There was not much for the chargers fans to encourage Los Angeles in the 2023 game against the Denver Broncos in week 14.
A season after one of the most shameful playoff losses in the history of the NFL, the chargers entered the campaign motivated to avenge that defeat and reach their potential to compete for a championship. Instead, this Sunday, they had 5-7, and their playoff possibilities were going to disappear. The Sofi stadium, its homemade stadium, was covered by Denver Orange for the Broncos fans.
Then, Field Marshal Justin Herbert suffered a right -index finger fracture that ends the season in the first quarter, and when it came out, the Chargers season did so.
But in the middle of a day and a season of disappointment, the organization gave staggering fans a reason to smile. In the midst, the team celebrated a ceremony to induce the closed wing Antonio Gates in the Chargers Hall of Fame.
“To the city of San Diego,” Gates said, pauses when the chargers contingent roared as strong as he had done that afternoon. “You supported me. You burned a 22 -year -old boy from Detroit, and you will always be my second home.”
Gates played 16 seasons in the NFL, 14 in San Diego and two in Los Angeles after the team moved. That movement is still a painful place for some fans who were mom when Gates thanked Los Angeles and booed aloud when Gates thanked the owner of the Dean Spanos team and the Spanos family.
While Gates never won a championship, he was partly responsible for marking the beginning of an exciting one of Chargers football that had some of the most successful seasons in the history of the franchise. The roars that day for Gates were a reminder of how much Gates meant for a city that had accepted him as his.
As Gates is included in the Hall of Fame of Professional Soccer with the consecrated Saturday, many in San Diego will encourage stronger.
“He was a guy who simply fit the city,” said David Drogemeier, a native of San Diego and coanfrerion of the podcast “Locked on Chargers.” “A guy who feels to be from here even though he was not.”
From the beginning, Gates' trip seemed crazy.
When he left Detroit Central High School, Gates accepted a soccer scholarship from the state of Michigan, which was then led by coach Nick Saban. But Saban wouldn't let Gates play football and basketball. Gates left Michigan's state and never played football at the university.
After the stops in eastern Michigan and the College of Sequoias, a community university in Visalia, California, Gates ended in Kent State as Junior and became one of the best basketball players in the history of the program. Like Junior, Gates led Kent State, a 10 seeds, the Eight Elite in 2002, the deepest school has done in the NCAA tournament. His shirt, No. 44, retired in 2010, since Gates became the fourth male basketball player in the history of the school to receive such honor.
Despite Gates's domain in Kent State, it was not projected to be a NBA player mainly due to its size; He was a 4 -inch striker, a position in which NBA players are an average of approximately 5 inches higher. Then, Gates returned to football, exercising for NFL teams, which were intrigued by their physical features. The Chargers decided to sign it as a free agent not recruited in 2003, but was very sharp to be part of the team.
The Stephen Cooper supporter, a free not recruited agent as Gates, was Gates's fellow in the Holiday Inn during that 2003 training camp. When the chargers began to make final cuts, Cooper remembers that the team had two places left, but he and Gates had convinced themselves that only one of them would do the team.
When they learned that they both did, they had a celebration off in their hotel room; It is a moment that Cooper will never forget, especially considering how much the doors will achieve as a closed wing.
“We ran around the room trying not to be too loud and excited just because we didn't want to be disrespectful with our other teammates who did not succeed,” said Cooper, who played nine seasons for the chargers. “Of all the moments with Antonio, that is one that I remember most.”
Gates' success changed the position of the closed wing. His basketball experience was evident in how he fit the defenders and pointed to football as if he were receiving a rebound in hard wood.
The current chargers coach Jim Harbaugh, said that Gates stands out as the first wing closed in being the focal point of the offensive of a team: “First guy I remember having caught 10, 12, 13, 14 balls in a game … bigger of all time.”
Gates' achievements made teams at all levels risk former basketball players. The most notable is the closed wing Jimmy Graham, who played a year of football after four years in the basketball team of the University of Miami. Graham was recruited in the third round by the New Orleans Saints and became one of the best closed wings in the league. He played 13 seasons and did five pro Bowls.
“Without [Gates]I wouldn't even have given me this opportunity or gave me the opportunity to play at university, “Graham told reporters in 2012.” “The road raided me.”
While the size of Gates was not an adjustment for the power of the NBA forward, it made an ideal closed wing of the NFL. It was too fast to be covered by most of the supporters and too strong to be covered on defensive backs, placing the D coordinators in a ATA every week.
“You knew that if a team wants to go one with him, he will kill them,” said the former security of the Chargers, Eric Weddle. “It was a nightmare of confrontation.”
Gates did not take long to become one of the best closed wings in the league. It was a first All-Pro team in its second season, the first of three consecutive selections. Gates' break came in his second campaign, in 2004, when he ended with 964 yards and 13 touchdowns. In the first game of that season, the Chargers faced the Houston Texans, with whom the current offensive coordinator of the Chargers, Greg Roman, was the team's field marshal coach. Gates caught each objective, ending with eight receptions for 123 yards in victory.
“It doesn't happen very often where you are going, 'Who is this guy?'” Roman said with a smile. “But all in the bank were: 'Who is this guy?'”
Gates is the leader of all NFL time to receive touchdowns from a closed wing (116) and the leader of all the chargers at receptions (955) and reception yards (11,841). Behind those statistics are the many injuries that their former teammates remember at the doors playing.
Before the AFC 2007 championship game, the state of Gates was uncertain. He had dislocated his big foot in the victory of the Chargers in the Commodines Round over the Tennessee Titans; The injury was serious enough to leave the game in a medical cart. Even so, Gates played him in the victory of the Divisional Round of the Chargers over the Indianapolis Colts and his loss of AFC championship game against the New England Patriots.
The former Chargers supporter Shawne Merriman said that Gates's image before the conference championship championship game at the training table, where he remembers that doctors numb the foot of Gates, stay with him and is one of the many reasons why Gates meant a lot for the organization.
“From the ankle down, I could not feel anything,” said Merriman. “And you think, man, [that] Someone from his caliber who has already done so much in his career would simply go and run that risk, my level of respect for him at that time simply went down the roof. “
While the chargers are mainly associated with not meeting expectations and have never won a Super Bowl, they have had some of the best players in the league, including the Philip Rivers field marshal, the Ladainian Tomlinson corridor, the Junior Seau, the open receptor Lance Alworth, the QB Dan Fouts and the wing wing Kellen Winslow.
Even so, many of those stars ended their careers elsewhere. Gates, Fouts and Winslow are the three in that group that plays for the chargers in all their careers, with Winslow playing nine seasons and Fouts 15. Gates '16 years as a charger for perhaps the most transformative years in the history of the franchise, when the organization alienated many of its fans with the movement to Los Angeles, will always make Gates make a different relationship of Gates with San Diego.
“I think it is really special to have someone who started his career in San Diego and stayed with the team all the time,” said Drogemeier. “But with Antonio, he was a guy who always did things in the right way, and he was also a creator of the game. He is obviously easy to resonate with that type of players.”
