Prior to their four-win debacle of a season last year, the San Diego Chargers were at least an average team, and sometimes even a slightly above average team. Skipping last year’s 4-12, the Chargers averaged a fraction more than eight wins a season the last five years, and snuck into the playoffs in 2013.

Well, GM Tom Telesco and crew must think last year’s record was an aberration because he did very little to upgrade the league’s third worst roster over the off-season. And that included failing to sign third overall pick Joey Bosa, the team’s one reward for sporting the third worst roster last year, until late in the pre-season.

The Bosa contract saga was a strange one, and after both camps publicly insisted they were the ones negotiating in good faith, it’s hard to decide who’s in the wrong. Or more in the wrong, because the whole situation is embarrassing for both. The NFL rookie wage scale, in effect since 2011 when Cam Newton’s first overall contract was two years shorter and $56 million less than Sam Bradford’s the year before, was supposed to eliminate first year contract issues. How a holdout that long happened six years in is unfathomable, and sets a bad tone for the team and player’s relationship moving forward.

Outside of the late-arriving Bosa, the Chargers’ only real additions this year were nose tackle Brandon Mebane, receiver Travis Benjamin, and safety Dwight Lowery. Of the three, Mebane could be considered the only real concrete upgrade since with Benjamin and Lowery each brought in to replace a departing player. Benjamin takes over Malcom Floyd’s role as Philip Rivers’ deep threat, while Lowery takes over Eric Weddle’s spot in the secondary. While the Chargers come out ahead swapping Floyd’s 561 yards and three touchdowns for Benjamin’s 966 yards and five touchdowns, nobody can consider the Lowery for Weddle exchange a win for San Diego.

The Chargers will benefit from one internal upgrade, so to speak, with Keenan Allen returning from injury that cost him half the season last year. Allen was on pace for 134 receptions and 1,450 receiving yards – which would have placed him in the Top 5 league-wide – at an incredible 75 percent catch rate last year.

A full season of Allen, to go along with the addition of second round tight end Hunter Henry and return of offensive coordinator Ken Whisenhunt, who helped Rivers bounce back from a couple average years when he was the team’s OC in 2013, should help the team’s offence and QB.

All that taken into consideration, the Chargers’ offence should still resemble the average unit that analytics had them pegged as last year – Football Outsiders ranked them 17th in the league last year, 2.4 percent worse than the “average” league offence – than the ninth-ranked unit traditional stats ranked them as.

Which takes us to Rivers, the team’s leader and a very good but decidedly not elite quarterback. Rivers puts up the stats, throwing for 4,792 yards and 29 touchdowns to 13 interceptions, but rarely the wins. Plus he has those two middling seasons Whisenhunt had to save him from four years ago, something truly elite QBs have missing from their resume.

Rounding out the team’s offence is sophomore running back Melvin Gordon leading the rushing attack. Even if Bosa held out the entire year, it’d still be more than last year’s first round pick, Gordon, gave the team a season ago. To be fair, Gordon’s had a promising preseason after recovering from microfracture surgery on his knee.

Switching to the other side of the ball, there is some talent on San Diego’s defence. Jason Verrett, the team’s first round pick from two seasons ago – they get some right! – is becoming one of the best cornerbacks in the league. And the team’s linebacking corps is strong with names like Manti Te’o, Denzel Perryman, and Melvin Ingram.

But while there are some bright spots on the Chargers’ roster, the team did not keep up with the other improving rosters in the AFC West this off-season (the Chiefs and Raiders), and don’t have a Super Bowl win to rest their laurels on (Broncos). For a team coming off just four wins a year ago, and without even their third overall pick to show for it, their urgency to improve was surprisingly lacking. Maybe Telesco has San Diego’s roster in the same holding pattern owner Alex Spanos has the team’s stadium situation in.