The Chargers are playing on Monday night football in Week 6 in the debut game for Andrew Luck as they take on the Indianapolis Colts and the game should be a good chance for Philip Rivers to continue his solid season.
Rivers has been a very good fantasy player this year with 13 touchdowns and 1,610 passing yards and this week the team will be hosting the Colts. Rivers has gone for over 400 yards in each of his last two games and he has been much better with turnovers, although he had three last week. He had 411 passing yards last week with two touchdowns and the previous week he had three against the Cowboys.
The team also added free agent Lavelle Hawkins on a deal. According to Pro Football Talk, Hawkins signed a deal with the Chargers a few weeks after Malcom Floyd went down with an injury and that came after Danario Alexander was lost for the season with a knee injury. The team said that Floyd is on his way back from a neck injury, but since he has not been practicing yet, the team felt it was necessary to add more depth to the position for Rivers behind players like Eddie Royal, Keenan Allen and Vincent Brown.
The Chargers have done a good job of spreading the ball around this season and Rivers has been particularly good compared to how he played last season. Floyd has been out since the win against the Eagles and now Hawkins joins up after previously playing for the Titans, Patriots and 49ers, although he never officially played in a game for the latter two teams.
Floyd only played in two games this season before getting hurt, making six catches for 149 yards, with the bulk coming in the game against the Eagles. In that game before he was injured, Floyd made five catches for 102 yards and while he may return soon, Hawkins now is another weapon for Rivers, who is having himself a very solid season so far.
Here is a look back on Rivers from this season and how he is outplaying Eli Manning and Ben Roethlisberger.
The San Diego Chargers are just 2-2 this season, but after losing two close games the team could easily be 4-0 and that would tie them with their AFC West rivals in the Denver Broncos and the Kansas City Chiefs and one reason for their strong play this season is quarterback Philip Rivers.
After throwing over 30 picks the past two seasons, Rivers has been looking like one of the best quarterbacks in the league and after years of questions about his skills compared to his fellow draftees in 2004, Rivers is clearly outplaying both Eli Manning and Ben Roethlisberger right now. With Manning and Roethlisberger each winning two Super Bowl championships and Rivers never making it to one, many said that Rivers was the lesser of the three taken that year, but right now Rivers is giving the other two a run for his money.
This season he has passed for over 400 yards two different times and apart from the opening Monday night game against the Texans, he has completed at least 76 percent of his passes. With both the Steelers and the Giants at 0-4 this season, it is telling that Rivers has been playing so well while the other two have been struggling.
Rivers has a new coach and a new offense with Mike McCoy and clearly he has been comfortable, including this past week when he passed for 400 yards and three touchdowns. He also set a record for having the highest completion percentage at 83 percent for a player throwing for over 400 yards, going 35 of 42 in the game, which ended up a victory for the Chargers over the Cowboys.
Rivers has been turnover prone in his career, but this season he has 11 TDs and just two picks and in two games he didn't turn the ball over at all and in three of four games he has had at least three touchdown passes and this is all happening with injuries to Danario Alexander and Malcom Floyd. Rivers is second in the league in TD passes and his stats just show the struggles of the other two, as they have combined for 11 touchdowns and 14 interceptions already this season.
Manning has been terrible behind a terrible offensive line and a terrible defense and terrible effort, throwing for over 1,000 yards already, but with six touchdowns and nine interceptions. The Giants are 0-4 and now the Steelers are as well and Big Ben has just five TDs to go along with five picks this season. No one will say Rivers is better than those two or a champion just because of four games...But it's a nice start.
