With a glove on his surgically repaired left hand and his team’s fortunes in his right, Justin Herbert soldiered through 67 minutes and 25 seconds of football.
Herbert withstood not just the pain in his broken hand, but a beating delivered by a ferocious Philadelphia Eagles pass rush.
Weathering a career-high seven sacks, Herbert piloted his Chargers to a 22-19 overtime triumph, captaining a game-tying fourth-quarter drive and a game-winning drive in OT with one hand and two fleet feet on Monday night.
"He had surgery a week ago and out here tonight,” Chargers head coach Jim Harbaugh exclaimed of Herbert, who was left with a bloodied left elbow, as well. “It felt like I was in a movie where the quarterback’s doing these things and you get to the point where you go, ‘OK, this is getting a little unrealistic.’ You know? That’s what it felt like to me. He refuses to lose. He’s as tough as they get. He’s a superhero quarterback.”
Statistically speaking, stellar stat lines were difficult to find on either team and Herbert was hardly super when it came to the numbers.
He was 12 of 26 (career-low 46.2%) for 139 yards with a touchdown, an interception and a 59.6 QB rating -- the lowest in a win in his career. He also rushed for a season-high 66 yards on 10 attempts. Somehow, Herbert stood up to a 68.3% pressure rate -- the third-highest in a game in the Next Gen Stats era (since 2016).
“It’s all about winning and that’s job No. 1,” Herbert said about how the stats played out. “Obviously, there’s a lot of plays I’d like to clean up.”
Herbert broke his hand during his team’s Week 13 Sunday win over the Las Vegas Raiders. He underwent surgery the following Monday. Though it wasn’t reported until just before inactives were released Monday that Herbert would be active, the Oregon product said he knew he would play long before.
“Probably Sunday of last week,” he smiled when asked when he knew for certain if he’d play.
For Herbert, who’s shockingly now 2-0 with his broken hand and 3-0 in games when he’s taken six-plus sacks, making the decision to play with a busted left hand wasn’t much of a decision at all.
“Honestly, I just think about the guys in that locker room, and they do it for us,” he said. “There have been multiple guys, I think Troy Dye and Elijah Molden broke their hands and I think they were playing the next week, too. They probably don’t get enough credit for that. Just because I’m the quarterback, I get the talk about that but those guys, they battle and there are so many guys in that locker room that are fighting through so many different injuries and things worse than what I’m going through. So, it’s the least that I can do is show up and give my best effort for them.”
It took little time Monday for Herbert to show he was up to the task of leading the Chargers despite being essentially a one-handed QB. He moved L.A. 80 yards on six plays in just 2:49 on the opening drive, hitting Kimani Vidal on a dump-off, with the running back screaming down the sideline for a 60-yard gain. A few plays later, Herbert hit the returning Omarion Hampton for a 4-yard touchdown.
Unfortunately, that was the Chargers’ last trip to the end zone. They relied on five field goals from Cameron Dicker and a lights-out defense -- along with Herbert willing them forward.
Vidal had just the one catch for 60 yards -- which stood as a team high. Second behind him was leading receiver Keenan Allen with a modest three catches for 22 yards.
In a chaotic Week 14 finale that featured eight combined turnovers and saw the victorious team muster just 275 yards of offense, Herbert and Co. were trailing, 19-16, with 2:16 left when they took over on their 28-yard line.
Herbert drove the Chargers 43 yards in 11 plays to set up a Dicker 46-yard game-tying field goal. He had three carries for 20 yards on the march.
L.A. took the ball to open overtime and Herbert was more than game, opening with a 12-yard scramble around right tackle in which he stunningly stiff-armed Reed Blankenship with his broken hand.
“He’s a superhero. He’s a competitive maniac,” Harbaugh said. “He was even stiff-arming guys with a broken hand.”
Said Herbert of the feat: “At that point, it was probably just instinctual.”
Instincts, grit and fortitude saw Herbert march the Bolts 34 yards in six plays to set up Dicker’s final field goal, a 54-yarder.
Safety Tony Jefferson then intercepted Jalen Hurts to secure the win, as the L.A. defense truly was the catalyst.
It was the one-handed QB who was the hero on Monday night, however.