Inside Football: It's time for Chip Kelly to execute a few changes on offense
Chip Kelly created these Eagles, yet seems baffled that his handpicked players can't execute his system. How long before he gives up on his foundering NFL experiment?
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12 min read
Chip Kelly harps on execution, which seems to be his favorite word these days. If only his handpicked players in his pristine scheme could execute their responsibilities as demanded, then this wouldn’t be a sad-sack outfit with a 1-3 record.
That’s essentially what Kelly is saying, usually through gritted teeth, week after week.
Only, it’s all of that talk about “execution” that just might get the coach executed within his locker room (metaphorically speaking, of course). He has already been walking a tight-rope these past few years in terms of player approval ratings, and his attempts to weed out malcontents is likely not thorough enough given the sour tone this season has already taken.
Everything Kelly has touched has come up empty through a quarter of the 2015 season. As much as he will stick to his rhetoric -- “We’re not getting consistent execution,” he said after Washington went 90 yards to cement a 24-20 victory -- somewhere he must know that the troubles run very deep. The problems are rooted in his taking full control over the entire organization.
Drastic changes beyond mere “execution” might be needed if this team is going to save a season that seems to be slipping away. It needs to start at quarterback -- the most Chip Kelly position of them all -- where Sam Bradford has been largely a disaster. It must also include some schematic adjustments to the run game and maybe even more time for his vagabond pass catchers, because this core group of youngsters don’t yet seem ready to the task at hand.
But make no mistake, this is the monster Kelly, and Kelly only, created, and it is already threatening to turn on him.
He chose to trade for Bradford and then opted not to deal him for the first-round picks he claimed very publicly were being offered and then opted not to trade up for Marcus Mariota -- his star pupil from Oregon.
Then he tried to extend Bradford (had Bradford not balked at that proposition the chorus of criticism for Kelly would only be louder) and ultimately was perfectly cool with paying the battered and beaten quarterback $13.5 million for one season’s work. And, if it’s me, I’m benching him this week and going to Mark Sanchez.
It’s not exactly the decision of a lifetime, but Kelly would do well to get back to even the modest offensive standards he attained last year with Sanchez under center. If Kelly continues to string Bradford along -- flashing just enough late in games after starting them in a hopeless manner -- then Kelly will be Charlie Brown to his quarterback’s Lucy and the trick will end up invariably on the coach.
Given Bradford’s physical state coming off another ACL tear, combined with his mental state after having already absorbed a career’s worth of beatings during his time with the Rams, it’s hard to find tangible signs that this will turn anytime soon. Bradford looks unsure and hesitant and jumpy in the pocket and has a terrible time settling into games. Occasionally -- Weeks 1 and 4 -- he rallies to finally attempt a few big-boy throws and gets his team back in a game, but even then it’s only to end up losing, anyway.
Let’s not pretend the Eagles were constructed for the defense to carry them. This team is supposed to race out to a lead and hold the ball for much of the game and operate at a frenetic pace that saps opposing defenses. So the idea this defense blew a late lead on the road shouldn’t really shock anyone. It was the offense’s inability to display a modicum of ability or intent in the first half that put them in a hole in the first place.
Through four games, Bradford is a brutal 35-for-66 for just 309 yards in the first half (this is the equivalent of two full games of work) with a paltry 4.7 yards per attempt, one touchdown and one pick. That’s an inept QB rating of 64.5. That’s a problem. Kelly, though, continues to defend his decision at quarterback -- “When he had time I thought he looked good,” Kelly said of Bradford after the game, seemingly with more spite than conviction.
Kelly can’t afford to have an immobile Bradford getting whacked around because there are too many other issues. His reconfigured offensive line is overrun most weeks, and the high draft picks he used on receivers Jordan Matthews and Nelson Agholor have yielded no immediate dividends. Players he identified to boost the defense -- Kiko Alonso and Byron Maxwell -- have been either injured or simply ineffective. Kelly’s new kicker, Caleb Sturgis, added insult by missing a big kick in his debut with the club.
Sanchez at least could give teams something to worry about in the zone run game at the mesh point and he’d be more decisive and maybe he gives the team a spark. Maybe Kelly needs to go back to veterans like Riley Cooper and Brent Celek and Miles Austin in some base packages. They were the guys who caught Bradford’s three second-half touchdown passes Sunday. Maybe it’s time to try to find a way to feature DeMarco Murray and find what he does best and try to duplicate some of the magic he had last season with Dallas rather than go so much by-committee (Murray had just 10 touches for 48 yards total Sunday).
The bottom line is this team continues to be pushed around week after week -- Washington had the ball for over 41 minutes -- and Bradford mostly looks overwhelmed and uninspiring. The losses are already mounting, and even in the pedestrian NFC East this team seems headed in the wrong direction, with the Eagles now 0-2 in their division and 0-3 in the conference. And the chatter will only continue that, say, if a head coaching change is executed in Austin, Texas, or some other big-time NCAA program that might just be the siren song to lure Kelly away if things continue down this path in Philadelphia.
More news and notes from around the NFL:
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Atlanta Falcons |
| There is no official award for coordinator of the year, but there should be, and so far Kyle Shanahan would have to be the obvious choice. What he has done to totally reinvent the Falcons’ defense, and to do so with literally no transition period is pretty special. His genius in the run scheme is showing each week, and despite losing Tevin Coleman to injury and despite having an offensive line that, individually, few would covet, and despite the Falcons long having a reputation as a soft team, they are now destroying teams at the point of attack. Devonta Freeman has seven rushing touchdowns the past three weeks, and three each in the last two games. Sunday, Julio Jones seemed to be ailing some, so no big deal, just put the hottest receiver in the game on ice and let Leonard Hankerson and some other dudes shine. It’s not like they are running at that bountiful a clip -- 3.7 per carry is below the league average -- but they are doing it relentlessly and until the big runs come and keeping teams from beating up on Matt Ryan as they have in the past. Shanahan is rushing the ball 31 times a game; Atlanta averaged 23 runs a game a year ago. The Falcons rushed 30 or more times in a game twice all of last season; they have done so three times already this season. They have held the ball for at least 31 minutes in every game this season -- protecting a still shaky defense -- and have topped 35 minutes a game twice; they hit that mark only once all of last season. And when they need a big run on third down, or to shift field position, it’s been there. It’s a huge part of their shocking 4-0 start under rookie head coach Dan Quinn. | |
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Cincinnati Bengals |
| Andy Dalton and the Bengals continue to soar, and while I have my reservations about them, come January they’re going to win a lot of games between now and then if they continue the pace they are on. They have almost never trailed this season, thanks in large part to an offense that comes off the bus firing. The Bengals have scored on their opening drives of all four games, three times for touchdowns. They’re able to stay balanced and keep Dalton in a comfort zone and he is spreading the ball around to his myriad weapons. The Bengals, who have a propensity to let inferior teams hang around through the half, are the league’s best first-quarter team thus far (35 points scored to 6 allowed; 14-3 Sunday). I’m not sold on the secondary and we’ll see how their health holds up, but I’m nitpicking and they look very impressive overall. | |
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Baltimore Ravens |
| This Ravens offense is going to be beyond rote without Steve Smith for at least a few weeks. They’d better slam it down Cleveland’s throats on the ground next week. If they don’t, that big win in Pittsburgh on Thursday will be quickly undone. I don’t see any playmakers left in that passing game and Joe Flacco can only do so much. | |
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Buffalo Bills |
| I wrote about how I expected Tyrod Taylor to be a bit of a yo-yo this season in terms of his performances and that’s been the case. He has alternated stellar outings with more uneven ones every week and that just might be the case for a while. He couldn’t get much going against the Giants until deep in the game. He has had slow starts in the losses to the Pats and the Giants and all four of his picks have come in those games. He’ll be solid though, I believe, while I’m waiting to see a little more of a consistent roar from that defense. | |
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Houston Texans |
| Bill O’Brien is taking the opposite tack as Kelly in trying to deal with the Frankenstein he has built in Houston, with that team getting absolutely embarrassed Sunday. The Texans are a total disaster through four weeks. O’Brien should be sending Kelly and Dolphins coach Joe Philbin a big thank you because if not for their more high-profile foibles we’d be hearing a lot more nationally about what a brutal outfit the Texans have been. Rarely will you see a team beaten in every stage of the game the way the Falcons emasculated the Texans in racking up a 42-0 lead Sunday without seeming to break all that much of a sweat. This is a season in crisis, begun when O’Brien acted hastily in benching starter Brian Hoyer in Week 1 and then watching the offense regress and constrict under Ryan Mallett. If you thought Sam Bradford’s first-half season stats were scary, check out Mallett’s. In three first halves Mallett is 35-for-73 (48 percent) for 325 yards (4.5 per attempt), one TD and two INTs, a 53.7 rating and only one play over 20 yards. That, and a suspect defense in which J.J. Watt is making fewer of the game-changing sequences we’ve become so accustomed to (don’t anticipate hearing too much MVP talk if this keeps up for player and team) have led to the Texans generally trailing in games and it surely has ended Mallett’s stint as the starter. Hoyer shredded a prevent defense Sunday, just as Mallett did when he played garbage time in Week 1, and with Thursday’s home game with the Colts looking like a must-win, O’Brien would be foolish not to go with the veteran passer. Unlike Kelly, O’Brien opted to focus his awkward and tension-filled press conference by uttering a mantra about not coaching well enough that bordered on theatrical. It seemed as if it took every fiber of O’Brien’s being not to explode into a torrent of expletives, Hard Knocks style. Instead he stuck to offerings like: “I have to do a much better job of being the head coach of this team,” while going nowhere close to explaining how he would do so. I’d start with the quarterback change, personally. | |
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New York Giants |
| If you didn’t see the ridiculous grab Odell Beckham Jr. made in Sunday’s game -- and it was on a play down the sideline and just out of bounds for what amounted to an eye-popping incomplete pass -- try to check it out. Dude is unreal. | |
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Oakland Raiders |
| Tough loss for the Raiders but I came away from it even more impressed with Derek Carr. He came within an inch or two of some unbelievable throws in the end zone -- a foot barely out of bounds -- and again rallied his team throughout and was a gamer in the fourth quarter. Getting to 3-1 with consecutive road wins would’ve been huge for Oakland, and losing on a long, late field goal will sting, but I continue to believe this team has more upsets and many more wins in it this year and beyond. | |
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Tampa Bay Buccaneers |
| Not sure why the Bucs waited another week to stick with their kid kicker, and then sent him out to try to make a field goal with the field literally flooding and amid a torrential downpour, but look for them to have a veteran in place by Tuesday. Josh Scobee, late of the Steelers, will need a few weeks to get a quad strain healed, but Kai Forbath and Randy Bullock, who lost out on Pittsburgh’s kicker competition on Saturday, are likely to be in demand. The Jags might be thinking about a change soon, too. | |
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St. Louis Rams |
| Welcome to the NFL, Todd Gurley. What an amazing second half he had against the Cardinals, and if the Rams can find a way to add that sort of physical presence on a weekly basis on offense to go with what that menacing defense, well, who knows. Of course, first they have to find a way to bring their A game consistently, but now that they already have a home win over Seattle and a road win at Arizona in their back pockets, it could make that NFC West pretty interesting after all. | |
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Washington Redskins |
| If the Redskins can build off some of their red-zone successes Sunday, they will be a tough out from here on out. That was a big win for Kirk Cousins and with DeSean Jackson maybe a week or two away, that offense could take off some in October. The schedule isn’t too brutal and anything is possible in the NFC East. | |
