Rob Gronkowski Calls Chargers the NFL's Biggest Mess After 0-2 Start
Rob Gronkowski says the Los Angeles Chargers are the NFL's biggest mess after opening 0-2, pointing to poor offensive line play, Justin Herbert's struggles and a broken offense under Jim Harbaugh and Mike McDaniel.
Rob Gronkowski did not hesitate when asked which NFL team is the biggest mess through the first two weeks of the 2026 season. The Los Angeles Chargers, he said, are at the top of the list.
«The Los Angeles Chargers I would say are probably the biggest mess in the NFL in terms of how they're playing and where they should be,» the future Pro Football Hall of Fame tight end told OutKick in New York City during an event for Bounty.
Gronkowski initially mentioned the Miami Dolphins as a candidate, but he described their problems as «expected» given the roster questions the team carried into the season. The Chargers, by contrast, were supposed to be a Super Bowl contender. Instead, they are 0-2 after losses to the Arizona Cardinals and Las Vegas Raiders, two teams few projected as playoff hopefuls in 2026.
«That's a mess over there right now,» Gronkowski said. «They gotta just grab a Bounty paper towel and wipe off all their linemen, because they're not clean. They're dirty and they're falling all over the place. Get the blocks down schematically and keep Justin Herbert clean in the pocket so he can perform.»
The numbers back up his criticism. Los Angeles is averaging just 14 points per game, the third-lowest mark in the league. The Chargers rank 23rd in total offensive yards per game, and the film shows why. Herbert has completed only 59.3% of his passes with two touchdowns and three interceptions in two games, and he has struggled to find any rhythm.
The offensive line, a persistent weak point in recent seasons, deserves much of the blame. But Gronkowski stressed that no single player, not even the quarterback, can absorb all the responsibility for a team falling so far short of expectations.
«It's not just one thing that's going wrong. It's a lot of things going wrong,» he said. «The quarterback just not playing good ball, the offensive coordinator just not reading his team and not putting them in the right position. Offensive line is stinking it up. The wide receivers just not making the plays when they need to. It's a collective of everything. Like, it's in the air — it's not just one thing.»
He added that the only way out of such a deep hole is to fix everything at once. «So, you have to fix everything as a whole when you go down that low,» Gronkowski said. «It's football. It's such a team game that one player can't make you collapse the way they're collapsing. It's everyone as a whole.»
The Chargers entered the season with high hopes, largely because head coach Jim Harbaugh brought in new offensive coordinator Mike McDaniel and his explosive scheme. That pairing was expected to elevate a talented roster and make Los Angeles one of the most watchable teams in the AFC. Two weeks in, the opposite has happened.
Herbert, regarded as one of the league's top quarterbacks, has been under near-constant pressure. The running game has offered little support, and the receivers have not consistently won their matchups. The result is an offense that has looked disjointed and out of sync in both games.
It is still early, but the schedule offers no relief. The Chargers travel to Buffalo this week to face the 2-0 Bills, then must take on the Seattle Seahawks, Denver Broncos, Kansas City Chiefs, Los Angeles Rams, Houston Texans and Baltimore Ravens. That stretch represents one of the toughest slates any team will face this season.
If the Chargers cannot correct their problems quickly, the gap between their preseason expectations and their actual performance will only grow. For now, Gronkowski's assessment stands as one of the harshest early verdicts of the 2026 season — and one of the most difficult to argue with.
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