Bobby Beathard

Bad omen: The Chargers' 1991 pocket schedules have a handsome picture of Marion Butts on the cover. So who did you expect? Dan Henning? Billy Joe Tolliver? Galand Thaxton? Who? Welcome to training camp, and this year's UC San Diego-based exercise in preparing the Chargers for anything other than a 6-10 finish. "I wouldn't be real happy with 6-10 this year," Henning said. "But I'm not going to make any predictions. I just think we have a better football team than the first two I had here."

In the coming days Bobby Beathard will get a Wizard of Oz-like call from tackle Jimmy Laister, the Chargers' seventh-round pick. Laister said he's still not sure if he has the heart to play football, but he wants to consult with Beathard about possibly rejoining the Chargers. "I don't want to say anything until I talk to Bobby Beathard," Laister said. "But if they wanted me the first time, then they should want me again, right? "If they say, no, then I'll just have to live with it.

It was draft-day business as usual for Bobby Beathard, so strap on the seat belt. More in a moment, however, on the defensive tackle who requires blood pressure medication, some guy named Yancey Thigpen and the trading of the Chargers' first-round pick in 1992 to Washington for the right to select the 20th player in second round Sunday. Beathard corraled "The Sheriff."

Bobby Beathard, Charger general manager, and outside linebacker Leslie O'Neal had a 30-minute meeting Wednesday, but talk was cheap. A new contract wasn't discussed. "We just sat around and talked," said O'Neal, a 20-day holdout. "I've seen him once before, so this is the second time we've really even talked to each other. "Sometimes you have to go out and make an extra effort so somebody can know a little bit about you as a person, and they can feel comfortable dealing with your situation."

Early reports from the Chargers' training camp at UCSD would lead me to believe that this team is coming off a Super Bowl season. No, I don't get this impression from anything happening at the training camp. This conclusion is reached because of the number of players who are not in camp. As Tuesday dawned, Bobby Beathard, the new general manager, had to be astounded that nine players were missing because of contractual disagreements. Nine players?

Monday afternoon. First full day of the Chargers' mini-camp. Sun beating down on Mission Valley. Uncomfortable? Hardly. A breeze wafting from the ocean kept the air fresh and warm rather than hot and stifling. How appropriate. The Chargers' little corner of Mission Valley has been awash in fresh air lately. This is literally and figuratively the springtime of The Bobby Beathard Era as general manager.

Bobby Beathard, the Chargers' general manager, finds himself in such an unusual position today that he almost doesn't know how to act. Beathard has a first-round pick in the NFL draft--and likely will use it. The last time he did that was in 1983, when he was the general manager of the Washington Redskins. He selected cornerback Darrell Green with the final pick of the round. This time, the pick is the fifth overall, a lofty position Beathard never enjoyed with the Redskins.

The Charger careers of offensive tackle James FitzPatrick, cornerback Elvis Patterson and linebacker Jim Collins apparently have come to an end. The three are among 17 players left unprotected by the Chargers in the NFL's Plan B limited free-agent program. And General Manager Bobby Beathard said they are not wanted back. "We figured we would be better without them," Beathard said Friday after the Chargers released a list of 37 players they had protected under the program.

To find proof of the value of the National Football League's limited free-agent program, known as Plan B, look no further than today's Super Bowl. Both the Denver Broncos and the San Francisco 49ers have on-the-field results to show for off-season ventures into the Plan B pool. Nine players joined the teams during the first year of the program in 1989. Two--defensive end Alphonso Carreker and cornerback Wymon Henderson--will start for the Broncos.

It seems to me . . . There is no doubt Bobby Beathard, who discovered that the surfing is better on the Pacific than the Potomac, is firmly in control as the Chargers' new general manager. Dan Henning, the incumbent coach, seemed quite satisfied with Larry Beightol, his incumbent offensive line coach. Beightol, in fact, was listed in the media guide as offensive coordinator as well, though this seemed gratuitous in that Henning himself better fit the description.