EL SEGUNDO — It’s a daily balancing act, no question, a daily work-life balancing act that makes Chargers outside linebacker Khalil Mack very much like the average 35-year-old attempting to be the best father and spouse possible while also trying to maintain a lofty status as a reliable and productive employee.
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It’s not easy.
It’s why Mack acknowledged Thursday, on the second day of training camp, that he’s thought of retiring and devoting himself fully to his family. He has managed over 13 seasons in the NFL, including the past five with the Chargers, to juggle his private and professional lives.
It might have been easy to walk away after the 2025 season, after nine Pro Bowl selections and a Hall of Fame-caliber career, after being named the NFL Defensive Player of the Year in 2016, after having tormented so many quarterbacks with his relentless pass-rushing ability over so many games over so many seasons.
One thing brought him back to the Chargers for this season, though.
“I want to win a championship,” he said.
Mack is 0-6 in playoff games in his career, including 0-3 with the Chargers.
It stings. How could it not?
So, the upcoming season represents another opportunity for Mack to win. He signed a one-season contract with the Chargers worth a guaranteed $18 million, similar to the deal he and the team reached the previous offseason as well. He was willing to continue his work-life balancing act for another season.
“I was leaning toward coming back the whole time,” Mack said. “It’s considering this stage of life, my kids, you know what I mean? It’s that balance of being a dad and a husband and still trying to follow your dreams. You know what I mean? I still don’t feel like I’m in a position to do both. I still spend time with my kids and my wife, but that’s the balance of football. I feel like you still get to spend time, but it takes time to figure that part out, you know what I’m saying?
“So, yeah, I don’t want to give up on my dream.”
So many of Mack’s friends and rivals have abandoned the game to focus on other things, including family. Mack only needs to look around the practice field or the locker room to see how many young players have replaced the ones who he once knew all those years ago. He is the elder statesman.
It’s not necessarily a new role, but it’s one he’s come to embrace more fully.
No question, it’s one the Chargers have embraced, too.
“Priceless, priceless,” Chargers defensive coordinator Chris O’Leary said when asked what it meant to have Mack back in the fold for another season. “I’ve said it before, but he’s the flag-bearer of our culture on defense. He leads the way with his actions. When it’s time for him to say something, he’ll say something.
“You’ve got a group of young edge rushers in that room that all they’re doing is watching everything he does and listening to everything he says. So, it’s more valuable than anything I could say or do. So, having him here is priceless.”
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For example, two years ago, when then-rookie cornerback Tarheeb Still said goodbye after a workout on a Thursday during the offseason, Mack asked why Still wasn’t coming in on Friday. Still showed up the next day, and by Mack’s reckoning hasn’t missed a Friday ever since.
For another, offensive lineman Joe Alt went to Mack repeatedly for advice and counsel during his rookie training camp after the Chargers picked him fifth overall in the 2024 draft. Mack was eager to give up his secrets and Alt became a Pro Bowl pick after the ’25 season despite a season-ending injury.
For one more, edge rusher Akheem Mesidor said not long after the Chargers made him the 22nd pick in the draft this past April that he intended to quiz Mack in order to learn all he could about being a pro football player on and off the field. Again, Mack was only too happy to oblige.
“Just trying to pick his brain as much as possible,” Mesidor said in April.
And so it goes for Mack. He could still recall who assisted him as a rookie with the then-Oakland Raiders, who answered his questions after he had been drafted fifth overall from the University of Buffalo in 2014, who helped guide him to the remarkable career he has had since then.
Charles Woodson was one of them, a Hall of Fame defensive back after 18 years in the NFL, including 11 with the Raiders.
“Just having those voices on the field and off the field with advice, just having those examples around me early on, it was the catalyst for my career,” Mack said. “I had them to lean on and I was very fortunate to have those guys early on and sprinkled in the world … and pretty soon I was probably the oldest guy on the team.”
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