It’s too early for Chargers’ homecoming

SAN DIEGO -- The burning smell was back, that acrid tang that pierces your lungs and inflames your eyes.

It had fouled the air when the wildfires began but had become a mild companion during the southward drive on I-5 Sunday, diminished through the efforts of firefighters who had tamed infernos all week.

Its renewed strength near Qualcomm Stadium before the Chargers faced the Houston Texans was alarming, but there turned out to be no need to panic.

The fires had left a distinct aroma -- “It smelled kind of like wood in the fireplace,” Chargers linebacker Shawne Merriman said -- but most of the scent came from hibachis set up in the parking lot.

While the scent of broiling steaks stirred fear, while fires burned and a haze hovered over scorched hills, it was wrong to play as if it were just another Sunday.

As if the ashes falling from the sky weren’t remains of someone’s house, photo album, furniture.

As if 360,000 acres hadn’t been incinerated in the five San Diego County fires alone and an estimated half-million people hadn’t fled their homes.

As if two days before the kickoff, Qualcomm’s parking lots and hallways hadn’t sheltered 10,000 evacuees unsure whether they’d have a house to return to.

The NFL wanted this game to be played here as scheduled, not moved or postponed. Note the phrasing of a news release issued Friday by San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders:

“Early Friday morning the Chargers informed me that the NFL has decided to play Sunday’s game as scheduled at Qualcomm Stadium. The city will be able to provide sufficient public safety personnel to manage a professional football game without impeding ongoing wildfire recovery efforts.”

What if the winds had turned or a sicko arsonist had ignited another firestorm and strained the area’s already stretched defenses?

The game had to be played. The NFL said so.

Heaven forbid that its precious schedule should be disrupted.

Or that bettors should be disappointed.

The city should have designated Sunday a day of community service, asking those who escaped unscathed to help those who had lost so much.

It should have declared a day of cleanup and contemplation, time to consider how to prepare for the next time this happens -- and there will be a next time.

No, the game had to be played.

So it was, despite air quality that the San Diego Air Pollution Control District said would range from moderate to hazardous for all individuals. “A couple of us struggled a little bit,” defensive end Luis Castillo said after the Chargers romped, 35-10.

Not as much, teammate Roman Oben acknowledged, as those who lost their homes.

The crowd of 60,439 was more than 6,000 below the Chargers’ average for their first three home games; rows of empty seats were visible in the upper deck and clusters of seats were vacant in prime spots near the field.

Some fans couldn’t go. Some could but didn’t have the heart to go.

“We can afford to fly our wives and significant others back home to stay with their parents for a week. There are people that are displaced and people that have really lost everything,” Oben said. “And those are the people that you really keep in your prayers.”

The Chargers were warm-hearted. They welcomed Salvation Army volunteers, who collected more than $50,000 in their orange plastic buckets, and the family of owner Alex Spanos pledged $1 million to aid fire victims. The NFL, which last year generated $6 billion in revenue, scraped together only $250,000.

The Chargers also staged a pregame tribute to the firefighters, police officers and emergency responders who had done such selfless work. The fans responded with a standing ovation. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was on hand to praise all who had served, and they deserved every word of it.

But it felt too early in the healing process to play a game and set off fireworks and shoot off cannons.

Too soon to put cheerleaders on the sidelines in frivolous Halloween costumes as Robin Hood, French maids and Tinker Bell.

Sports can have redemptive value, and if anything good has come from this it’s the stronger connection the Chargers feel with the community.

Merriman was evacuated twice -- once from his home and again after he sought refuge with teammate Stephen Cooper. “I was just glad we got a chance to get back here, get back home,” Merriman said.

Cooper expressed gratitude to those who showed up and empathy for those who did not.

“We know it’s been a tough week for a lot of people,” he said. “A lot of people had to leave town and lost houses. We know they’re still supporting us if they’re here or not here.”

Castillo said playing the game was the right thing to do because “people wanted their team here and they wanted us to play great, and give all the credit in the world to them for them to come out and give us the support they did today.”

If only they hadn’t had to forge that bond by fire.

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Helene Elliott can be reached at helene.elliott@latimes.com. To read previous columns by Elliott, go to latimes.com/elliott.