NFL Regular Season 2012

[downtown]

I think Chip Kelly is an outstanding hire, and I think he'll be a successful NFL coach.

People are being lazy if they just equate Kelly with gimmicky spread offenses. First and foremost, Kelly's skills are as a talent evaluator, and a contraction innovator. NFL organizations suffer from the worst group think, and when somebody finally gets the balls to do something different, they can wreck some serious havoc on the rest of the league, even when they are at a talent disadvantage, like the Dolphins during the first year of the Wildcat.

Kelly's Oregon teams weren't recruiting dynamos. His highest class was ranked 11th I think, and USC, and sometimes Stanford, got better players. He is excellent and finding guys to run his specific system, and then tweaking that system to make sure it fits his personnel.

I'm pretty confident that Kelly isn't going to try and run sweeps and zone reads for 45 times a game. He's going to be able to pull out a few wrinkles that should excite the Philly fan base though.

 

[Azale]

Kelly has never had experience at the NFL level. I dunno, part of me thinks he'll bolt back to the first nice college job that opens up if he struggles a bit at first with the Eagles.

I have no doubt he will be able to implement an offense successfully.

 

[dgfred]

Well, in college he had over 100 players at practice and ran his offensive practice by repetition... over and over. How is he going to do that with 50 players and some of them older?
Talent evaluating is more important in college IMO. You can't get everything you want in the pros... like players. If an owner doesn't want somebody, there is little chance of getting him. I don't know how much power he will have with the Eagles.

You run repetitions with your running QB at practice... then he gets killed on about the 3rd play of the game. 2nd team QB can not usually run the O like your special guy... have to basically have another offensive scheme for him.

He is going to have to fix the D... without that it might not even matter about the O.

 

[El Justo]

interesting remarks. thanks guys. neat to see other perspectives. i think i can warm up to the guy

 

[downtown]

I'm not sure why the roster size matters so much? It's not like Oregon actually PLAYED a hundred players. I think the NCAA limit for a visiting team is around 60.

Talent evaluation is critical at every level. The salary cap rules require teams to find production from UFAs, bargain players, and lower round draft picks. I'm not sure Philadelphia has been great at that in the past, but it's something that I think Chip Kelly would be very good at.

His defenses at Oregon weren't bad either, especially last season. The superficial statistics aren't as great because Oregon always got killed on time of possession, but the advanced stats had them as a very effective unit, especially against the pass. Oregon wasn't exactly the 1980s WAC or anything.

The two biggest changes, I suspect, will be an emphasis on the run game that was lost at Philly (so more touches for McCoy, including in space), and an increase in offensive speed. We've already found that NFL teams like New England can be successful running a lot of no-huddle type stuff. The focus on pushing the pace does seem to be a constant with Kelly everywhere he's gone.

 

[dgfred]

You can have like a 120 players at practice in college.

 

[Serutan]

Bruce Arians to the Cardinals. Given his track record with QBs I am cautiously optimistic.
Provided they can do something with the O-line. I'd like him to keep Horton, but it sounds
like that probably won't happen.

 

[El Justo]

i wonder if he'll try and reclaim our boy corn-on-the-kolb ?

 

[Serutan]

Good question. I wouldn't mind seeing them make a run at either Flynn or Alex Smith (at the right price) - Arians has a much better QB development record than Whiz. If they can't get either of those two mentioned above, I would guess they draft a 1st or 2nd round QB, and use Kolb as the
bridge guy.

 

[El Justo]

they were jesting on the philly airwaves the other day that the cardinals will trade kolb to the chiefs and let the new guy there try to whirl the magic wand one more time

 

[Serutan]

they were jesting on the philly airwaves the other day that the cardinals will trade kolb to the chiefs and let the new guy there try to whirl the magic wand one more time

If that actually happened it would be proof positive Andy is wallowing in hubris.

 

[Dachs]

From what I saw Griffin wasn't in to going out of bounds or sliding. Good for
tough guy rep, bad for lengthy career.

He's done both of those things plenty of times. Like every single other football player in the league, he also has made split-second decisions about whether the potential to gain extra yards on a given play is worth the risk of serious injury. And like basically everybody else, he is praised for it when it works out, and is lambasted for the exact same thing when it doesn't. Which is stupid. Andrew Luck's done more than his share of risky quarterback run plays exposing him to potential serious injury; it's basically the vagaries of chance - and the Redskins coaching staff - that have led to Luck and Griffin being where they are right now relative to each other, injury-wise.

 

[NickyJ]

JaWalrus Russell wants to make a comeback. (Read: Moar money.)

 

[Azale]

DC bites on a trade to send Cousins to NY for Revis and a 2nd. RGIII is out for season. JaMarcbust Russell starts for the Redskins.

 

[dgfred]

Or maybe Tebow and Vick go there .

 

[NickyJ]

DC bites on a trade to send Cousins to NY for Revis and a 2nd. RGIII is out for season. JaMarcbust Russell starts for the Redskins.

Or maybe Tebow and Vick go there .

Better: Shanny makes his Portis-Bailey trade of his Washington tenure with Cousins, but in addition to or instead of the 2nd rounder, he gets Tebow. RG3 is out for the beginning of the season, leading to a QB controversy between SanchGrossman and Tebow.

Oh, and Revis turns into Nnamdi 2.0.