Chargers GM Joe Hortiz discusses Keenan Allen decision: 'I knew who I was trading'

New Los Angeles Chargers general manager Joe Hortiz’s first massive decision came early in his tenure: to trade longtime great Keenan Allen to Chicago for a fourth-round draft pick.

Hortiz said Thursday that he didn’t love parting with the player, but financials forced a hard decision.

“Yeah, I knew who I was trading,” Hortiz said, via the team’s official website. “He’s a very talented player and I respect him as a player, as a person. It’s difficult when you have to cut a player, trade a player, release a player.

“It’s always difficult for a player like him certainly, but it creates an opportunity for other players to step up,” Hortiz continued. “Again, we’re not done building that room out so we’re going to look to continue to add pieces to that room.”

Hortiz said the club approached Allen and his reps with “multiple different options,” including an extension, but noted “just none of them worked out.”

“I think when you’re talking about trading Keenan specifically, yeah that’s not a decision you make with no acknowledgment of, ‘This is a talented player that can still compete,'” Hortiz added.

Allen’s agent later responded on social media, saying, “Only one offer was made. It was a pay cut for 2024 with a two-year extension (and both years had even deeper cuts to his current pay). We made a counter offer. It was rejected. Then we were informed of the Chargers intention to trade (Allen).”

The situation feels very “this is business in the NFL.”

Both sides wanted to remain paired. But the new Chargers brass desired to get the books in order, and Allen, coming off the best statistical season of his career, had no desire to take a pay cut at 32 years old. Neither is unjustified in their position. Business is business.

The GM isn’t fretting about the thin WR room. With the draft still ahead, the Chargers have a chance to add to a corps headlined by Quentin Johnston and Josh Palmer.

For Hortiz, getting the books in order was his main task this season after the Chargers’ top-heavy roster floundered.

L.A. had four massive contracts for aging veterans that needed to be dealt with: receivers Allen and Mike Williams and edge rushers Joey Bosa and Khalil Mack. Bosa and Mack wound up taking pay cuts. Allen was traded, and Williams was cut, eventually signing with the New York Jets.

“We had four great players with great contracts in terms of great volume, great money,” Hortiz said. “We had to address that and we approached it in the sense of we respect all four players, value all four players and know that all four players can help us win.

“But the reality of it is, given the cap and the situation that we’re in, the likelihood of all four players coming back and us being able to build depth and a complete team, that wasn’t a realistic end result. We were going to have to make moves, and we weren’t locked in to any two players throughout the process.”

Hortiz’s philosophy clearly isn’t to charge the company credit card and kick the salary-cap can down the road much. As such, expect the Chargers to be deliberate in free agency under his watch.

“You can keep punting money but then you hurt your depth, you hurt your depth for signing quality depth pieces,” Hortiz said. “And you hurt your flexibility going forward. Our goal is to be as flexible as we can every year. We’ve got a quarterback that makes a lot of money and that’s why you have to be cap conscious.

“It’s fun to go all in one year. … I’d like to be all in every year. … I want to have a chance to compete for Super Bowls every year.”

With the Chargers taking their lumps in 2024, the new staff under Jim Harbaugh will have to do yeoman’s work to compete for a Super Bowl this season.