Jim Harbaugh Still Can’t Stop Praising Mike McDaniel as Chargers Camp Rolls On

Jim Harbaugh isn’t cooling off on Mike McDaniel. Six months after hiring him, the Los Angeles Chargers coach is still talking about his offensive coordinator like he just won the lottery.

Harbaugh hired McDaniel in late January, days after McDaniel was fired as head coach of the Miami Dolphins. The Chargers haven’t advanced past the wild-card round since 2018, and Harbaugh went looking for a spark. He found one in McDaniel, whose reputation as one of football’s sharpest offensive minds made him a hot name across the league’s coaching carousel that cycle.

Speaking with Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer, Harbaugh described exactly how fast he came around on McDaniel, even without a prior relationship.

“I like him. I like him, and I didn’t know him. I’d never really met him or talked to him, but it’s like, ‘That guy’s going to have to prove to me that I don’t like him.’ That was my initial impression. And, ‘Wait, he’s available? Wow, let’s swing for the fences here,'” Harbaugh said.

He didn’t stop there. “This was a year where eight or nine, some of the top offensive minds and play-callers, you’re looking at it, like, ‘Oh, they’re all available?’ But he was at the top of the list. I love him. I don’t just like him. I love him,” Harbaugh added, according to Breer’s reporting.

That enthusiasm hasn’t faded with time. Asked in the spring what the two months working alongside McDaniel had been like, Harbaugh kept it simple, telling reporters, “Awesome. Awesome with a capital A,” per NBC Sports.

Why Harbaugh Made the Leap on McDaniel

McDaniel, 43, spent four seasons running the Dolphins and finished 35-33 in the regular season, with back-to-back playoff appearances early on before Miami’s offense slid the last two years. He’s a product of the Kyle Shanahan coaching tree, built on wide zone running, pre-snap motion and getting the ball out fast — a sharp departure from Greg Roman’s system, which Harbaugh scrapped after Los Angeles managed just three points in a 16-3 wild-card loss to the Patriots.

Harbaugh has pointed specifically to pass protection as the reason the fit works for quarterback Justin Herbert, who absorbed 54 sacks in 2025, the second-highest total in the league. “It’s probably two ways. One, it’s just less … dropback protection. Straight dropback protection, the defensive line can transition into pass rush immediately,” Harbaugh explained, describing how McDaniel ties the run and pass game together through play action so defenders hesitate for a beat before committing.

He connected that idea directly to Herbert’s game: “Justin’s accuracy, Mike’s vision of football and timing, and receivers out of the break? That’s Justin.”

Training Camp Is Backing Up the Talk

The early returns have matched the hype. At training camp in San Diego this month, McDaniel said Herbert’s grasp of the new offense has exceeded what he expected. “He’s really progressing as fast as one could even picture, much faster than I was planning for,” McDaniel told reporters.

McDaniel has installed a shotgun-heavy look and pushed Herbert to take more calculated risks in practice, reasoning that it’s better for the quarterback to find his limits now than in September. ESPN’s camp coverage noted Herbert has looked comfortable and on-time with his reads through the opening week of padded practices, including a connection with rookie receiver Brenen Thompson that had Herbert raving afterward. “He’s gonna be very good. We saw it early on that he was gonna be,” Herbert said of the rookie. “He’s skilled.”

The Bolts also returned to the University of San Diego — Harbaugh’s old stomping ground — for a pair of camp practices in front of packed crowds, a stop that’s become something of an annual homecoming. “Blessed is the word that I can come up with because there’s no word better than blessed,” Harbaugh said of the trip, according to FOX Sports.

What It Means for the Roster

McDaniel’s fingerprints extend beyond Herbert. He’s pushed running back Omarion Hampton to attack the line with more urgency in the run scheme, and both tackles — Rashawn Slater, who tore his patellar tendon in last year’s camp, and Joe Alt, who missed 11 games with an ankle injury — are back healthy and expected to anchor a retooled offensive line that also added center Tyler Biadasz in free agency.

The Bottom Line

None of this guarantees results once games count. McDaniel went 0-2 in the playoffs at Miami, and adapting a run-heavy, timing-based scheme to a new roster in one offseason is no small task. But for a Chargers team that’s lost in the wild-card round in each of Harbaugh’s first two seasons, the early chemistry between its coach, coordinator and quarterback is exactly what they were missing. The Bolts open the regular season Sept. 5 against the Kansas City Chiefs.