Aaron Fentress, Rob Moseley and others are reporting that various sources, including KGW and the Tampa Bay Times, are reporting that Chip Kelly is close to signing a deal to coach the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
The three highest-paid coaches in the NFL, Bill Belichick, Mike Shanahan and Pete Carroll, make around 7 million dollars a year. Kelly’s deal at Oregon pays him in the neighborhood of four million.
In Chip we trusted. Chip Kelly’s close to running out of town for a lucrative pro deal (katu.com photo).
Jim Harbaugh of Stanford found immediate success as a pro coach, but others like Nick Saban, Bobby Petrino and Oregon State’s Mike Riley found the long hours and cutthroat environment, coupled with players not motivated past their cars or their mistresses, was not for them. The pay is great, but the pressure and the working conditions are terrible. Many coaches sleep in their office. If Kelly didn’t enjoy interacting with the media at Oregon, the mandatory postgame press conferences in the NFL will be a constant irritant for him.
But he’s one of the brightest minds in coaching, and sources close to him say he’s intrigued by the challenge of coaching at the highest level. He’s risen from assistant coach at New Hampshire to the Top Five of college football in five years, and now an NFL deal is likely within hours.
For Duck fans, this is a tremendous shock coming on the heels of turn-pro announcements by LaMichael James and Darron Thomas. It will make many think about their emotional investment in college football. It’s clearer now than ever before that for the players and coaches, it’s a business.
If Kelly goes, Oregon will likely make immediate overtures to former assistant coach Chris Petersen, the highly successful head man of the Boise State Broncos. Earlier this month Petersen signed a new contract that pays him about two million a year, about half of what he could make coaching the Ducks. Petersen has been approached about many jobs, and he says he and his family are very happy in Boise.
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