LeSean McCoy Compares Andy Reid And Chip Kelly
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – It's only natural to compare Andy Reid and Chip Kelly, especially this week. Eagles running back LeSean McCoy was asked to, and said the two are like night and day.
"Chip can be tough, but he has that, like those small things, when Andy [Reid] was here you never seen him. On the practice field, he never came in the locker room, he never came in the training room, you never seen him," McCoy said on 94WIP Monday night. "Certain guys, like he [Ike Reese] said, would come up to the office, 'What's up coach, what's going on?' With Chip [Kelly], it's different. He's in the weight room, 'Hey what's going on guys, what are you doing?' He might do a little curl or do, make a joke or two, you'll see him in the training room. So he's always around, where guys can joke a lot and say what they want when the coach is not around, but when he's always around the awareness pops out, 'Alright, is coach here?' So he's different. He's [Kelly] a players coach and he gets out there, he might go over like different drills, he'll pop in a drill. He'll put the away jersey on, so he's cool, like the scout team. Chip is different, I like it a lot."
The two coaches will be linked for the rest of the time they're at their current jobs. Reid brings his new team, the Kansas City Chiefs, to Philadelphia for a Thursday night game against the Eagles and Kelly. Reid has turned the Chiefs around, and at 2-0 they've won as many games as they did all of last season. Kelly's Eagles are 1-1, but have been exactly as advertised. An offensive juggernaut, with a defense that will make victories a struggle, even when the offense is at its peak.
"I mean, the Washington game, I've never seen a coach get so hype. I'm like, wow, does he [Kelly] want to suit up? Certain words he's saying to get us up, 'Come on guys, let's go!', " McCoy said. "My favorite quote he said was, 'You know what guys, if you make a mistake on a play don't worry about it because we're running so many darn plays you can make a mistake!'"
Reid was considered a players coach, and had the support of his team until things fell apart in his last couple of seasons in Philadelphia. McCoy said that protecting his players like he did may have taken its toll, at least publicly.
"I think sometimes he [Andy Reid] took a lot of heat and responsibility for things that he had nothing to do with. I think, I don't want to say the fans didn't appreciate him because I think they did, I felt it was such a long stretch," McCoy said. "He didn't get the Super Bowl, he didn't win things, but you don't understand, in this league it's so hard to win. In this league, you won't find to many great coaches like Coach Reid. It's a reason why, when he got fired right, how fast he got a job."
"He [Andy reid] sends some texts out, every once in awhile, and I talk to his wife. So we're definitely close. Since I've came into the league he's only been---embraced me with open arms and he's been excellent to me. So, I love the guy. Actually when he came in, when he left, I was so angry like, 'Man why did we let him go' and I'm putting fear in everybody else, you know and I love Chip [Kelly] so them feelings went away a little bit. But I love Coach Reid. He didn't show like his true emotions to the fans, that's another thing why they didn't like him so much. To the media, he was so dry and dull. To the players, though, we seen the real Coach Reid. Fired up! The texts, the calls, big game, trying to get his guys amped up."
Chip Kelly is also excitable, but in a different way than Reid. A way that the Eagles players seem to be embracing.
"He [Chip Kelly] approaches the game like a player, that's what a player does. As a close game you look at all the small things you could have did better in that game," McCoy said. "And he knows that, like myself, I know I'm gonna make way more better plays and positive plays, than negatives. And he knows that, he's going to make way more positive plays, as far as making calls and things like that, than negatives."
Andy Reid and Chip Kelly will not face each other in an NFL game for a quite a while after Thursday, that is unless one of them doesn't last in his current job, or the two meet in the (gasp!) Super Bowl at some point. But the lack of head to head matchups will not prevent the comparisons between the two. They both get chance to get a leg-up in such comparisons this week.
Listen To McCoy's Comments About Reid and Kelly:
