LOS ANGELES -- The Los Angeles Chargers began their venture into this market with a rallying cry. They were going to “Fight For L.A.,” a slogan that evolved into a website URL, a Twitter hashtag, eventually even a hype video. It was meant to be nothing more than a harmless marketing campaign, but it also fueled their critics and even rankled some of those employed by the neighboring Los Angeles Rams.

Only 20 months have passed, but one side clearly believes it’s over.

“Oh yeah, we won that fight,” Rams cornerback Nickell Robey-Coleman said. “That was easy.”

The Rams arrived with the benefit of history, having spent 48 prior years in the greater Los Angeles area. (The last 14 of those were spent in Anaheim, which resides in a different county altogether. But still.) They also came first, in 2016, which means they had an entire NFL-starved metropolis to themselves for 12 months.

The Rams’ surprising ascension in 2017 seemed to only solidify them as the pre-eminent professional football franchise of L.A., leaving the Chargers scrapping for crumbs. Melvin Gordon, a fourth-year running back, lamented how his Chargers “always seem to get the short end of the stick.”

“New kid on the block, man,” Gordon said, shaking his head. “New kid on the block always gotta do a little bit more. … It’s not as big of an adjustment for them as it is for us. We’ve always been San Diego Chargers for as long as I can remember. It’s tough, you know? It’s tough. People bashing us, this and that. It is what it is.”

Gordon wishes the Chargers’ stadium -- StubHub Center in Carson, which seats 27,000 -- were bigger. He wonders if tickets are too expensive, which might be pushing away the team’s true fans. And he believes -- hopes, at least -- that winning can fix it all, enough so that perhaps even the estranged San Diegans might someday support the Chargers again.

“They pissed, man, they pissed,” Gordon allowed. “But I guarantee you -- we start making that run to the Super Bowl, they not going to miss it.”

Those Super Bowl aspirations don’t seem far-fetched, for either team.

At this time three years ago, L.A. didn’t have an NFL team. Now it might have two division champions at once, a feat the New York Giants and New York Jets have not been able to pull off in five decades of sharing a market.

The Rams (54.4 percent chance) and Chargers (36 percent) each project to win their respective divisions, according to ESPN’s Football Power Index. As of Aug. 24, the Rams possessed the second-best odds to win the upcoming Super Bowl (17-2). The Chargers (16-1) ranked ninth.

A Rams-Chargers Super Bowl, in only their second year together in L.A.?

Robey-Coleman smiled at the thought.

“That would be too geeked up,” he said. “That would be too geeked up. L.A. Chargers versus the L.A. Rams? Oh my god. Hey, it could happen. It could happen.”

The similarities are striking.

The Chargers intercepted 18 passes last season and have since added standout rookie Derwin James Jr. to a loaded secondary that features Casey Hayward, Trevor Williams, Desmond King and Jahleel Addae. The Rams intercepted 18 passes last season and have since built a secondary that looks just as fierce, adding Marcus Peters and Aqib Talib to a group that includes Lamarcus Joyner, John Johnson and Robey-Coleman.

The Chargers might have the best duo of edge rushers in Joey Bosa and Melvin Ingram. The Rams might have the best duo of interior rushers in Aaron Donald and Ndamukong Suh. The Rams are loaded at receiver with Brandin Cooks, Robert Woods and Cooper Kupp. The Chargers are loaded at receiver with Keenan Allen, Mike Williams and Tyrell Williams.

The Chargers employ a future Hall of Fame quarterback in Philip Rivers, but the Rams have similar hopes for Jared Goff. The Rams have arguably the game’s best running back in Todd Gurley, but Gordon isn’t far behind.

Woods believes the Rams “have everything we need to be one of the greatest teams in the NFL,” which sounds obvious. Rivers thinks the Chargers “have a chance to be special,” and few would argue.

The Chargers won’t have Hunter Henry, the star tight end who tore his ACL in the spring. But they re-signed Antonio Gates and can make up for Henry’s production elsewhere. (Get familiar with Mike Williams and Austin Ekeler.) A bigger concern lies at kicker, where four men combined to convert an NFL-worst 66.7 percent of their field goal attempts in 2017.

An even bigger concern might be their persistent inability to win close games.

The Chargers -- 9-7 despite starting 0-4 last season -- went 7-20 in one-score games from 2015 to 2017, worse than every team except the Cleveland Browns.

“I like the talent that we have on our roster, but what head coach don’t like the talent on their roster?” Chargers coach Anthony Lynn said. “We gotta go out, we gotta do the little things, the detailed things, and we gotta not beat ourselves. Because there’s too much parity in this league to overcome certain things if you do that. So if I can get this team to continue to compete and be tough, and not beat themselves, I think we’re going to be in it. I think we’ll have a chance.”

The Rams’ only vulnerability appears to be at linebacker, where an assortment of unproven players -- namely Cory Littleton, Matt Longacre and Samson Ebukam -- must make up for the absence of Robert Quinn and Alec Ogletree. The Rams will also play a first-place schedule, complete with five prime-time games and few pushovers.

Sean McVay, the reigning Coach of the Year, has been obsessed with making sure his players remain focused on the boring details that made them so great last year. He wants them to “be where our feet are planted, be present every day” and not get caught up in the newfound hype that surrounds them.

“We certainly didn’t achieve a lot last year,” McVay said, exemplifying his mission. “But we made some improvements.”

Under McVay’s watch, the Rams became the first team in the Super Bowl era to go from last to first in scoring from one season to the next. A franchise that slugged through 10 consecutive losing seasons improved by seven wins, won the division and finished third in point differential.

Didn’t achieve a lot?

“No,” McVay said, “because it’s really more a product of how the expectations change as you go through a season. As the season built, I think the confidence built. And unfortunately the last thing that we remember is losing in the playoffs.”

That playoff game, in the wild-card round against the Atlanta Falcons, remains a vivid snapshot for Rams COO Kevin Demoff. Not because of the loss, but because of the energy that Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum provided on that Saturday night.

“I’ve talked to so many Angelenos who say it was one of the most exciting environments they’ve been in,” Demoff said. “And I think that’s where winning football, coming back to Los Angeles, whether it’s us or the Chargers, brings out that energy, that star power, that brings the city together. People talk about this being a front-runner city. I don’t think that’s true. It’s a big-event city, whether it’s award shows or premiers or big games. And you have to get to the point where you’re playing big games.”

The initial excitement that the Rams carried into L.A. fizzled quickly amid the despondency of Jeff Fisher’s 2016 offense. Their uplifting 2017 season was littered with aerial shots mocking a Coliseum that often looked half empty, the Rams’ fans apprehensive in their support until the very end.

When the Chargers announced their move in January of 2017, the headline in the Los Angeles Times read, in part: “We don’t want you.” They were ridiculed for their attempt at a new logo, dismissed for the diminutive size of their temporary stadium, forgotten after their slow start.

The Rams had a rough first season, but it was their own undoing.

The Chargers never really had a chance.

“We know it’s going to take time,” Chargers GM Tom Telesco said. “We have a big fan base that we need to build. It’s going to take a lot. It’s going to take years to build that fan base. But I think with the type of team we have, their style of play -- they play with a lot of energy, a lot of enthusiasm, they’re an exciting team. The more we win, we’ll gradually build that fan base. It’s not going to happen overnight.”

The market is at a fever pitch now. LeBron James has joined the Los Angeles Lakers. The Los Angeles Dodgers, led by Clayton Kershaw and Manny Machado, are gunning for their sixth consecutive division title. The L.A. Galaxy and LAFC have built a real soccer rivalry. Chip Kelly has brought hope to UCLA, while J.T. Daniels, a true-freshman quarterback, has injected excitement into USC.

But the Rams and Chargers, who face off in Week 3, still have a chance to carve out their space.

“I feel like we have to leave our mark, make a statement,” said Woods, an L.A. native who attended USC.

“We have a chance to put a stitch in this city,” Hayward said, “and that’s all about winning. They make room for winners. No matter what it is, we need to win.”

The greater L.A. area now houses 11 professional sports teams and two major colleges. Asked if he believes his Rams are in competition with the rest, veteran offensive lineman Rodger Saffold said: “Not necessarily, because I think that everybody supports each other.”

“Now, of course, between us and the Chargers,” Saffold continued, “that’s something completely different. You want to be that good team. When people think of L.A., you want to be that team that they think about. So that’s the only challenge, I think, for us is to continually try to outplay those Chargers.”