Daiyan Henley played just 53 defensive snaps as a rookie. By his second season, the 2023 third-round pick moved into the Chargers’ defensive signal-caller role as an every-down linebacker — for a defense that made a considerable leap.
The Bolts have Henley signed for 2 more seasons, and so they re-signed 2024 regulars Denzel Perryman and Troy Dye this offseason. But the interior preference could also be for those veterans to offer insurance in part-time roles. This might clear a path for a Henley-like ascent from 2024 third-round pick Junior Colson.
Playing for Jim Harbaugh and Jesse Minter at Michigan, Colson couldn’t establish himself as a rookie-year starter. He logged 218 defensive snaps, ceding time to Perryman (11 starts) and Dye (five). Colson made one start, but when he has a solid training camp, that status must be expected to alter in 12 months 2. He enters this yr’s Bolts camp because the player to look at at linebacker, per The Athletic’s Daniel Popper, who notes the ex-Wolverines cog has a path to being an impactful 2025 starter.
Harbaugh drafted two of his Wolverines last yr, adding wide receiver Cornelius Johnson in Round 7. Johnson isn’t any longer on the roster, but three years remain on Colson’s rookie contract. Although Colson didn’t prove ready as a rookie, he saw two health issues impede him. An appendectomy led to missed camp time, and an ankle injury led him to IR in the course of the season. The Chargers used an IR activation on Colson in December, and he returned to a part-time role during that stretch.
Henley’s climb from rookie afterthought — in Brandon Staley‘s abbreviated final season — to green-dot player in a yr’s time provides encouragement for a Chargers team that got plenty from an unspectacular defensive forged last season. The team giving Perryman a one-year, $2.7MM deal — ahead of his age-33 season — and keeping Dye at two years, $5.5MM don’t stand to dam Colson if he proves ready over the following several weeks (the Chargers also didn’t draft an off-ball LB this yr). The Bolts, who jumped from twenty fourth in scoring defense in Staley’s finale to first in Minter’s debut, would then have two starting LBs at rookie-scale rates.
A labrum tear didn’t disrupt Henley’s ascent last season, but the previous Nevada and Washington State ‘backer addressed the problem via offseason surgery. While a couple of Bolts landed on the energetic/PUP list to open camp, Henley was not one among them. Henley said this week he’s full go entering his third NFL camp.
Nikhil Mehta contributed to this post.