For Mark Herrmann, Trade From Colts to Chargers Led to a New Confidence in His Ability to Throw the Ball : Changes in Latitude, Changes in Attitude

In a chic new development dubbed Copperfield, the only hint of California is the spa in the backyard of a home on Trotwood Circle.

Actually, Mark Herrmann installed the spa before the vagaries of professional football sent him westward to San Diego.

Now he is making other concessions to the culture of Southern California.

A solid, conservative Midwesterner, Herrmann can be seen these days in sweaters of bright pastel stripes and a luxury sedan of Germanic origin.

He also has a new approach to life. Like so many refugees from the heartland, he is starting fresh on the West Coast.

“Last year was like a rebirth for me,” said Herrmann, who plans to establish permanent residence in San Diego after his wife, Susie, gives birth to their first child this summer.

“Last year renewed my faith in my ability,” he said. “It was like I had made it to heaven.”

Herrmann was installed in 1985 as the Chargers’ quarterback-on-call, the guy they hope they never have to use. He works only when Dan Fouts can’t.

It may not sound like the California Promise, but it was more than the Chargers really had in mind. And it was more than any other team in the National Football League believed he could handle.

Life had turned ugly for Herrmann after a collegiate career at Purdue in which he set nine NCAA, six Big Ten and and 23 school passing records.

His warmest moments, before San Diego, were spent in his backyard spa, where he sometimes contemplated retirement. He started only four games in a four-year span, 1981-1984, thanks in part to a broken thumb and a broken collarbone.

The physical battering, however, was minor compared to the loss of confidence he suffered as a sideline spectator.

Employment in San Diego brought a dramatic recovery.

“Running the most potent offense in history is very exciting for me,” Herrmann said recently as he reflected on his shift in fortunes. “This is the way it’s supposed to be.

“I try not to think too far ahead, but I’ve got a good taste of the NFL now, where before it was all sour. And it’s nice knowing there might be something out there on the horizon (when Fouts retires).”

For Herrmann to work up the nerve to make such a statement--as close as he is ever going to come to echoing Muhammad Ali’s “I am the greatest”--required a personal renaissance.

Filling in for Fouts last year, he also filled in some holes in his personality inventory.

Herrmann learned to believe in himself, as did the Chargers. They passed on a highly regarded college quarterback, Chuck Long, with the first of their picks in last month’s draft, giving Herrmann a vote of confidence.

Few jobs in pro football, however, come with a guarantee. And even the ones that seemingly offer security usually have some fine print giving the employer a way out.

So it is with Herrmann, the Chargers’ officially designated No. 2 quarterback.

The job is his this year.

Well, probably.

Uh, we’ll see.

“After the job he did for us last year, I told him as long as I have a say, he’d have a job,” offensive coordinator Ernie Zampese said. “Going into this season, no question he is our backup to Dan Fouts. The players believe in him, they know he can run the offense.

“The job is his . . . unless somebody beats him out. Remember, he had no chance to make our team last year, but he made it.”

The Chargers didn’t want Herrmann to make it last year. After trading a 10th-round draft choice for him, they buried him behind Bruce Mathison, a quarterback who hadn’t started a game since high school.

Herrmann had learned something about what it is to be neglected in his years in pro football, but his experience in training camp was without parallel.

He was issued a helmet and a playbook, but had little use for either. He watched during practice, he watched during exhibitions. The only exercise he got was moving his eyes.

Not until the second half of the final exhibition game did the Charger high command decide that Mathison was a lost cause and give Herrmann a chance.

It was only a morsel, but to a starving quarterback, who had averaged one starting assignment in each of the four preceding years, it was a blessed event.

Herrmann was deployed in what was an otherwise meaningless exercise with the New Orleans Saints. He directed the Chargers to two second-half touchdowns, and a last-second heave to tight end Eric Sievers set up a game-winning field goal by Billy Ray Smith, pinch-kicking for Rolf Benirschke.

It wasn’t so much what Herrmann did as the way he did it that impressed Zampese and Coach Don Coryell.

“He had had zero preparation, zero repetitions with our offense,” Zampese said. “Watching him against the Saints, we realized, my gosh, if he can do that with no preparation, what can he do if we work with him?

“We saw that he would fit our offense better than Bruce. He throws a soft ball, like Dan, and it’s very easy for receivers to catch. There’s not a big difference in trajectory or velocity for our receivers to get used to.”

It took less than 30 minutes for Zampese to make some of these discoveries.

But it took six weeks, plus 3 1/2 exhibitions, for Herrmann to be given a chance.

Zampese is honest enough to admit that he didn’t think Herrmann was the right guy for the job--or deserving of a chance. The Chargers had obtained him as insurance against injuries to either Fouts or Mathison, and to provide a little competition for Mathison.

“I had already approached Mark during the summer and told him he wouldn’t get much of a shot to make our football team,” Zampese said. “We felt Bruce was going to be the guy, and we wanted to give him every down.

“It was hard for me to talk about. I told Mark I wouldn’t blame him if he wanted to try to hook on somewhere else, but if he stayed, something might happen.”

Herrmann stayed.

It wasn’t like he had anywhere else to go.

“The way I was ignored during camp, I asked Ernie why they even brought me in,” Herrmann said. “I was feeling like I wasn’t good enough for the job.”

He got a chance because the San Francisco 49ers gave Mathison a going-over in the third exhibition game and the coaches decided to see what, if anything, Herrmann could do.

“I was very anxious all week, but I managed to relax while I was out there against the Saints,” Herrmann said.

“Dan gets most of the preparation time during the regular season, but if he gets hurt, you still have to be able to go in and perform. I think the coaches liked the fact I was able to produce without the preparation.”

After the Chargers dispatched Mathison to Buffalo, they were able to give Herrmann a better chance to prepare himself.

Barely a month had elapsed when Fouts was hurt, forcing Herrmann into the lineup for the first of two tours of duty.

Herrmann’s most impressive games came against Kansas City.

The Chargers were 2-3 when they played the Chiefs in October. Herrmann completed 26 of 36 passes for 320 yards and two touchdowns as the Chargers won, 31-20.

That victory was the first solid indication that Fouts could be replaced without disastrous consequences, at least for a period of three or four games.

Coryell, meanwhile, was battling to keep his job, and Herrmann’s relief work was a plus.

Fouts returned at mid-season and lasted until the closing weeks, by which time the suspense surrounding Coryell had dissipated with his rehiring for 1986.

The Chargers, however, still had another game with Kansas City, and in this one Herrmann really came into his own. He completed 37 passes, tying Fouts’ team record, and surpassed another Fouts mark with 58 passing attempts. Herrmann’s throws netted 362 yards and three touchdowns in a losing effort.

Herrmann’s statistics for the season showed 132 completions in 201 attempts for 1,537 yards, an average gain of 7.65 yards, which compared favorably with the Fouts average of 8.46 yards.

Under the NFL’s complex rating system, Herrmann’s rating of 84.6 also stacked up well alongside the Fouts mark of 88.0.

“I felt last year really solidified my position with the Chargers,” Herrmann said. “This is the most comfortable I have felt in years. Having a little track record, I won’t be as tense and worried about things.

“As long as I know a guy like Ernie Zampese is behind me, that’s a big help. It hampers me if I sense that the coaches have doubts.”

Dan Reeves and Frank Kush had doubts, and then some.

The Denver Broncos selected Herrmann on the fourth round of the 1981 draft, and he never proved himself to Reeves.

“I had a lot of friends over for the draft that day,” Herrmann said. “I got more and more depressed as the draft wore on. The ESPN telecast was closing down when the announcer said, ‘And here’s a name we expected to hear earlier--Mark Herrmann.’

“I guess the scouts really had soured on me.”

Herrmann played behind Craig Morton and Steve DeBerg in his rookie season. Morton retired the next year but Herrmann still played in only two games.

He received a shock in the spring of 1983 when he was part of a trade that enabled Denver to draft John Elway. Herrmann was sent to the Baltimore Colts, beginning an unhappy two-year stay.

He didn’t much care for the city of Baltimore, but he tolerated Kush better than he had expected. However, a broken collarbone ruined his season.

While watching television one day in March, 1984, Herrmann got another break, the one he thought he had been waiting for. There were the moving vans being loaded in Baltimore to take the Colts’ operation to Indianapolis.

It was a homecoming that Herrmann relished for at least a few months. The city was excited about reclaiming a guy who starred at Carmel High School in football and basketball before a distinguished career at nearby Purdue.

Herrmann started playing football at age 10. He would pretend to be quarterback Len Dawson of the Kansas City Chiefs, throwing passes to his brother, who would imitate Otis Taylor in their backyard games.

Herrmann lacked a strong arm, but he was accurate, and his progress was steady. He became a four-year starter and an All-American at Purdue.

There weren’t many setbacks in his amateur days, but all that changed dramatically in the NFL, including his return to Indianapolis.

Two weeks into training camp, Herrmann broke his right thumb, sidelining him for 10 weeks. He was unable to dislodge Mike Pagel and Art Schlichter after his return.

“I went through some pretty rough times,” Herrmann said. “With the Colts, there was no protection for the quarterback. It was horrible. That experience certainly makes me appreciate what I have now with the Chargers.”

Herrmann likens his experience in San Diego to his years at Purdue.

“The offenses are similar with the concentration on short passes and timing patterns,” he said.

“Timing and accuracy are my strong points, and if I have time to throw, I think I can be as effective as anybody. With the Chargers, I got time to deliver the ball, and it struck a flame in me. Football wasn’t drudgery, for the first time in years.”

Herrmann’s arm is never going to remind anyone of Dan Marino, and his subdued personality contrasts with the forceful, take-charge approach of Fouts.

The Chargers accept these reservations, for the most part.

“He doesn’t get flustered,” veteran lineman Ed White said. “Some guys, they take a hit, then they can’t stand in there and throw the ball next time. Mark isn’t like that. He’s cool out there.”

Zampese said he’d like to see Herrmann show a bit more intensity.

“Maybe he needs to exhibit more quickness in his movements, step into that huddle quickly with no nonsense,” Zampese said. “You want a guy to call a play quickly and confidently, like he’s saying, ‘This play is going to work, period, no question.’ ”

Perhaps to put a little more quickness into Herrmann, the Chargers have signed a free-agent quarterback, Wayne Peace. Zampese said he likes the take-charge huddle mechanics of Peace.

Herrmann seems unlikely to change drastically.

“I try to be even-tempered,” he said. “I don’t get hyper like Jim McMahon. I’ll say something in the huddle if I have to. I’m not complacent out there.”

When you require five years to work your way up to No. 2, complacency isn’t a concern. For a No. 2 anything, there are no guarantees.