Some Kelly Talk
Posted: December 16th, 2013 | Author: Tommy Lawlor | Filed under: Philadelphia Eagles | 53 Comments »I just got done watching Chip Kelly’s day after press conference. You can go check it out on PE.com if you like.
Kelly was asked about the Texas rumors. He said he’s not going anywhere. I wrote the other day that I don’t see Texas as a good fit for him. I also think Kelly likes the NFL. No academics. No recruiting. Just football 24/7. Kelly is a terrific coach and his college background is going to mean that his name will be mentioned for every major opening. This might die out in a few years, but we’ll have to live with it for a while.
In a way, that’s good news. You want to have a coach that others covet. I don’t recall Texas boosters getting fired up for Rich Kotite.
Kelly did an 18-minute PC. He stood there and covered everything the media brought up. That isn’t to say he always gave them lengthy, insightful answers. No coach does that.
He was asked about potentially resting starters if Dallas wins on Sunday afternoon. A Dallas win would render the Bears game meaningless in terms of the division race. Everything would then hinge on the season finale. Kelly said he would not rest players. He thinks the Eagles need to keep getting better.
The Eagles can still get the #3 seed so winning on Sunday night is important in that respect.
Kelly didn’t get into any excuses for the loss. He focused on trying to identify what went wrong and then fixing those issues. I loved what he said in reference to players griping about calls. I don’t remember the exact words, but he pointed out that the officials aren’t going to change the call so why go on and on complaining. Wasted energy.
When asked about the defense, Kelly brought up the need to cover tighter in zone and the need to tackle better. I wrote prior to the game that RAC yards were a concern. That turned out to be a problem. The coaches will work on this, but they have limited resources. It would help if Earl Wolff would come back this week. We won’t know about that til late in the week.
Maybe the most interesting thing to me was Kelly talking about his mentality as being a favorite/underdog. He doesn’t pay attention to that stuff. Kelly believes a team needs to focus on itself, not outside perceptions of it. Kelly’s biggest challenge is getting the Eagles to think like him and then act the way he wants them to.
Kelly is trying to get the Eagles to be consistently excellent. You play to a standard, not your specific opponent. You never expect to achieve perfection, but that is always the target you are working toward. Think of it this way. If DeSean Jackson beats Riley Cooper and Jason Avant in a race, that’s not a big deal. He could beat them easily and only run a 4.45. The result might look impressive, but it wouldn’t be since Jackson isn’t running as fast as he can. Jackson needs to run his fastest to truly be happy with the result.
A lot of coaches talk about this kind of stuff, but Kelly is one of the few who I think really pushes it aggressively. To steal a Bill Parcells phrase, I think too many coaches let good enough be good enough. Kelly isn’t one of them.
I really am curious to see what this team is like in a couple of years.
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There’s a lot of things wrong with the 2013 Philadelphia Eagles.
Chip Kelly isn’t one of them.
I agree, but there is no denying that he has made many mistakes on game day. Hopefully, he will learn, and not repeat the same mistakes year after year.
Tommy, you better hope Chip doesn’t read your blog. He would slap the crap out of you for that last sentence. Win the day! 😉
I think the biggest ‘compliment’ I can give Chip is that I’ve paid little attention to draft prospects so far. The last few years I’ve spent November and December watching college tape and trying to figure out who I’d like the team to bring in to fix stuff. This year is different. Firstly we’ve still got meaningful football to watch, which helps, but secondly I finally have faith that the team scouts know better than I do. Previously I’d look at a pick and be like ‘oh, that was dumb’, but after hitting on Logan and Wolff deeper into last year’s draft I’m taking a more ‘let’s see who we get and then learn about him after’ approach.
Yeah, no interest in next years draft class yet.
With the Ravens’ win, looks like the week 17 SNF game will be either Packers – Bears, Ravens – Bengals, or Eagles – Cowboys.
dont think a team can get picked 2 weeks in a row= rules us out
Haven’t seen anything to suggest two flex games in a row is against NFL’s rules. Looks like the league has complete control over who gets that slot, depending entirely on the playoff implications.
This site has a pretty elaborate breakdown of the possible scenarios: LINK
The only rule is how many games each TV station gets in prime time.
They showed the Broncos two time in a row this season, against the Colts and the Patriots. So it’s possible, if they want to do it is another story.
Matthew Stafford was awful last night. Simply awful. To put up that offensive performance at home with all the talent they have?
Schwartz should get sacked if they don’t make the playoffs.
Defense has also underperformed, at least compared to the talent I believe they have.
Though they didn’t allow a single TD last night!
But yet Stafford tends to get a free pass in regards to being called a franchise QB since he has a rocket for an arm and was a high first round draft pick (all due to his big arm).
To some people, that’s all being a QB is – arm strength. They even confuse strong throws with good reads. It is sad, and sometimes amusing, watching their cognitive dissonance materialize itself as ever greater disagreements with reality and facts as they exist, to the point where they believe their subjective opinions override all available facts.
I actually like Stafford, but I don’t think he’s ever going to hit the Brees, Brady, Rodgers level. He’s more of an Eli level of QB, which means that he could win a SB someday, with the right circumstances, but he’s probably not going to be consistently excellent when it comes to the details of reading defenses. He’s also got an amazing safety blanket in Megatron, which takes a lot of pressure off of him – it’ll be interesting to see how he fares when that safety blanket is missing for an extended period of time. For some QBs, that forces them to become better; for others, it kills their confidence and makes them regress mightily.
I think Stafford with the right offensive mind could be deadly.
Remember guys like Brees, Rodgers and Brady and a guy like Foles this year, has really good offensive minds who know how too game plan for their QB.
You could be right. I’m not as optimistic as you, but it certainly wouldn’t be a surprise to see him have a few monster years with the right talent and scheme around him.
In my opinion, every QB is a function of his coach or the system. Peyton Manning is successful in Denver because he is using the same scheme he used with the Colts. Had he been forced to use Kubiak’s PA, bootleg based system he wouldnt be as good because he isnt a great boot leg guy (he can do it once or twice, but not like 10 times per game)
People said that about Cutler, when Trestman came in, but he’s still the same old Cutler (I view Stafford and Cutler as very similar styles of QB’s). Stafford would make dumb mental mistakes no matter where he does. Same as Cutler. The aforementioned guys have the mental capacity to be elite NFL QB’s. Guys like Stafford and Cutler have elite NFL arms, but not the that smarts to go with it.
Take Brandon Marshall and Calvin Johnson away from those guys and they are much worse.
http://www.advancednflstats.com/2012/10/matt-stafford-exposed-as-bears-shut.html
Stafford gets a free pass because he was drafted by the Lions after an 0-16 season. He’s also the only stable QB they’ve had since……I honestly don’t know.
He also has like a bunch of games every year where wins in a shootout. His passing yards per year:
2011: 5038
2012: 4967
2013: 4211 in 14 games
He’s also a year younger than Colin Kaepernick and a few months older than Andrew Luck.
“I don’t recall Texas boosters getting fired up for Rich Kotite.”
…which is not to say he wasn’t considered for opportunities elsewhere.
http://www.jetnation.com/jetswiki/images/c/c2/Kotite2.jpg
Our biggest improvement this season is in our press conferences.
Reid was the master of not saying anything. Jim Johnson was honest and gave good answers. But his successors were horrible in front of the camera.
But I love listening to Bill Davis, Nick Foles gave a good positive pep talk there. I have seen good player press conferences after a win. (Like Freddy’s “I want to thank my hands” or Asante’s bringing the 2 balls that he picked Manning with) but I don’t remember a good loosing press conference.
I also like how Chip explains his decisions that didn’t work out and the logic behind it. It beats “I will try to get better at that”
One of my favorite things about Chip is he isn’t afraid to try thing which may not work. So rare to see head coaches do that.
I wonder if Chip sees the team on schedule, ahaead, or behind. I have to think Foles has been a pleasent suprise for him, if not that implies he thinks his QB can set every seasonal record in the book if he had a really good one. Foles if astonishingly productive this year. If he’s not a good fit for Kelly, how amazing would a QB who is be???
Really interesting question about Kelly and his schedule, if there is one.
I think his schedule is status quo. How can it be anything else? After 1 draft, there’s no way he can put ‘HIS’ team on the field. He was given a defense of below avg. players. No expectations this year except to point the ship in the direction he wants. The ship IS going in the right direction, he just doesn’t have the right people rowing….
I think the team is ahead of Chip’s timeline. The Vikes lost was important to their maturation as a team. Seriously, the Bears should be worried about the Eagles offense.
As I have said in previous posts on other blogs, I believe Chip picked the Eagles because of the players on offense – including St. Nick. I mentioned to GEAGLE recently that almost every player on offense fits the Chip criteria – even Coop who is the kind of big WR who can intimidate most DBs.
I need to keep perspective with this team. The majority of the players are not Chip Kelly’s guys. They’re hold overs from Andy Reid or stopgaps. I think Kelly is getting the maximum out of the roster as it’s constructed considering they’re all still in year 1 of new systems on both sides of the ball.
What has me most excited about the future of the team is the contribution we’re getting from the rookies. We’ve got a starting RT, a very good 2nd TE (who’s putting up good numbers), a starting NT, and a starter at safety. I can’t remember the last time we had that much contribution from a rookie class.
From where I sit Chip has the offense he wants. He just needs better execution and the maturation of St. Nick. Look out NFL, if this offense starts to execute it will more than make up for the deficiencies in defense.
I also enjoy his responses to questions he thinks are dumb. The sarcasm is entertaining, but the last question was the best. He paused and stumbled like he was trying to treat the question with honest consideration, then gave up and just said “No,” in a way that added, unsaid, “and you are an idiot.”
I do think Kelly has some game management issues, and the Eagles certainly have some talent deficiencies. But I’m actually optimistic about the direction of the franchise.
Do you think he has improved in that area as the year has progressed?
I’d say he’s gotten worse, but that may be because there have been more opportunities in the last few weeks for his weaknesses to show up. I expect him to learn from his mistakes, though.
Go watch AR or other veteran coaches make stupid mistakes and it is clear that Kelly aint making any more mistakes than any other good coach.
True enough. I’m not one that gets overly mad about these things. I mean, at the time I was frustrated at wasting a TO on the decision to go for two – it was simple math. But I’d say there have been more things in the last few weeks where I thought Kelly managed things in the wrong way. Like I said, this may just be that the opportunities have been there where they weren’t before. If he holds to his own philosophy, these things will be fixed as he considers them and makes the decisions before he’s even on the field. But they need to come up for him to know about them.
I don’t think there has been one repeated error, except for the challenges. And I think it’s his philosophy to not challenge plays unless there is a real benefit. He values the timeout.
I do think he gets frustrated if the offense isn’t stumbling and then he makes poor decisions.
His lack of confidence in Henery though is concerning to the point of, if h doesn’t trust him in some of these situations, why is he here?
Yeah, I don’t recall seeing things twice. Which is encouraging (though still a small sample size). I hope, based on how he seems to work, he actually practices making decisions. As he likes to say, he doesn’t want to face something in the game that he hasn’t practiced during the week.
Not sure about a lack of confidence in Henery. With regard to kickoffs, he said he wasn’t sending them out the back in warmups. The lack of confidence was in the coverage unit. That Henery wasn’t putting it out of bounds is just a fact.
I think the most encouraging thing is that he’d probably agree with you. It remains to be seen whether he’s able to address it, but Chip seems quite honest in that respect and (even if he doesn’t always say it publicly) is probably happy to hold his hands up and say “y’know what? I messed up there – let’s make sure I do that differently next time”.
I’ve bought into Chip and I’m still excited for a good ride. I know people were excited about the defense — but we know the truth and how bad this defense is capable of being. Eagles are top of their division. Way above expectations and the only place to go is up from here. 2014/2015 — that’s when the expectations happen. This year — enjoy it — win or lose — it’s exciting football.
After watching Stafford last night, I think some of you need to be thankful we have someone like Foles, you nitpicking girls.
Exactly. No one should be allowed to have any criticism of Foles as long as any quarterback anywhere could be considered worse.
I really like what I hear from Chip in his pressers.
So I read as much Eagles stuff as I can, but man is it hard to take this columnist seriously. Pay Maclin the average of to the top 5 WRs in the league when he’s coming off an injury?
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1881980-7-moves-philadelphia-eagles-must-make-this-offseason/page/2
It’s Bleacher Report… may as well get your info from the comments section on ESPN, which is to say, not worth reading.
Lol, like I said I’m a glutton for Eagles articles. Doesn’t help that half of my office is already on Christmas vacation so the days have been long and boring this week.
he pointed out that the officials aren’t going to change the call so why go on and on complaining. Wasted energy
However, if you need a challenge or are going to use a challenge, use it wisely. I’ll be interested in the All-22′ because I thought the 3rd down spot was far more worth challenging than the 4th down spot, also failure would have still left us in 4th down and not turning it over on downs. Though I didn’t like the result, it was nice to see the D play strong in response to the turnover on downs.
Another point that maybe worth discussing is Opposing Ds. In the opposite of AR world, we seem to struggle more facing 43 Ds than we do facing 34 Ds. I no longer know what Chicago play except that as of the summer no team had played 43 longer than the Bears thanks to the very informative Mr Viking, but fear we face two such Ds in the following two weeks. Anyone else noticed this?
Chip has been pretty consistent with this all year. If he is in a situation where he would go for it on 4th down anyway, he is not challenging on 3rd down. He would rather run his tempo than take a chance the officials don’t change the call and the defense has had extra time to prepare. 4th down is 4th down so… ( I thought he got it there, but you are right he certainly got it on 3rd down).
Agree or disagree with his philosophy, but admit that he is at least consistent in this area. You have to recognize that it is at least something he believes in. I’m not sure I agree with it, but I am willing to admit that Chip might have a better idea of what he is doing than I do. I will grudgingly accept the practice.
Andy was pretty inconsistent with challenges in general, which is strange since he was so meticulous. It is nice to see that there is a plan when it comes to these situations, that happen more often than one might think (I can think of at least 3 times this season).
It would be interesting to know which way round it is – does he not challenge because he’d rather go for it immediately, or is it because the guys in the booth don’t get a chance to relay the message? Obviously we don’t rush punts, so that gives an extra 20-25 seconds for the challenge flag to be thrown.
I agree. I wouldn’t mind if he was deliberately choosing not to challenge, but if it’s just ignorance on the part of the booth guys then it’s a concern.
I thought about that and wondered. I have to believe that they have ample time. We saw the replay at home, the announcers had time to comment on it, and then they ran the play. Another incident was on the goaline IIRC, at home, and the fans even had time to react to the replay. He still went for it (and scored).
Was this 3rd down play discussed already? Missed reading all the posts in the previous threads as I had come over all cheese headed on Tuesday morning.
I’m not sure to TBH. I tend to stay away from the conversation after a loss for a bit so really just getting back into comments today. I was just replying to what you said there with my own observations.
Look, I’m a Kurt Coleman fan, but I don’t say that without knowing that the guy’s got his limitations. If Chung is being benched (or rotated, in what reads as the worst after-the-fact coach endorsement ever) for him, that doesn’t say much for Chung. And if you have Coleman playing, and he gets hurt… Well, I can’t feel too bad about the secondary’s performance, especially since Coleman was the back up nickle CB, too.