Chargers News: Griff Smith Leaning On Experts For Advice Ahead Of First Game As Interim Head Coach

He'll need it, since the Bolts are a disaster.

Ahead of the Bolts' likely demolition at the hands of the surging Buffalo Bills, Los Angeles Chargers interim head coach Giff spoke about some advice he's received ahead of his first career game as a HC.

#Chargers interim HC Giff Smith said he's had multiple former head coaches reach out to give him advice. The most helpful piece of advice, he said, came from Chan Gailey: "All those suggestions and thoughts you had are now decisions. Good luck."

— Daniel Popper (@danielrpopper) December 19, 2023

Smith mentioned having spoken with Chan Gailey, who spent a number of years as an NFL head coach with the Dallas Cowboys and Buffalo Bills. The advice Gailey gave him, however, doesn't seem to be all that helpful so much as it is spooky, as it reinforced the amount of pressure placed on Smith as a head coach as opposed to an outside linebackers coach. 

That said, Gailey's advice could also be seen as good (which is seemingly what Smith thinks as well), as perhaps he had certain ideas, gameplans, schematic recommendations, etc., that former head coach Brandon Staley wasn't on board with. A fresh slate for Smith to be able to call the shots could lead to a lot more success than what we saw with Staley, especially since the bar for that is extremely low. 

The new head coach has a tall task this week, working with a Bolts team that'll be without its two best players, Justin Herbert and Keenan Allen, in an already-difficult matchup. Let's see if there's any Raiders-esque magic on the horizon, where the team rallies behind an interim coach to find more success.