Chip Kelly mentioned as potential next UCLA head coach

UCLA made a surprising announcement on Sunday that Jim Mora has been fired as the school’s head football coach. With the team one win away from bowl eligibility and coming off a close defeat to rival USC, it seemed like an odd time to fire the head coach.

So why is UCLA making the move? They obviously want to go in a different direction, and they want to make sure they’re in the mix for the top head coaching candidates before its too late. One such candidate could be Chip Kelly.

Over the past year, Kelly has been mentioned as a possibility for UCLA. He has been out of coaching since being fired by the 49ers after one season. He took a year off, but is he ready to return? Some are figuring UCLA could land the former Oregon head coach.

UCLA is my bet to win the Chip Kelly sweepstakes, IF he's really ready to come back to college.

— Stewart Mandel (@slmandel) November 19, 2017

Although he left the Eagles in disarray somewhat, Kelly won 10 games there in his first two seasons. He took Oregon to new heights, including the national championship game. There is very little doubt about his ability to succeed at the college level.

Kelly would excite any fan base, not to mention recruiting base. We know Florida was vetting Kelly as a head coach. Now there’s sure to be competition for his services.

As a UCLA fan, this is pretty much the only coach I would fire Mora for. Maybe the Bruins know something.

Steve Spurrier ‘almost 100 percent’ sure Chip Kelly wont be next Florida coach

Steve Spurrier was hired as an ambassador and consultant for the University of Florida athletic department last year, so it would stand to reason that he will have some say in who the next head football coach of the Gators will be. And given what the former national champion said about the coaching search this week, it may be time to rule out Chip Kelly.

During an interview with “The Buddy Martin Show” on Wednesday, Spurrier said he is “almost 100 percent” certain that the next coach at Florida will be someone who is currently coaching another team.

“The coach is with his team now. The coach we’re going to hire is probably, I would almost 100 percent say is coaching his team today, this weekend, and through the end of the season, and maybe through the bowl game,” Spurrier said, according to FootballScoop.com.

There has been a lot of talk about Spurrier stumping for UCF head coach Scott Frost to get the job. Frost has coached the Knights to a 9-0 record this season and has them ranked No. 14 nationally, but Spurrier insists he is not endorsing any particular candidate.

I am not recommending anyone for the job. We all have complete confidence that Scott Stricklin will make the best choice for our school – and we will support his decision 100 percent. https://t.co/GREyvfIfFW

— Coach Steve Spurrier (@SteveSpurrierUF) November 15, 2017

A number of names have been mentioned in connection with the Florida job, but Kelly’s has created the most buzz. If Spurrier, who won a national championship with Florida in 1996, is that certain about the next Gators coach being with another program at the moment, it is probably safe to rule Kelly out.

Given some of the things Spurrier has said recently about the Gators, you have to wonder if he and Kelly would clash.

H/T College Football Talk

Report: Florida vetting Chip Kelly as head coach candidate

Could Chip Kelly be the next head coach at Florida? He reportedly is in the mix for the job.

The Gators fired Jim McElwain two weeks ago and have gone 0-2 under interim coach Randy Shannon. They’re in the market for a new head coach and are in the process of examining candidates. Yahoo Sports’ Pete Thamel names Kelly, Scott Frost and Dan Mullen as the top three candidates for the job.

In fact, Thamel says Florida has begun vetting Kelly by making “calls to NFL executives to do general background on Kelly and exploration of his NCAA issues at Oregon.”

Kelly is one of the biggest names in all of coaching. He is sitting out the season as a coach after being fired following a 2-14 showing with the 49ers last year. However, he went an incredible 46-7 in four seasons at Oregon, taking the Ducks to new heights, including the national championship game. He also went 10-6 in each of his first two seasons with the Eagles.

Kelly left Oregon amid an investigation into violations, which led to him receiving an 18-month show cause penalty. That matter is not expected to be a huge deterrent for teams interested in hiring him.

Thamel believes that the timing of what Florida does will tip their hand about their rankings of coaching candidates. He says that if they want Kelly, they can reach a deal with him in the near future. However, if they prefer Frost, they would likely wait until after UCF finishes its regular season out of respect for the coach’s pursuit of an undefeated season in Orlando. Mullen has enjoyed tremendous success at Mississippi State, but he is well compensated and has rebuffed interest from other programs in the past.

Paul Finebaum admits he has talked to Chip Kelly about potential Tennessee job

As Butch Jones’s position grows more and more tenuous with Tennessee, talk of potential replacements is beginning to heat up.

One popular name for any high-profile opening will be former Oregon coach Chip Kelly, who is currently serving as an ESPN analyst after his firing by the San Francisco 49ers. Jones is still employed, so it would be premature to say anything is close, but Kelly has at least talked about the Tennessee opening.

We know this because his ESPN colleague Paul Finebaum said so.

“It’s an awkward kabuki dance every Sunday morning about 7:15 when I bump into him, because I have the same response wherever I have previously been,” Finebaum told WJOX 94.5, via Michael Wayne Bratton of Saturday Down South. “I say ‘Chip, I was in Knoxville yesterday, saw a lot of signs with your name on it. Anything new?’ He says, ‘Haven’t gotten a call yet.’

“I mean, I’ve talked to him. I don’t want to speak for him because I don’t know him that well… I think he clearly wants to coach. He’s up there (at ESPN) studying college football, and I do believe he will be back very quickly.”

Kelly has, in the past, kept his focus on NFL jobs. That may change if a big college job comes available, and he’ll be linked to any that do.

H/T The Spun

Oregon campus store uses Chip Kelly for credit card swiping instructions

It has been more than four years since Chip Kelly coached a game at the collegiate level, but his presence is still being felt on the Oregon campus.

The Duck Store on Oregon’s campus apparently is not yet equipped to read the new data chips on credit cards. For now, customers are kindly asked to swipe their cards. You can probably see where this is heading:

Well played, Duck Store. LOL pic.twitter.com/MlZaaNkwdj

— George Schroeder (@GeorgeSchroeder) August 7, 2017

While Kelly’s coaching tenure in the NFL wasn’t exactly a success, he led the Ducks to a 46-7 overall record in four seasons and won the Rose Bowl then Fiesta Bowl in his final two years with the program. It will be interesting to see what fans think of Kelly in his new role this season, but he’s always going to have a special spot in Eugene.

Chip Kelly defends Colin Kaepernick: He was not a distraction

Much has been said about how much Colin Kaepernick was a distraction in the San Francisco 49ers’ locker room last season, but the man who oversaw things is defending the quarterback.

Chip Kelly joined ESPN’s Adam Schefter on the “Know them from Adam” podcast, which was published on Wednesday. The two are now colleagues at ESPN, and they talked about Kaepernick, who served as Kelly’s quarterback in San Francisco most of last season.

Kelly was adamant that Kaepernick was not a locker room distraction despite kneeling for the national anthem. He also defended Kap’s play.

“Kap was awesome. At the beginning of the year he made his stance on what he believed was right. We recognized and supported his ability to do that. But he never brought that into the locker room,” Kelly said, via Black Sports Online. “We had a meeting the day after the Green Bay game that he did it in the preseason and he explained to all the players the process and mindset of what he was doing. And there were some players that agreed with him and there were some players that didn’t agree with him.

“After that point we heard from the outside what a distraction it is except those people weren’t in our locker room and Kap never was a distraction and turned it into a circus. He came into work every day, extremely diligent in terms of his preparation, in terms of his work ethic in the weight room, in terms of his work ethic in the meeting room.

“I really enjoyed Kap. I’ve talked to him three or four times since we left San Francisco. I know he’s working out really hard in New York right now. I think he’s a really good person and a really good player. And I really enjoyed coaching him.”

In addition to talking about Kaepernick, Kelly answered a question about his alleged pursuit of Marcus Mariota during the 2015 NFL Draft.

Kelly says that contrary to the trade rumors leading up to the draft, the Eagles never made the Titans an offer because Tennessee was adamant about selecting Mariota and would not entertain trades.

“With Tennessee, they weren’t moving off the pick. Rightly so. They were looking for the same thing we were, to get themselves a really top-quality quarterback. It really wasn’t like … We didn’t really get into a conversation of what we can offer or what we can’t offer, because they made it known that they really weren’t looking to trade the pick.”

The Titans were smart for that, because now they have Mariota and appear to be building a contender.

As far as Kaepernick, Kelly defended the QB during the season, so it’s not a huge surprise that he’s continued to back Kap. He also said he felt multiple surgeries the year before resulted in Kaepernick not being at his best.

Four potential replacements if Lincoln Riley falters at Oklahoma

The news of Bob Stoops’s retirement as Oklahoma football coach took everyone by surprise — and also kickstarted the rumor mill into high gear. Was 33-year-old assistant Lincoln Riley really the man the school trusted to lead one of the nation’s most prestigious football programs into the future? For now, the answer is yes, with Riley being given the job without any qualifiers or interim tags attached.

Is Riley really the long-term answer, or will Oklahoma keep one eye on the coaching carousel in the event he underwhelms? Here are a list of possible names who could wind up with the job in the next couple years if Riley falters.

1) Chip Kelly

If Riley fails to impress in his first season or two, all eyes will fall on Kelly, who has only recently joined ESPN as an analyst. Pretty much everyone agrees that his stop in Bristol is temporary.

Whatever you make of Kelly’s NFL career, his collegiate resume speaks for itself: 46-7, three top-ten finishes, and one of the most innovative and electrifying offenses at the college level in recent memory. It’s an open question whether he’d be able to recapture that magic at a different school, but pretty much any major program with a vacancy would be willing to find out, as his established record of success bests everyone else’s.

The only question would be whether Kelly would be willing to finally let go of his NFL ambitions and settle for another college job. After getting passed over for every position he interviewed for this past offseason, the answer might be yes, and he’d struggle to find a superior college opening than Oklahoma’s.

2) Les Miles

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