Playing the waiting game

SAN DIEGO – Two days before he’s expected to get the most extensive playing time of his rookie season, San Diego Chargers backup quarterback Philip Rivers had a pretty good reason for missing practice.

Rivers was with wife Tiffany at a hospital on New Year’s Eve, awaiting the birth of their second child.

Rivers said the baby was due Friday, two days before the AFC West champion Chargers (11-4) play host to the Kansas City Chiefs (7-8) in a game that’s meaningless except to players like Rivers, who had brief mop-up duty in one game and has yet to throw his first pro pass.

“I don’t see any reason why I won’t be there,” Rivers said by phone. “I expect to play.”

Pro Bowl quarterback Drew Brees is expected to sit out to keep him healthy for the Chargers’ playoff opener, which will be at home, most likely next Saturday. If Brees sits, 42-year-old Doug Flutie will start and Rivers will play at some point.

Coach Marty Schottenheimer, who’d like the Chargers to win even with backups playing, remained coy.

“The likelihood is that Drew will not play,” Schottenheimer said. “But don’t etch that in granite.”

Rivers has taken just six snaps this season, all at the end of a 26-point win over New Orleans on Nov. 7. He handed off three times, then took a knee three times to end it.

“I suppose there’s a certain amount of curiosity on the part of all of us” to see Rivers play, Schottenheimer said.

Flutie also has played just once, after Brees sustained a concussion in the second half of a home loss to the New York Jets on Sept. 19.