The odyssey of former San Francisco 49ers head coach Chip Kelly has been fascinating to watch this year. He went from helping Ohio State win a national championship as offensive coordinator in January to getting hired as offensive coordinator for the Las Vegas Raiders under Pete Carroll.
That experiment ended up going terribly as Niners fans couldn't help but laugh as things got worse and worse until Kelly was let go before the end of the season.
Yet, the beleaguered coach has got a new job with Northwestern University making him the offensive coordinator.
A return to the college ranks makes a ton of sense for Kelly. He gained notoriety for the job he did as head coach at the University of Oregon with an efficient, fast-paced offense that he was successfully able to bring to the NFL for a few years as the head coach of the Philadelphia Eagles.
After things went south in Philly, he was hired by the 49ers to replace Jim Tomsula and only lasted one season as the Niners went 2-14 which triggered a full-on clean house with Kyle Shanahan being hired as head coach and John Lynch being hired as general manager. That turned out to be a good decision by CEO Jed York.
Kelly returned to the college ranks and had minimal success as the head coach at UCLA before joining Ryan Day's staff at Ohio State. His hiring in Las Vegas was his first return to the NFL since his time with the Niners, and it truly could not have gone much worse.
The Raiders are 2-14 and it would not be a huge shock if Carroll gets let go after just one season with how much of a dumpster fire it has been.
Yet, while Kelly certainly deserves blame for how poor the Las Vegas offense has been for much of the year, he is much like a cat in that he always lands on his feet no matter how badly things go. For some reason, people keep taking a chance on him and it partly makes sense because his offensive scheme can be successful.
It would be surprising if he returned to the NFL anytime soon, though. After how badly things went with the Raiders, he is bound to be viewed as damaged goods, so serving as a collegiate offensive coordinator is probably what he is best suited as going forward.