Chip

Kelly

That was, of course, Pete Carroll’s final season in Seattle. Rapoport went even further, saying, “One previous opponent even had their scout team prepare cards based on Seattle plays of the past under Carroll, sources say.” This report comes just a few days after Tom Pelissero, Rapoport’s NFL Network colleague, said that Chip Kelly botched his own play calls during games and even called plays that hadn’t been installed during practice. As tends to happen in disaster seasons, everyone in Vegas is fighting to blame someone else through the media. Assuming Carroll is a one-and-done in Vegas, it’s a sad end to a legendary career. The game had left Carroll behind in his final years with the Seahawks, but he just couldn’t stay away. The Raiders, in turn, will have to blow things up and start from scratch this offseason.

Kelly’s time with the Raiders lasted just 11 games, yet this move still feels past due. The offense averaged 4.6 yards per play, 6.67 yards per pass play and 3.5 yards per carry. The Raiders’ front office signed Kelly to a contract that paid him $6 million per year, back in February, making him the NFL’s highest-paid offensive coordinator. His results were extremely disappointing. Seeing him return to the college ranks would be unsurprising.

It sounds like the expected organizational culture change is officially underway with Tom Brady and Pete Carroll at the helm. The Raiders reportedly tripled Kelly’s Ohio State salary to secure his services. It will be interesting to see how much money ownership will be willing to throw at the position coaches as Brady and Carroll attempt to make their mark.

Pete Carroll brings aboard his former Pac-10 and NFC West nemesis to coordinate the Raiders’ offense. Carroll and Kelly coached against each other in the college ranks from 2007-2009, while Carroll served as USC’s head coach and Kelly operated as Oregon’s offensive coordinator (2007-2008) and head coach (2009). The two briefly coached against each other during Kelly’s 2016 season serving as the 49ers’ head coach while Carroll was with the Seahawks. Kelly returned to the college ranks after a 2-14 season in the NFC West.

Jones also adds that Kelly “could get looks in Tampa Bay.” The 61-year-old former NFL head coach is fresh off winning a national championship in his first year as Ohio State’s offensive coordinator and had spent the previous six seasons at UCLA before leaving to take the job at Ohio State. Kelly spent six seasons in the NFL (2013-2016) during his time with the Eagles and 49ers. His offense ranked top five in both yards and points per game during his first season with the Eagles, and they finished 12th in scoring in his final year in Philly in 2015. Things went far worse for him in San Francisco, as his 49ers went 2-14 a year after Jim Tomsula led the team to a 5-11 record. There haven’t been any official reports of Kelly meeting with a team this offseason, but it wouldn’t be surprising if things ramped up in the coming days if the interest is real.

Notable as it may be for the college football world, Kelly was also linked to the Raiders, Seahawks, and Commanders as a potential offensive coordinator candidate, and most recently interviewed with the Seahawks. Clearly eager to get away from UCLA, the former NFL head coach won’t be returning to the league this year, as he now heads for the Buckeye State to work with Ryan Day.

Kelly continues to draw interest from NFL teams. He was passed on by the Raiders for their offensive coordinator position and was loosely linked to the Commanders — although there’s no report of the two sides ever speaking with one another. Much like newly-minted offensive coordinator Kliff Kingsbury, Kelly is a former NFL head coach whose offensive prowess in the college game never quite carried over to the pros. Also, like Kingsbury, Kelly has never worked exclusively as an offensive coordinator in the pros and could be worth a shot by a team in need of a play-caller.

ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler adds Kelly is also a candidate for the OC vacancy in Washington D.C. Increasingly embattled as his conference-upgrading school, Kelly is apparently the latest NCAA coach grasping for an NFL lifeboat as college football continues to undergo fundamental change at dizzying speed. Kelly hasn’t set foot on an NFL sideline since his disastrous one-year tenure as 49ers head coach in 2016. Now 60 years old, Kelly will have to make the jump soon if he wants to return to the big leagues.

The Ducks were slapped with three years of probation Wednesday, while Kelly was handed an 18-month “show-cause penalty.” It means any NCAA team that hired Kelly in the next 18 months would have to “show cause” to the NCAA why they should be allowed to do so. Kelly didn’t leave behind nearly as big of a mess as Pete Carroll did at USC, but he certainly skipped town at just the right time. Provided Kelly’s Eagles tenure doesn’t end after just one season, he should have little trouble getting another NCAA job in the future.

Caplan’s remark came in response to an article penned by Smart Football’s Chris Brown breaking down Kelly’s offense and why it is “fundamentally broken,” a must-read accessible at the link below. Brown noted that Kelly has failed to adjust to NFL nuances, among many other flaws. Kelly’s offenses got progressively worse in Philadelphia and the 2016 version looked putrid this preseason. Currently sporting the NFL’s worst assembly of skill-position players, Kelly is facing an uphill climb in San Francisco, to put it mildly.