank among the league’s worst this season.
Neither game was particularly competitive. Chargers quarterback Justin Herbert has been mediocre at best, while the offense under new coordinator Mike McDaniel has appeared disjointed. The defense, meanwhile, has failed to do enough to keep Los Angeles within striking distance.
The Chargers now face an especially punishing stretch. Their next seven games are against teams expected to reach the playoffs, raising the possibility that Harbaugh’s historically poor start could become even more troubling.
Historically, NFL teams that start a season 0-2 reach the playoffs only about 15% of the time. Harbaugh and the Chargers therefore have a great deal of work to do.
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