Chargers OC Greg Roman calls Justin Herbert's 2025 season "Career-Defining"

EL SEGUNDO, Calif. — With one game left in the regular season, the Chargers will get a brief glimpse of life without Justin Herbert.

Herbert won’t suit up Sunday as Trey Lance is set to start the finale, a calculated pause designed to protect the franchise quarterback as he prepares for the Wild Card round the following weekend. It’s a rare quiet moment for Herbert after a season defined by endurance, toughness, and leadership — the kind that doesn’t always show up on a stat sheet but is felt throughout an entire building.

Simply put, the Chargers are not in this position without him.

Herbert spent the year navigating an offensive line that seemed to reshuffle weekly, skill players who cycled in and out of the lineup, and a schedule that offered little margin for error. Yet the result is an 11–5 record and a playoff berth — something that felt far from guaranteed at several points along the way.

Chargers offensive coordinator Greg Roman didn’t hesitate when asked how he views Herbert’s season.

“To me, it was an MVP season with all the attrition we had and what he’s been able to do to lead the team to a playoff berth,” Roman said.

Roman continued to give Herbert his flowers, emphasizing not just the physical traits, but the mental resilience that defined the year.

“Just the way he has gutted through and found a way and will it to victory,” Roman said. “His ability to navigate through that with a steel mind and not blink, not for one second… It’s a career-defining type of year.”

Those words carry weight coming from a coach who has seen plenty of quarterbacks. Herbert didn’t just survive the chaos — he stabilized it. Every week, no matter the circumstances, the Chargers believed they had a chance because No. 10 was under center.

While Herbert has been the engine, he hasn’t been alone in his growth. Left guard Zion Johnson quietly put together a breakout season of his own, becoming a tone-setter up front.

“I think it’s marked,” Roman said of Johnson’s improvement. “He just exudes energy — he’s like the energizer bunny. All that devotion on his part has paid off. I think he’s playing the best football of his career.”

That progress hasn’t always been linear for the offense, and Roman was candid about his own role in the team’s slow start against Houston last week.

“I gotta do a better job there,” he admitted. “I might’ve done some things differently. I felt like we were kinda tripping over ourselves early in the game.”

The Chargers corrected those issues — and that’s been the story of the second half of the season.

Coming out of the bye week, the team rattled off four straight wins, something defensive coordinator Jesse Minter pointed out Thursday morning at The Bolt. Around the league, few believed the Chargers could pull it off. Inside the locker room, there was no doubt.

“At the BYE week, I don’t think a lot of people saw us winning the next four games,” Minter said. “We’ve proven to ourselves that we can play really well against anybody.”

That belief was amplified last week at SoFi Stadium. For the first time since the Chargers moved in, it truly felt like a home-field advantage — a sea of powder blue that drowned out the opposition.

Even Minter noticed.

“Great showing by the fans,” he said. “The guys felt the momentum.”

That energy translated directly to the field, fueling a dominant second-half defensive performance and reinforcing the sense that something has shifted with this team — not just in wins and losses, but in identity.

Now, with one more practice remaining before the regular season comes to a close, the Chargers will take the field Sunday with Trey Lance at quarterback and their eyes firmly on what comes next. By Sunday night, they’ll know who they’ll face in the Wild Card round.

Justin Herbert will be watching, resting, and preparing — exactly where the Chargers want him as they head into January, built on a season that proved just how valuable he truly is.