Chargers Think They Have Someone Special in Pasquale

Grabbing the catsup bottle with one hand and the pepper shaker with the other, Larry Pasquale begins to describe the punt return. Pepper is the short man, catsup the deep man.

His eyes light up like those of someone about to slap down a royal flush. He gets a charge out of this stuff.

Pasquale is the Chargers’ new special teams coach. He came west this year, after 10 seasons with the New York Jets, to fix what was nothing short of an abomination last season. He knows how a special teams unit can win a football game. Or lose one.

This is one of his favorite examples:

It was a Monday night game between the Jets and New Orleans back in the early 1980s. There were less than two minutes to play, and the Saints were ahead.

“Howard Cosell basically had shut off his mind,” Pasquale recalls. “He had assumed the Saints were going to win. They were talking about nothing at the end of the game. They were basically just rambling.”

Suddenly, the Jets returned a punt 76 yards for a touchdown, and Howard tuned back in and said in his unmistakeable voice: “What a football game this turned out to be.”

You can hear it, can’t you?

“They might have been packing up or something, saying ‘What time is that plane?’ ” Pasquale says, demonstrating how the camera had focused on the pepper shaker when it should have been following the catsup bottle. “I thought it was really hysterical.”

Hysterical. What a perfect word to describe the Chargers’ special teams last season, unless, of course, you are one of the coaches. It was better than vaudeville.

Let’s see, we saw Hank Ilesic shank two punts that went less than 10 yards each. There was the 17-16 loss to Seattle in Week 6 when the potential tying extra point and a subsequent field-goal attempt were both blocked. There were the times the football bounced off players’ helmets and through their fingers.

It was all great stuff for the blooper file. But it naturally didn’t sit well with Charger Coach Dan Henning, who fired Joe Madden as special teams coach at the end of the season. Madden was the defensive coordinator on the Pittsburgh Steelers’ 1976 Super Bowl team, but Charger players lost confidence in him.

“People just didn’t feel like it was important,” says inside linebacker Gary Plummer. “Most of the guys that are in the NFL have been stars all their lives. When all of a sudden they’re relegated to special teams, they feel like second-class citizens. And that’s the way the guys played last year.

“When you have a motivating guy like Pasquale, you feel important.”

That’s where Madden fell short. Players didn’t take him seriously.

“I felt the change was necessary because some people in our organization (thought) we needed a change, and that carried over to the players,” Henning said. “And I thought Joe was a little undermined. He was fighting an uphill battle. We needed a fresh approach and a fresh start.”

In defense of Madden, Henning says the personnel wasn’t conducive to a polished product. The Chargers filled in a lot of gaps with backup players who had little or no experience in that area.

When the special teams look like a circus act, the coach gets blamed.

“And that’s not the way you should completely evaluate the coach’s ability,” Henning says. “That would mean that Chuck Noll wasn’t a very good coach for three or four years, but he was a great coach in the ‘70s. He’s an outstanding coach, and when he had outstanding players, they were outstandingly productive. When he didn’t have outstanding players, he wasn’t as good a coach. So that’s a crock.”

Either way, Henning knew whom he wanted as Madden’s replacement. Back in high school in New York, Henning and Pasquale used to play football at rival schools in Brooklyn. Henning was the quarterback for St. Francis High, a Catholic powerhouse, and Pasquale was the quarterback at Lafayette, a public school with an equally successful program.

Henning tried to get Pasquale to coach his special teams in Atlanta in 1983 when he was coach of the Falcons. Pasquale declined, deciding he didn’t want to desert Jet Coach Joe Walton.

Henning called again after last season, and he and Pasquale met in New York. Three or four hours of discussion were enough to determine that they were on the same wavelength. Henning wanted to have every coach and every player on the team involved in special teams. Pasquale decided it was worth leaving New York for a new challenge.

“It was an opportunity to maximize our coaches’ contributions and players’ contributions,” Pasquale says. “I really wanted to be a part of that.”

This year, everybody participates in special teams drills. Pasquale spends hours with his assistant, LeCharls McDaniel, evaluating personnel and figuring ways to make sure players are in sync.

Playing special teams is kind of a strange deal. It’s all about throwing linebackers, receivers, running backs and whoever else together on one unit and expecting them to click.

“It’s very tricky,” Pasquale says. “You have to develop a bond. They have to have a trust in one another and a feeling for one another. It takes a great deal of understanding of the personalities of the people.”

So far so good. Wide receiver Nate Lewis went 87 yards on a kickoff return last Saturday to help the Chargers to a 30-27 victory over the Rams. Exhibition or not, that buoyed Pasquale.

And the players are taking pride in playing on special teams. Guys such as Donald Frank, a rookie cornerback from Winston Salem State, and Lewis, a rookie from Oregon Tech. Both are Pasquale’s type: speedy and powerful.

In past seasons, the special teams players would stay late after practice while the others headed for dinner. That didn’t sit too well.

“You felt like it was a punishment,” Plummer said. “With Larry, everyone’s out there. Everyone’s involved.”

Which doesn’t mean that everything is perfect. Against the Rams, the Chargers missed a 27-yard field goal and a PAT. And they narrowly escaped a blocked punt.

If there is still room for improvement, there is one thing that is certain. There is enthusiasm. Special teams aren’t a chore.

“I just felt that (last year) they didn’t really believe they could make a difference,” Pasquale says. “It didn’t seem like they were really into it, like they felt they could defeat their opponents on a regular basis. Our biggest job was really to regain their confidence in special teams.”

Charger Notes

Charger Coach Dan Henning said defensive tackle Les Miller, who strained his elbow in the Rams’ game, will miss Saturday’s game against the 49ers. Also out is tight end Arthur Cox, who has missed 15 days with a back strain.