Chip Kelly has been the head coach of the Philadelphia Eagles since January 2013, and is now also the General Manager. He has been the head coach for 34 games.

It is time to fire Chip Kelly, and move on from this failed experiment. I know that Jeff Lurie won’t do this, because he still owes Chip Kelly $18 million in salary. But consider the following:

• The Eagles are 1-5 over their last 6 games.
• With an 0-2 start, there is now only a 10% chance that the Eagles make the playoffs this year.
• They did not make the playoffs in 2014, either.
• When they did make the playoffs in 2013, they lost at home in the first round to the New Orleans Saints.
• Which means that if they don’t make the playoffs this year, Chip Kelly will go three years without a postseason victory.
• Chip Kelly is supposedly an offensive genius. Let me put “offensive genius” in quotes. The offense is terrible. Twenty (20!) NFL quarterbacks rushed for more yardage yesterday all by themselves, than the entire Eagles backfield, including DeMarco Murray, Ryan Matthews and Darren Sproles.
• That backfield gained 7 yards last night.
• For those who think that I am reacting too soon….I am reacting too slowly. Bob Brookhaven of the Philadelphia Inquirer wrote an insightful article last week on Super Bowl-winning coaches (there are 11 active coaches in the NFL who have won Super Bowls). He noted that they have an “arc”, or a pattern of winning. All of the active NFL coaches who have won Super Bowls had more success, quicker, than Chip Kelly. No active NFL coach went three years without a playoff win, and then won a Super Bowl.
• The Eagles lost to a Cowboys team that was missing Dez Bryant for the entire game, and Tony Romo for the second half. In other words, the Eagles lost to a team that was missing its best WR, its QB, and its RB from last year (who is now playing for the Eagles).
• Chip Kelly is also the General Manager of the Eagles, which means he is responsible for personnel decisions.   His signature move will always be Sam Bradford. Bradford was a bad quarterback with St. Louis, so I wasn’t expecting very much from him, but I had no idea how bad he was. Yesterday, he had the lowest QBR rating of any quarterback in the league.  All of the other thirty-one QBs played better than he did. And we traded for him.
• In case you didn’t watch the game, one of Sam Bradford’s three turnovers happened on the snap. The center snapped the ball into his chest, but he wasn’t prepared to catch the ball. He was not prepared to receive the snap. For that alone, I would cut him. He is not prepared to play NFL football.
• For those that think that Sam Bradford’s Heisman trophy means anything-the last Heisman trophy winning QB to win the Super Bowl was Jim Plunkett. He was drafted in 1970.
• In addition to trading for Sam Bradford, and starting him, Chip Kelly wanted to sign him to a long term extension, in order to pay him even more money. Why? In addition, Kelly traded up to get Bradford, and is paying him almost twenty times (20!) what Nick Foles was making. Allow me to suggest that this was the worst trade in Philadelphia Eagles history.
• I can only find six players that Chip Kelly has drafted over the past three years on the roster. Two of them (Marcus Smith, 2014 first round pick) and Eric Rowe (2015 second round pick) haven’t played this year. They have been inactive- which means they aren’t good enough to play. We traded up (and traded away two draft picks) for Eric Rowe.
• Kelly has let some really good football players leave town, including LeSean McCoy, Jeremy Maclin, DeSean Jackson, Nick Foles, and Evan Mathis. Some Pro Bowl NFL talent there.
• I don’t even want to bother discussing penalties, mistakes, and missed assignments. There are too many to count. But every one of them is a sign of poor preparation. Is poor preparation the responsibility of the head coach (Chip Kelly) or the General Manager (Chip Kelly)?

The Chip Kelly Experiment is a gimmick. Run plays as fast as you can, in order to tire the other team out. It worked temporarily on the college level, against college players and coaches.

But now the NFL has cracked the code. The impact of that is that the Eagles defense is out on the field for 40 minutes a game, exhausting themselves.

Five of the last six games.
Please end the experiment.

Hal

P.S. For those who disagree- if you think the Eagles will make the playoffs I am willing to wager $100, payable to your favorite charity,. $1000 for a Super Bowl victory.

If you are willing to wager the same.

I’m waiting.