It was a little easy to miss it in the chaos of final cuts, waiver wire action and practice squad additions, but the Los Angeles Chargers moved a pretty big name to injured reserve this week. 

And with Denzel Perryman going to injured reserve to start the season, the transition to defensive coordinator Chris O’Leary loses a leader and gets just a little bit more complicated for Week 1. 

After all, there’s no clear-cut starter to take Perryman’s place on a depth chart that didn’t do much to add new faces at what seemed like a pretty straightforward spot in the middle of the defense. 

That’s not to say this is an emergency situation like the alarm bells that keep ringing about the offensive line in front of Justin Herbert. But it’s hard to compare to that why didn’t they do more? situation, obviously. 

Denzel Perryman injury analysis

Getting up there in age and on one-year contracts or not, Perryman is still an important piece. Over 10 appearances last year, Perryman played about 52 percent of the Chargers’ defensive snaps. 

Perryman will now miss at least four games, though comments from head coach Jim Harbaugh kept the return timeline ideas very open. 

"I know it will be a minimum of four games," Harbaugh said, according to Eric Smith of Chargers.com. "I don't know if it will take that long. Close to it, it depends on the rehab and things. I don't think it will be too much longer than that though." 

Harbaugh also has no plans about naming a starter next to Daiyan Henley. 

"Not naming a starter today, but Del'Shawn, Troy, ton of confidence in them and Marlowe and also Junior and Lander," Harbaugh said, per Smith. "We feel like we got a good, deep group there."

Clearly, the Chargers have options: 

• Troy Dye
• Del'Shawn Phillips
• Marlowe Wax

The Chargers also have two names on the practice squad they can call up for depth over the first month of the season: 

• Junior Colson
• Lander Barton

Troy Dye has filled in admirably in the past when injury hit the linebacker core. Del'Shawn Phillips is such a fantastic presence on special teams that there is always a chance the coaches won’t want to expose him to additional wear and tear on the base defense often. 

Former undrafted standout Marlowe Wax could always use the situation as a sort of audition during the regular season, too. The way he has knocked aside other projects like Junior Colson has made him undeniable and perhaps an actual threat to develop into a starter. 

Regardless, the stability the Chargers wanted when bringing back Perryman for yet another season is now lost for an unknown amount of time and outsiders won’t start to get answers about how the team deals with it until next week.

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