Chargers Turn to Redskins : Football: Offer made for Stan Humphries. Beathard awaits response.

The quarterback-poor Chargers made their pitch for Washington’s Stan Humphries on Wednesday, and now they await the Redskins’ response.

Several Redskins assistant coaches expect Humphries to be a Charger soon. The only holdup apparently is the approval of Redskins owner Jack Kent Cooke.

“I did talk to (General Manager) Charley Casserly, but that’s as far as it goes,” Chargers General Manager Bobby Beathard said. “Nothing has been worked out, but they do know we have an interest. We’re waiting to hear back from them.”

Beathard said negotiations remain sensitive and declined to discuss the situation further.

There were indications from Washington, however, that the Chargers had tried to complete the deal Tuesday night before Humphries boarded the Redskins’ team flight to London for an exhibition game later this weekend.

The Chargers had hoped to have Humphries, 6-2, 224 pounds, here at Bryant College in time to practice against the Patriots. The Redskins did not accept the Chargers’ offer Tuesday night, but further discussions Wednesday appear to have increased the chances of completing the deal.

If successful, Chargers officials have indicated that Humphries will be viewed as the team’s starting quarterback, although he has only nine games of NFL experience and has not played a down since 1990.

The Chargers have not announced their quarterback rotation for Friday night’s exhibition with the New England Patriots, but Bob Gagliano is expected to start.

Redskins Coach Joe Gibbs has told the team’s other quarterbacks that Humphries will not be with them this season. He has refused to use Humphries in exhibition action, and has a scheduled meeting with Humphries today.

Gibbs told the Washington reporters Wednesday, “We’re going to try and continue to work something out. We want to do something that is an opportunity for Stan, but that’s fair for us, too.”

Gibbs has been no fan of Humphries, who refused to stay in Washington for off-season workouts, but he praised Humphries’ reaction in recent weeks to a trying situation.

“He’s handled it great,” Gibbs said. “He’s very professional about all of this.”

Beathard, while the Redskins’ general manager, selected Humphries, 27, in the sixth round of the NFL draft. He has been interested in acquiring has made several attempts, and has been rebuffed in the past, leading to speculation that Cooke has given orders to team officials not to deal with his former employee.

The Redskins, however, are expected to release or trade Humphries by the Aug. 25 deadline for trimming the roster to 60 players. Minnesota expressed interest in Humphries, but the Vikings are not expected to offer as much as the Chargers.

Since joining the Chargers, Coach Bobby Ross has placed an emphasis on the passing game. Ross had quarterback John Friesz throwing the ball in the final minutes of the first half in the team’s exhibition opener with Phoenix, and he went down with a season-ending knee injury.

Gagliano replaced Friesz, and is backed up by Jeff Graham and Pat O’Hara, a pair of former World League football performers who have yet to attempt a pass in a NFL regular-season game.

Since Friesz’s injury, Ross has not been pleased with the media’s attention to the team’s quarterback situation. When asked if he can mount the passing attack he has in mind with the three quarterbacks he presently has in camp, he said, “I think we’ve got to keep working on it.”

When pressed, Ross became agitated. “Why do you all have to ask such negative things about those guys?” he said.

Ross was asked to assess the performance of his quarterbacks in two days of work with the Patriots.

“To tell you the truth, I’m not watching them on the field,” he said. “I’m watching up front. I can’t tell you what they’re doing until I watch the film.”

Later in the day he said he watched videotape of his team at work, but no, he said, he had not reviewed the work of his quarterbacks.

He has watched videotape of Humphries at work, however.

Saftey James Fuller, the team’s eighth-round pick, returned to San Diego Wednesday and will undergo arthroscopic knee surgery today to repair damaged cartilage.

Wide receiver Shawn Jefferson, who has been bothered by a sore hamstring, talked his way onto the practice field, but he will have a tough time convincing Ross to let him play against the Patriots Friday night.

“I don’t know if I would want him to play,” Ross said. “I’ll have to be convinced that he can go. He wanted to go today and I didn’t want to let him go and he talked me into it. You got to admire that, but we’ve got to be smart, too.”

Ross said he has become increasingly concerned with the absence of H-back Craig McEwen. McEwen has spent most of training camp on the sideline with a sore tendon in his foot and Wednesday he continued to move with a limp.

The Chargers wrapped up two days of practices with the Patriots with a two-minute challenge.

The Chargers’ offense took on the Patriots’ defense and failed to score. Quarterback Pat O’Hara was sacked twice, and on his final Hail Mary fling, his pass was intercepted.

The Charger defense failed to check the Patriot offense. New England quarterback Hugh Millen found wide receiver Greg McMurtry open for a touchdown.

The Chargers will move from their dorms on the Bryant College campus to a Providence hotel today. They will work out in Foxboro Stadium today, and then return Friday for an exhibition game with the Patriots before taking an all-night flight back to San Diego.

The Patriots, who lost 34-14 to Indianapolis in their exhibition opener, are 3 1/2-point favorites to defeat the Chargers.