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Chargers Bet on a Healthy Jalyn Armour-Davis to Steady a Winless Season
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- Chargers Bet on a Healthy Jalyn Armour-Davis to Steady a Winless Season
(USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect)
The Los Angeles Chargers came out of Sunday's 24-9 loss to the Rams still the only winless team in the NFL, and by Monday morning general manager Joe Hortiz had made a move.
The Chargers are signing cornerback Jalyn Armour-Davis, a 27-year-old former Alabama standout who has spent the last 11 months rehabbing a torn Achilles and who, by all accounts, is finally healthy enough to play again.
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It's a low-risk signing for a team that badly needs some good news, and Hortiz knows the player better than most. He was in Baltimore's front office when the Ravens took Armour-Davis in the fourth round of the 2022 draft, 119th overall.
That history likely helped the Chargers feel comfortable bringing him in for a workout on October 13, a week after he worked out for the Buffalo Bills, and it clearly helped seal the deal once the medical picture came into focus.
From Developmental Prospect to Titans Starter
He's 6-foot-1, ran a 4.39 in the 40-yard dash, and came out of a Nick Saban secondary where he started for one full season in 2021, picking off three passes and breaking up seven more.
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He was also seen as a developmental prospect, which is rare for an Alabama corner, and injuries made that development hard to come by in Baltimore.
Across three seasons with the Ravens, he appeared in just 19 games with three starts. He ended two of those seasons on injured reserve, so his release during final cuts in 2025 surprised people, especially since it came right after the best training camp and preseason of his career.
The Titans claimed him off waivers and handed him a real role, and Armour-Davis responded with the most productive year of his career, starting 10 of the 11 games he played and recording 34 tackles, a tackle for loss, and two pass breakups.
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In 2025 alone, he passed what he had done in his entire Baltimore career. Then, in Week 17 against the New Orleans Saints, his Achilles gave out, and his breakout season ended early.
What the Chargers Can Learn Down the Stretch
That injury is the big unknown in the future. Achilles recoveries are notoriously unforgiving for cornerbacks, whose jobs depend on burst, change of direction, and the ability to recover when a receiver gets a step.
If Armour-Davis has kept even most of the speed that made him intriguing coming out of Tuscaloosa, the Chargers will have added a long, experienced outside corner for close to nothing. If he hasn't, they will have lost very little in finding out.
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With a 0-7 record and the second half of the season ahead, the Chargers have every reason to look at players who could still be part of their plans next year.
A string of late-season starts would give Armour-Davis a chance to prove that the Titans version of him is the real one, and it would give Hortiz useful information on a corner he has believed in since draft day.
For a franchise searching for answers, a reunion with a familiar face is a sensible place to start.
