Panthers Chargers Football
Returning Chargers LB Shawne Merriman is coming back to the playing field in 2009, and feels that he’s got something to prove. Merriman recently was dumped to 12th on a list of the league’s top linebackers, and told Charles Robinson of Yahoo! Sports that he’s going to take it out on teams this year.

“I was pissed off,” Merriman recently told Charles Robinson of Yahoo! Sports. “I’m sitting there like, ‘Hold on, there are 11 guys in the league better than me? When did this happen?’ I know I didn’t play for a year, but I didn’t know I had that much of a drop-off. . . .

“People haven’t seen the best of me, not at all. In the past, I would tell someone, ‘I’m about to go out and just kill it this year.’ Now, I want people to just watch. I had enough doubters around before, and some people felt like I was just talking [trash] or just talking too much. My thing is, now I’m just talking about what I’ve done and what I’m doing right now, not about what I’m going to do.”

Merriman is coming back after he missed just about all of 2008 after undergoing surgery to repair the lateral collateral and posterior cruciate ligaments in his left knee. Two years ago he had 12.5 sacks in 15 games, and three years ago he was in on 17 sacks in 12 games.

The Chargers have no problem if Merriman is unhappy about the ranking, they’d like to see him play out that frustration on the field.