USA Today's Jarrett Bell was a guest on Wednesday's episode of Chargers Weekly, the official podcast of the team.
Bell shared his observations from the Chargers' joint practice with the Saints and revealed what he's learned throughout the league during his training camp visits. Below are a couple additional highlights from the conversation:
2018 Expectations for the Chargers
"Win the division, number one. And then, maybe you can emerge as that team that really threatens the Patriots. Now, the Steelers have been positioned over the past couple years as maybe a threat to the Patriots. I still think that's the team to beat in the AFC and I don't know if it's as strong of a Patriots team as we've seen in recent years, although they still have (Bill) Belichick and Tom Brady. … And so, you've got them at the top of the mountain here, but I think the Chargers are in a group that would include the Steelers; that would maybe include the Houston Texans as a team that you're going to have an eye on and say 'OK, can this be the year that somebody else does it?'"
Anthony Lynn's Second Year as Head Coach
"… Anthony Lynn did a wonderful job in taking a team and improving that team from Week 1 to Week 16. I think that's the thing about the Chargers that now you want to say, 'Can this carry over to next year?' and I know Lynn, just from talking to him, he's expecting that. I mean, why wouldn't you? You expect that you built the foundation for how we're going to do things. You've got a culture that you're trying to establish, so that should carry over. And if you think about how the beginning of the season turned out for the Chargers last year with those missed opportunities and missed kicks, it could have been a different story. But, through all of that they responded to the adversity and then they improved from week-to-week as you got towards the end. So, yeah, Anthony Lynn (is) definitely proving to be worth his weight."
Listen to Wednesday's entire episode, which also includes an interview with Fox Sports' Kevin Burkhardt. As the 2018 regular season draws closer, Burkhardt discusses the league's most intriguing storylines and shares his view of the AFC West.
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