Press Pass: Chip Kelly

I mean he's I know he's disappointed, but it's just my call, you know. I think there's a fine line, you know, and then I part of it. You look at what happened to Niles Paul last night, you know for the Redskins, who's a tremendous football player who's done for the year right now. So there's that fine line in in uh preseason games where you are so um, you know, his first eleven on eleven was two weeks ago, and now going out against a team. It just my decision.

I've we've been back and forth around it, but I made the final call that we're just we're gonna sit in this game and he'll be ready to play against Ravens. So Marcos start the game. Um, that's the only position we've really done right now is just quarterbacks. The rest of it we'll all be determined based off of today's training and tomorrow's training on what's going to be available.

But Marco's start, Um won't play very much, and then it'll be a lot of Matt, a lot of Tims, so we would chance to see those guys in some extended play. So you're balance between you know, getting the guy out there that has not played a lot over the last two years, getting you comfortable one pass rush to Sina, and also of course trying to make sure that he stays healthy for the lot of Yeah, that's

the decision I had to make. And I think with the training sessions with the Ravens next week, I think we'll help, you know, because we'll get two real good days with them in pads with with uh you know, with John's team, and then then we have the game against the Ravens and you got the Packers. So um, I felt like we had some more opportunities for it. So Marco and injury, I gave one more time. Any other position besides quarterback won't be determined until after training tomorrow.

So to Marco's gonna go today. Um, he'll go tomorrow and then we'll make determination on all those guys. So Sam try to talk you out of not getting anywhere. He didn't talk. You know, Sam understands, but I did think he's disappointed. But I think he understands. So there wasn't a debate out there yesterday. App Yeah, Zach has a core muscle injury and he's probably gonna be out for a couple of weeks now. No, I think he'll be back for a week one. But I think right

now he's out. So Um, he's with doctor Myers today. So um it'd be to be a couple of weeks with him. Um, but he won't. He's not going to play in the preseason. The opportunity, said to him, gives you from a schematic standpoint, because of his skill set, if you were to make the team, would it be fair to say that some of those things that you might want to employ him to do, we wouldn't necessarily see in the preseason anyway. Now, I mean that's part

of our offense and what we do. So you know, I think when Tim gets in there, you'll see him and run the ball a little bit, you know, that's part of what he Uh. We have the ability to call plays depending on who's in there, so you'll see that. We're not trying to hide anything. I think people know we can run zwn me plays in. The quarterback has the ability to carry the football, So I don't think that would surprise anybody if we didn't do that in

the preseason. A sudden Tim at an opportunity to played during the season and we sprung it on him. So like a gadget standpoint, but you wouldn't show gadgets in pre season. Yeah, but Tim's not a gadget guy. I think Tim's a quarterback and I think he's proven that so far when he's been out here. And um for all those guys though, and I've said it to begin with,

they they're in red jerseys. It's a different game when we get to Sunday, and I'm excited, you know, we really as a coach chef, I want to see Matt play awhile and I don't want to see Tim play awhile. And we'll see what happens to those guys. Yeah, yes, Jamarco will go, Demko's going, Kendricks will go. Um. The only guy who's not going is Arts and Brandon Hepburn has an ab a domino. Um, so he's out. I

don't we don't. I don't have the extension on Brandon Hepburn and d J McBride hurt his foot, so he won't go. But all those other guys will be back. Loa, No, Kiko is out me Yeah, No, he's coming along. He's done a lot of different things. We're trying get him acclimated. And you know, we also carried the ball more than anybody in the National Football League last year, so we're just trying to integrate him into Yeah, we look at

everybody's and where they are from a body standpoint. I think we manage every individual player here in terms of where they are and what they are. And my job, or our whole not my job, our entire coaching staff, training staff, sports scien staff, is to get those guys ready to play in week one. So Malcolm j Malcolm James is busting people's chops and I was laughing because he asked me before he did it. Can we get those guys, some Mahitos and maybe some fans because they

got a day off. But um, again, we every player is dealt with individual here, so you know what works for player A may be different from player B. And that's that's the way we've always done it. So he goes fine. But I think it's again we know what type of football player is, but that's not a position. That's not something you need to rush him back into doing anything. I think he's he's his legs are healthy, you can run around, he can do all those other things.

But I think and when you deal with an injury like that, you're just gonna take your time. We don't have a game to play until we play the Falcons on the fourteenth. So yeah, now we haven't even put him through the protocol. He's where we're just taking him along slowly, so why not put him Well, he's doing stuff in there, but we haven't asked to get him

cleared because right now it's not important to us. It's just let's just make sure that that he's in meetings, he understands everything, he's doing everything in there, and when we get ready, he'll be ready to go play against Ravens hopefully, So what you meet so many changes this all season has to be a point where you do what you want to see your guys on the fields this game and just closer, closer your part of you guys as a fan of this football team and help

this game, and you want to see all these changes how they come together out here. Now, my my job is to make sure our team's ready play against Atlanta Falcons. So I'm not a fan of anything. My job is to make sure that this team is ready to play when we go to play Atlantis, I'll say, but not playing the streete we play against. We haven't. We haven't

gotten into that part of it. But you know, usually the damo is we're gonna play our Usually our ones play eight to ten snaps in game one, it gets extended in game two, you play probably a half in game three, and then they don't play in game four. So um, but a lot of that will depend on

how everything else falls into place. But Fridge a tight ends and obviously with Arks being out for a while, you over probably Yeah, I thought, well, it's one of those where daily it's it's kind of a different guy shows up, you know, Eric Thomlinson came on the last two days, made some big catches for us in the red zone. Um. All three of them have size. Uh, Andrew's a really sharp players, really pick things up very quickly. Um. And then justin Twoks is starting to really come along.

So excited to see those three guys. So one of the buy products is not being able to have Zach for a couple of games here in the preseason. We'll give those guys an opportunity to show what they can do because we we have three guys you know and sell it, Urts and and Trey that we feel real confident in. But you know, really trying to figure out who that fourth guy is. And I think it's really a toss up. But all three of those guys have at times getting like, wow, they got a legitimate show

of making this football team. Let's see how we can do it on a more consistent basis. Offensive weapons acknowledge when you signed this way book would be crazy and tight end. Were you looking at all for guys who were beating? Yeah, outstanding blockers along with maybe if you're blocking more than receiving or didn't matter to you that.

I think sometimes when you get to the undrafted free agents immediately after the draft, it's what's available, because you know, you say, hey, I really like that guy, and then that it happens that everybody. Then someone takes him in the sixth and you're, God, I wish we were hoping, you know, we get a chance to get him, you know, a little bit later in terms of where he is. But um, you know, those are three guys we liked. They all have specific qualities that you kind of like

in them. But it was just at that point in time, you're just what's available in uh and who are you gonna be able to bring in? And with James Casey not here, you know, I think they all felt that it was an opportunity to compete and see the fourth tight end could be on this team. Four guys are right? Did you four slash four? Was it alphabetical aphabetic or numeracle alphabetical? All right? Are you looking forward to Yeah? We are, you know, and they'll they'll all get an

opportunity to play. Um, but you're excited to see what those guys can do when it's when it's live competitions. Yeah, it shows out here, but it's I think that kind

of validates it when you get in the game. So here I'm one wondering do you think that the place for your advantage calling up play and then young I try not to bust people's chops when I'm calling plays, but not being able to I think it helps, I mean, but what we end up doing because of I think the thing that helps the most is we've got so many reps and we get so many more opportunities to

be in play calling situations, if that makes sense. So we've had a lot of trial and error in terms of how we do it because we get so many reps, in terms of how we train. I think that's the biggest thing for us employees pick it right, sure, yeah, But the key is if you run a lot of players, you can call crappy ones, you know what I mean. So if you if you're a team that only runs fifty to sixty plays a game, you almost have to

hit on every single one of your play calls. If you can get eighty five to ninety play calls, you're gonna you know, twenty five thirty not very good calls, but they tend to forget about them because the next play got your first down. You know what I mean now book on game day is I think I just think your retention during the week, you know you can have That's the fine line I think for any staff when you're putting together a game plan is how much

is too much? You know, we need to have this, we need to have this, we need to have this. And then for us, you want to have confidence because they drilled it. You know, if you go into a game and you know, you listen, people say, we have one hundred and fifty plays up for this game, Well, how did you practice them all week on? You only have X amount of days. We're getting fifty snaps three days in a row. That's one fifty. Did you run

every play once you know? And did you run it to the right, did you run it to the left? You know? And did you run it against that defense that you were anticipating getting. So that's kind of the chess matchup when you try to pare down a little bit. Just so our guys when we call things, they're prepared for more than one or two offenses. I mean one or two defenses. So contract too long time us funny

bad because they had in your news year. But those two guys are outstanding leaders here both you know, Todd offensively and Trent defensively, and um economically, it's it's the only reason they're on another sideline. But those two guys did absolutely everything we asked them here. Um, they were two tremendous football players, two great Eagles. UM. So I'll be excited to see both those guys see them, especially

because you know they're both the sumilar situations. Yeah. I both those guys again, I thought did a great job because they were older veterans in here. Um, they accepted our staff and immediately when we got in here. Uh, we're both probably two of the hardest working players we had and on our team. You know, both in the classroom and in the weight room. You know, it was evident when you play that many years in this league, there's a reason for it, you know, And I think

it's their dedication. But there you know the quote unquote what everybody's looking for, two professional football player in terms of how those guys approached it, and I think it it really rubbed off on our younger guys. You know, you could ask BG, but I know how much he looked up to Trent, and Trent kind of took him

under his wing and trying to bring him along. And it's the same thing with Lane being next to Todd for such a long you know, for the two years that he was with him, how Todd kind of taught Lane the rope. So they were both real good mentors to our younger players. Here we're saying, at does he have limitations at all coming off his injury or seeing he's been full going everything. The only limitation as a head coach. Yeah, obviously you would rather he'd got some

game reps in the preseason. How does that set him back in terms? You know, the biggest thing for us in this situation, to be honest with you, is that, um, it's something that we wanted to get cleaned up. So it's the reps weren't really important. I think it's in a long term thing. He's going to be a lot better for it. So we just wanted to get it out of the way. I don't know, but we just wanted whatever it is. Doctor Meyers said, it's gonna be a couple of weeks and things. He'll be fine by

the opener. So I said, if we got to shut him down now, I'd rather shut him down now then have to shut him down sometime in the middle of the season, so thanks ro