Chargers Keeping Brandon Staley Landed Them Jim Harbaugh Instead Of Sean Payton, Which Looks Genius

“Everything happens for a reason.” 

That’s a common refrain among all people, and it really rings true for fans of the Los Angeles Chargers. 

Chargers fans desperately wanted Brandon Staley fired after the team blew a 27-point lead in a 2023 NFL Wild Card Playoff game against Trevor Lawrence and the Jacksonville Jaguars. 

I wrote prior to that game that the Chargers firing Staley to hire Payton would be a bad idea. 

“There are many reasons why it would be a mistake, but let’s start with the biggest one: Sean Payton is overrated,” I wrote in December 2022. 

If you want to know exactly why I believed that at the time (and still very much do), you can read that piece. 

The Los Angeles Chargers stuck with head coach Brandon Staley rather than hire Sean Payton and it helped them land Jim Harbaugh.

(USA Today Network/Imagn Images)

Ultimately, the Chargers hung on to Staley for an extra year, Sean Payton took the Denver Broncos job and both teams missed the playoffs last season. 

The Chargers fired Staley in the middle of that disastrous third season, and they did so for good reason. 

Then, they hired Jim Harbaugh, fresh off a National Championship win at Michigan. 

I cannot overstate how much better Harbaugh is at coaching football than Sean Payton. 

The media loves Payton because he’s a nice guy, and he’s very friendly and forthcoming with reporters. He does that on purpose so that they’ll protect him. And they do. 

He gets a lot of credit for winning one Super Bowl with a Hall of Fame quarterback, Drew Brees. 

But Jim Harbaugh went to three consecutive NFC Championships, and one Super Bowl, with Alex Smith and Colin Kaepernick. 

Sean Payton went to the same number of NFC Championship Games (3) in 14 years with Brees as Harbaugh went to in three seasons with Smith and Kaepernick. This isn’t even a debate. 

Then, Harbaugh went to Michigan and won a College National Championship. His resume is so superior to Payton that they don’t belong in the same conversation. 

That’s already shown this season, too. Payton is running a 2005 offense with the Denver Broncos and they stink. 

He made one of the most foolish coaching decisions I’ve ever seen in my life in Sunday’s loss against Pittsburgh. 

The game has passed Sean Payton by. He’s a dinosaur who thinks he’s smarter than everyone else. 

But he isn’t. These younger, more innovative coaches are scheming circles around the Broncos head honcho. 

Harbaugh isn’t the most innovative guy around, but he’s better at surrounding himself with people who are willing to try new things.

Payton isn’t. He’s a “set in his ways” guy who’s still living off a Super Bowl he won 15 years ago. 

The Broncos will ultimately regret the decision to hire Payton, if they don’t already. 

The Chargers will forever be thankful that they hung on to Brandon Staley for one more season because it set them up in a big way for the future. 

Sean Payton’s best is in the past. It’s well in the past, I might add. 

I don’t know if Jim Harbuagh’s best is still ahead of him. It’s going to be hard to top three-straight NFC Championship appearances with backup-level quarterbacks. 

But I do know that what’s ahead of Harbaugh is a lot better than what’s ahead of Payton.