After saying very little about Colin Kaepernick since he was hired as head coach of the San Francisco 49ers, Chip Kelly has finally decided to throw his weight behind the quarterback.
While speaking to reporters at the NFL Scouting Combine Thursday, Kelly said there has never been a question about whether Kaepernick was going to be on the Niners’ roster in 2016.
“I don’t know what the narrative is that, ‘Is he on the team? Is he not on the team?’” Kelly said, per Matt Maiocco of CSNBayArea.com. “It’s never been a question. I’m excited to work with Colin. I’ve never thought that, ‘Hey, I’m going to go to San Francisco and he’s not going to be there.’ I don’t know why everybody else looks at it that way, either.”
By claiming last month that he was not allowed to speak about Kaepernick, Kelly fueled speculation that the 28-year-old’s days in San Francisco are numbered. Then there was a report claiming Kaepernick wants to leave the 49ers to play for a certain team on the east coast. Kelly insists that is not true, either.
“He wants to be here,” Kelly added. “He’s never expressed to me that he doesn’t want to be here. He expressed to me that he was excited about getting healthy and getting going. And we’re excited about him getting healthy and getting going.
“Kap’s really good. He had the ball on the 5-yard line, taking the team in to win the Super Bowl. You can just look at the tape and know how talented he is. Our job is acquiring talent, not getting rid of talent.”
Kaepernick’s $12 million salary for 2016 becomes fully guaranteed on April 1, and 49ers GM Trent Baalke said Wednesday that Kaepernick isn’t going anywhere. He will, however, supposedly have to compete with Blaine Gabbert for a starting job.
At one point, the belief was that Kelly was extremely high on Kaepernick. How high? This high. If that’s true, Kaepernick should have the early advantage over Gabbert.
