Bruins, Hoping For Oregon-Esque Success, Are Stuck With An Also-Ran Head Coach
With media and fans scratching their heads, the answer to “what’s wrong with UCLA football” is simple. The Bruins hired Chip Kelly.
I’ve always felt Kelly was overrated as a coach in the first place. He received credit for taking Oregon from a 2-9 team every year to a fast-paced success. But that’s wrong.
The program was turned around by Rich Brooks, and Mike Bellotti is the one who put it in another gear. One of the things Bellotti did was bring in Kelly from New Hampshire to run his offense.
When Bellotti retired, Kelly did manage to maintain what his predecessor built. But Kelly has no track record of rebuilding a program, and in fact has a nice history of tearing down a couple in the NFL. Ask any Philadelphia Eagles fan how he or she feels about Kelly. He’s not exactly revered in San Francisco, either.
But, needing a “splash” hire, UCLA Athletics Director Dan Guerrero went for and got Kelly. It took $23 million to do it and fans were excited; “we finally paid for a coach!,” they exclaimed.
But the Bruins are terrible. They are 0-2 as of this writing, having been dominated by Cincinnati and were beaten for the first time in school history by San Diego State. Considering Kelly was 3-9 his first year, this is not exactly building for future success.
Here’s the big indicator of Kelly’s lack of coaching abilities: the team has not only not progressed from his first year but appears to have gone backward. Where is that vaunted offensive innovation? Why is the defense lining up improperly and missing tackles? Why is team play so sloppy?
By comparison, look at Pete Carroll’s second year at UCLA compared to his first, as well as Bob Stoops at Oklahoma, Nick Saban at Alabama, Dabo Swinney at Clemson and Kirby Smart at Georgia. Each took a team from being an also-ran to a national title contender. That’s coaching, folks.
Okay, UCLA is largely comprised of freshmen and sophomores but how much talent has Kelly actually recruited? The Bruins were 40th in national rankings this past recruiting year.
Kelly – and his “you guys don’t know what you’re talking about and I do” attitude – said he has a different way of evaluating players. But you need players to win. Look at Alabama and Clemson. Think they would be champions by recruiting 40th-ranked classes? And they coaches that are far better than Kelly.
Bruins fans are going to get a real look at how far behind their team is to elite programs when Oklahoma comes to town in Week 3. Maybe then, Bruins Nation will realize – as I do – that Kelly is not a good coach. A “splash” hire, yes. But someone forgot to put the water in the pool.
#ChipKelly
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Too Many liberal idiots running UCLA , they haven’t recruted correctly in many years – this is what liberalism does for you – liberals are ungodly & anti Christian people – no brains – whoever paid Chip Kelly 23 million or whatever he is paid needs to be indicted – wake up liberal Calif – UCLA lools like the worst team in football …. disgraceful !
Liberals or not, that has nothing to do with the current state of UCLA football and paying to get a coach who rode the coattails of the successes from the previous coaches at Oregon. You may be right on one thing, tho, about UCLA looking like the worst team in football.
Bruce Conley – you are an idiot!!! Do not make this in to a political issue.
UCLA made a bad coaching hire with Chip Kelly, and that’s it.
It was a bad coaching hire, you are correct.