Tom Krasovic: Bobby Beathard and Bobby Ross would have admired these Chargers

Much like for opponents of the Bobby Ross-coached San Diego Chargers team that reached the Super Bowl, it can’t be much fun to play Jim Harbaugh’s Los Angeles Chargers.

They hit hard, especially on defense.

Their offense shortens the game, keeping the team’s defense fresh.

Above all, Harbaugh’s players relish collisions – be they defenders or within an offense that likes to run a 296-pound defensive tackle at fullback and increasingly lines up a third blocking tackle.

Bobby Beathard would’ve admired Harbaugh’s team.

Soon after San Diego Chargers owner Alex Spanos got over his own ego and paid up to hire him as the general manager, Beathard began to build upon ex-Raiders talent man Steve Ortmayer’s effort to build an AFC team that could bludgeon the likes of the Steelers, Raiders and Broncos.

Beathard hired Ross, drafted Junior Seau and got quarterback Stan Humphries from Beathard’s former team, Washington, for a third-round draft pick. For receiver Tony Martin, he sent a fourth-round chip to Miami, which won Super Bowls with players Beathard recommended as a scout.

Natrone Means was another Beathard acquisition, via the draft.

The brutality Means both dished out, and endured, shortened his career.

But with the 245-pound, second-year running back pounding away in most games, Ross’ third San Diego club powered its way to the Super Bowl.

The victory at Pittsburgh’s Three Rivers Stadium in the AFC title game owed mostly to San Diego’s slight edge in ruggedness and an almost masochistic endurance against one of the NFL’s hardnosed franchises.

On the unforgiving fake-grass field, the two teams slammed into each other at a ferocious pace – both defenses allowing only 66 rushing yards on some 25 carries.

Seau had 16 tackles. Teammates Chris Mims and Darren Carrington each forced a fumble. Linebacker Dennis Gibson broke up Pittsburgh’s final pass, clinching the win.

Humphries, making the signature play of his career and perhaps San Diego’s Super Bowl season, displayed the grit that endeared him to teammates.

Knowing he’d take a straight-on hit from Kevin Greene, a Hall of Fame linebacker who charged at him unblocked, the 29-year-old, pocket-bound QB got off a perfect deep ball to Martin before Greene staggered him with a blow to the head.

Martin’s 43-yard reception went for a go-ahead touchdown in the fourth quarter.

But it wasn’t the Chargers’ lone scoring reception of 43 yards.

Running free after a Humphries’ fake handoff to Means suckered two Steelers defenders, tight end Alfred Pupunu pulled San Diego within four points with his third-quarter reception.

Beathard and Ross coveted forceful tight ends, leading Beathard to sign the 260-pound Pupunu. The Weber State alum, a native of Tonga, had become available when the Kansas City Chiefs cut him as a rookie in 1992.

The touchdown at Pittsburgh was Pupunu’s first in the NFL, a span of 47 games.

He was prepared for it.

The Polynesian went into an end-zone celebration. Using the football as a make-believe coconut, he faked the drinking of a juice known as kava. “It was to honor my homeland,” Pupunu told Tampa Bay Times columnist Hubert Mizell a week-plus later.

Unfortunately for Ross’ team, its Super Bowl opponent was a San Francisco 49ers team led by Hall of Famers in quarterback Steve Young, receiver Jerry Rice and cornerback Deion Sanders. The 49ers matched Seau and Co’ physicality but also asserted their mastery at quarterback, receiver and within the West Coast offense coordinated by Mike Shanahan, a future winner of two Super Bowls as Denver’s head coach. Since that blowout, in which Seau’s and teammates’ initial reads were often used against them, the franchise hasn’t returned to the Super Bowl.

Yet the comparison between Harbaugh’s team and Ross’ best San Diego team must be limited to basic traits — toughness, play strength, physicality and success at complementary work among each team’s three units.

While those staples decide games in this era, too, the game is officiated much differently now.

NFL teams today are far more apt to go for it on fourth down and pass to get the game’s first lead. Altering tactics further, field goals of 50 yards have become free throws for kickers.

At quarterback, Justin Herbert’s unique set of traits discards comparisons to any Chargers era.

Simply, no San Diego team employed a quarterback who came close to matching Herbert’s bundle of size, speed, agility and arm strength.

Beathard and Seau, for sure, would’ve appreciated Herbert’s toughness.

Beathard set a high bar at coach. He hired Joe Gibbs to his first head coaching job, bringing him to Washington in 1981, following Gibbs’ two seasons with the Air Coryell Chargers.

The two men helped to lead Washington to three Super Bowl wins with three different QBs.

Have no doubt: Beathard would be impressed by Harbaugh’s two-year performance with the Chargers, and safeties Derwin James and Tony Jefferson would’ve been two of his favorites on this team.