Assessing Chip Kelly's Culture Post LeSean McCoy

Kiko Alonso has a DUI on his record, was charged with felony burglary, criminal mischief and criminal trespassing (all in one incident) and suspended by Chip Kelly in his time at Oregon. Yet, when given the opportunity, Kelly didn’t hesitate to trade perhaps the greatest running back in franchise history for Alonso and cap space.

LeGarrette Blount punched a Boise State player, in his first game back from a separate suspension, after Oregon’s 2009 season opening loss. Kelly suspended Blount for the season originally, but after essentially good behavior and continued hard work at practice, Kelly brought Blount back over two months later.

That was Blount’s Senior season at Oregon, and the incident kept him from being drafted. Even when he signed with the Titans as an undrafted free-agent, he punched a teammate in a practice. Though not an abnormal occurrence during off-season practices, it didn’t look good.

Blount never made the Titans, but had moderate success in Tampa Bay, before a bursting onto the scene with tremendous playoff success for the Patriots in 2013. That success led to a free-agent contract with the Steelers. Trouble returned for Blount in Pittsburgh, as he was arrested with new teammate Le’Veon Bell during training camp for possession of Marijuana. Later that year, in the midst of Bell’s breakout season, Blount walked off the field early during an eventual win against the Titans, leading to his eventual release from the Steelers.

Blount has avoided ever getting in any serious trouble, but to say that he doesn’t have great character wouldn’t be a stretch. Yet the second Bill Belichick had the chance to bring Blount back to New England, he did so as Blount eventually helped the Patriots to win the Super Bowl. Had Belichick not signed Blount to a two-year deal, you can bet Chip would have been on the phone trying to bring him to Philadelphia after the McCoy trade.

So how exactly does Chip Kelly define culture? Why does Chip seemingly covet players like Alonso and Blount, both with a track record of off-the-field troubles? All the while with Blount having been a locker-room issue in Pittsburgh, but was willing to move on from DeSean Jackson and LeSean McCoy, with both having had tremendous success in his system?

It feels like the answer to that question has to be more than just that Alonso and Blount are from Oregon. If it isn’t and Chip really is just trying to recreate a roster heavy on former Oregon players and some players that played in the Pac 10/Pac 12, then he probably won’t have a long stint in the NFL.

There’s no doubt that Chip loves feeling like he has over control over things. He needed to bring in Tom Gamble to help run his front-office when he became the Head Coach. When Gamble lost a power-struggle to then General Manager Howie Roseman, Kelly seemingly was ready to leave the Eagles if he didn’t get personnel control. We may never know if he was serious about that or bluffing, but he got what he wanted.

Dealing with players that he’s already familiar with from previous stops, or good character guys that he inherited (Brent Celek, for example), isn’t difficult at all. But there is a ceiling you get to in most NFL occasions where if you don’t take any risks on talented players with some issues, you plateau.

If not for anything but the fact that I’m hoping this is the case, I’m going to assume Kelly knows that. I’m going to assume that by now he has weaned out anyone who he thinks doesn’t fit ‘his culture’ (including Howie Roseman). As he aims to build a team in his image, it’s fair to assume Kelly expects to have an extremely upbeat, positive working environment in the Novacare Complex next year. After he lays the foundation in 2015, he needs to begin to take some risks. The problem is, we don’t know what a ‘risk’ is in his mind. That’s the missing piece to learning about how Kelly feels about ‘culture’.

About a month ago, I did a mock draft simulation (emphasis on the simulation), where Marcus Mariota went first in the draft, and Jameis Winston fell into the range where the Eagles traded up and selected the 2013 Heisman Trophy winner. How did I justify someone who has had a ton of off-the-field issues as fitting into ‘culture’? Like this:

"Would the Eagles shy away from Winston because of some of his off-the-field troubles considering Chip Kelly’s emphasis on culture? Perhaps not. Admittedly, no one besides Kelly knows exactly what he defines as “culture”. Certainly, being accused of rape is much worse than any conduct detrimental to the team in a sports locker-room. But the way that Winston’s case has gone through numerous outlets, there at least seems to be enough evidence to believe that he won’t ever be proven to have raped his accuser.I don’t know if he’s innocent or guilty of rape, I was not there. But if he doesn’t get convicted, much like Kobe Bryant and Ben Roethlisberger weren’t convicted, his career goes on. And despite him being accused of raping someone, stealing crab legs and screaming obscenities on the Florida State campus, you never heard Jimbo Fisher once question Jameis Winston the football player. By all accounts, Winston was not only an elite Quarterback in college, but he was the type of leader that you would want to go into battle with.Football-wise, Winston shouldn’t struggle to impress in NFL draft combine interviews. Despite the feeling that based on what some perceive as below-average speaking skills, I don’t think Winston is stupid. If he can convince NFL teams that the days of him being “young and dumb” (that does not refer to the rape charges) are behind him, then someone like Chip Kelly could fall in love with his competitive nature."

Winston didn’t struggle at all in combine interviews, with one scout comparing his football IQ to Peyton Manning. If Kelly wasn’t so steadfast on pursuing Marcus Mariota (we think), he probably would have been one of the people interviewing Winston.

Whether or not Kelly would like Winston specifically isn’t necessarily the point. He’s someone worth considering because he has character concerns far more egregious than perhaps Blount or Alonso–not that he’s ever been convicted or come close to being convicted–but he also has much more talent than either of those two, both of whom have done some impressive things in their own rights. But he’s not from Oregon and didn’t play in the Pac-12, so Chip Kelly doesn’t have a familiarity with him.

He also had his fair share of heated sideline discussions with Jimbo Fisher, normal looking to anyone that ever played sports and wasn’t looking to find a reason to detract from Winston. But would something like that be against the grain to Kelly?

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Kelly doesn’t seemed to be bothered by Alonso’s past. He probably shouldn’t be. I doubt that Blount’s history would scare him off, because he knows he can control Blount. And after a few months with Riley Cooper, Kelly didn’t release him following his N-word incident, seemingly because he was buying into what Chip was preaching.

It’s been well-documented that, among other things, Jackson was insubordinate in Kelly’s mind. As many have said, Kelly releasing one Pro-Bowler under those circumstances could be chalked up to him ‘building his culture’. The team got an impressive return for LeSean McCoy, despite his $11.95 cap-hit at the time of him being traded. Various reports have suggested that the team would have released him had they not found an interested team on the trade market. It’s fine if you trade someone under those circumstances, also possibly hoping to trade him before he hit the running-back wall. To release him before even asking about restructuring suggests that something about McCoy also rubbed Kelly the wrong way.

Perhaps there is another shoe to drop. Maybe McCoy did something else more detrimental to the team in Kelly’s mind. No one, at least publicly, knew about Jackson not buying into Kelly until after he was gone. But in this case, there isn’t an NJ.com article suggesting McCoy has gang ties or that he was ‘blatantly insubordinate’ to Kelly during the season. Sure, there’s rumblings that McCoy and Kelly’s relationship had become ‘strained‘ and that McCoy may never have fully bought into Kelly’s system, but for 2,926 yards over the course of two seasons, was it strained that badly that Kelly was prepared to release him? It’s hard to think any sane head-coach/front-office mind would simply cut McCoy because of a high cap-number or because he wasn’t the ‘north-south runner’ that Kelly craves. At least not someone that’s as good and has accomplished as much as McCoy.

Yeah, maybe there was something more behind the scenes. But LeSean sure did everything in his power to publicly praise Kelly. Take for example, this snippet of an ESPN the Magazine article entitled 30 Yards And a Cloud of Dust: The Eight Truths LeSean McCoy Had to Learn About Chip Kelly Before he Became a Believer–And The NFL’s Most Dangerous Weapon.

"Before the Eagles’ first preseason game, Kelly tells the players he wants them to ride together to the stadium, all dressed in jumpsuits. When McCoy was a rookie, he’d watch stars drive fancy cars and roll up in pristine suits. After he signed a five-year, $45 million extension in 2012, he joined the club, buying a Rolls-Royce, tailored threads and a rock for each ear. Now, what the hell? Jumpsuits? “It was like, ‘Are you serious?'” McCoy says.But a month later, in the season opener against the Redskins, something strange happens: McCoy feels like he’s part of a football revolution. Out of the hurry-up, the Eagles run 53 plays and gain 322 yards — in the first half. On one play, McCoy runs for 10 yards out of the type of formation for which Kelly was famous at Oregon, with only three down linemen and both tackles split out next to wide receivers. The gimmicks that most swore wouldn’t fly in the NFL are working. In the third quarter, McCoy takes the handoff on that boring, old zone run, darts right, cuts left and flies nearly untouched for a 34-yard touchdown. McCoy finishes with 184 yards, one shy of his career high. After the win, he’s exhausted and impressed. “I don’t know how he thought of it,” he says of Kelly. LeSean McCoy surrounded by water that symbolized Chip Kelly’s sports science.CREDIT: Warwick SaintPhoto Effects: Gene Bresler/Catchlight Digital"

Kelly, according to author Seth Wickersham, declined to speak for the story. At the time, the story made me, and many others, feel as though Philadelphia was the epicenter of something special. Sure, established players like McCoy didn’t buy in originally, but they bought in and were prepared to do great things. DeSean Jackson not buying in wasn’t a big deal, because he was DeSean Jackson. He was always a guy that came off as a strange, me-first guy, and he probably was, so Kelly believed that by cutting him, it was addition by subtraction.

A year later, McCoy had a high cap-number, much like Jackson. There’s no denying the return that they got or the varying other positives that many have drawn from the trade. But it appears McCoy left in the fashion that Kelly would have preferred Jackson left. And if that wouldn’t have been feasible, Kelly would have dumped McCoy in a Jackson-esque fashion.

Perhaps I focused on the wrong portion of this article, because now that McCoy is gone, this is the part of the over 5,000 word article that sticks in my head.

"When McCoy struggles, he tends to dance in the backfield. Nothing angers Kelly like throttled speed, and it boils to the surface against the Bucs on Oct. 13 when McCoy is slow to an opening.On the sideline, Kelly unloads: “Hit the damn hole, Shady!”“There was no damn hole!”“Shut up!”McCoy heads to the bench. But he can’t let it go. He brings Kelly a photo of the play and says, “Do you see a hole?”Kelly returns to the game, and McCoy returns to wondering whether he can coexist with his coach.But in the team meeting the next day, Kelly says something the players have never heard so explicitly from a head coach: “Shady and I got into it, and I was wrong.”"

This happening once was fine. McCoy dancing behind an injury-riddled offensive-line for much of the first half of the duo’s second season probably didn’t help the dynamic between the two. There have been rumblings that maybe Kelly would have liked to jettison McCoy with Jackson after his first season, but knew that the team couldn’t handle that public relations disaster. In hindsight, this article could have been McCoy’s way of attempting to salvage his relationship with Kelly, someone that he must have seen as good for his on-field career, only to see the relationship crumble even more in his second season under Kelly.

And so, as talented as Kelly knew McCoy was, he knew after the Eagles defeated the Giants in Week 17 that McCoy had played his final game as an Eagle. McCoy wasn’t completely buying into Kelly’s sports science ideas highlighted in the ESPN article. He wasn’t hitting the holes the way that Kelly desired and had a high cap-number. It was the perfect storm. Kelly didn’t believe that McCoy fit into his ‘culture’, and he had a high cap-number that he could very easily allocate somewhere else. Oh, and they got an impressive return in Alonso.

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But it makes you wonder, if McCoy not completely buying in was enough for the Eagles to be prepared to release him, what does that say about people outside the organization? Would Kelly look at Winston–again, just an example–and feel he wouldn’t fit into his on-field culture because he has some push-back?

I don’t think he would shy away from Winston off the field, he’s willing to take risks with players like Alonso, who have had issues away from the game. But he knows Alonso, he knows they co-existed before, and therefore it brings him a level of comfort. Is he too afraid of bringing any unknown big egos into his locker-room because they might question his philosophies at the start? And if they buy-in enough to be successful, but always question things, will Kelly be too stubborn to consider adjusting his philosophies and changing ‘culture’ a bit? Because to me, that’s what makes a great coach, and establishes a winning ‘culture’; a coach that has a plan and isn’t pushed around, but makes the necessary adjustments when given feedback. After he used ‘culture’ to seemingly move on from both DeSean Jackson and LeSean McCoy, Chip Kelly needs to prove that he can co-exist in his own ‘culture’.

Kelly can coach on gameday, there’s zero doubt about that. And whether or not he has earned the power he has in the front-office is irrelevant–he has it. He can use that power to attempt to bring in scheme-fits that fit the ‘company guy’ mold, but the chances of that alone producing a Superbowl title are slim-to-none. So Chip Kelly needs to look himself in the mirror, when he gets a chance to hang up the phone, and assess ‘culture’ this off-season. Two years and part of a drastic off-season into his regime, ‘culture’ has become the defining word of the Chip Kelly era. If he doesn’t manage things correctly, that word, and his tenure, could end up with a negative connotation.

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Assessing Chip Kelly’s Culture Post LeSean McCoy

By Tim Kelly | Mar 11, 2015

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