I would say the big thing about San Diego’s offense is their deep balls. He’s a very good deep ball thrower and they run… I mean, every play, really, is a deep pass. Not that they throw them all down there, but they have them going. So if you don’t have him defended well, he hits those deep balls and of course that opens up everything else. It opens up the intermediate passing game. It helps the running game and all that. So their offense is really built around getting the ball down the field. And they’ve got good receivers and tight ends and even in [Darren] Sproles’ case, a back that can get down the field and a quarterback that is very accurate throwing it, as we talked about there. They’re the best team in the league on third-and-long. Third-and-10 to them is nothing. Third-and-10, Third-and-three, they don’t care. They’re fine with that and they hit a lot of them. It’s really their deep passing game, and I would say that extends on all downs: first down, second down, third down, play action, drop back, three receivers, two receivers. Put out there whoever you want, they’re looking to throw it deep and if you take that away, then they’ll come to the underneath stuff where you don’t have very many guys and they have some good receivers like [Antonio] Gates and Sproles and [Randy] McMichael and those guys. That’s kind of what their passing game [is]. Other than some situational plays, that’s kind of the essence of it.
Bill Belichick on the Chargers Offense