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Chip Kelly: Eagles took 'different direction' with Roseman move

PHOENIX - A day after Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie said that Chip Kelly wanted "a football guy" to run the Eagles personnel department, the Eagles coach said moving Howie Roseman out as general manager and promoting Ed Marynowitz as his chief scout were moves made to "maximize everybody's strengths."

Eagles general manager Howie Roseman (right) and head coach Chip Kelly. (Clem Murray/Staff Photographer)
Eagles general manager Howie Roseman (right) and head coach Chip Kelly. (Clem Murray/Staff Photographer)Read more

PHOENIX - A day after Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie said that Chip Kelly wanted "a football guy" to run the Eagles personnel department, the Eagles coach said moving Howie Roseman out as general manager and promoting Ed Marynowitz as his chief scout were moves made to "maximize everybody's strengths."

"Howie does an unbelievable job from the contract side and cap side," Kelly said Wednesday at the NFL meeting, "and we're just moving in a different direction from a personnel standpoint."

Kelly was asked what he thought of Roseman - who had been the Eagles' GM for six seasons after getting his start as a salary-cap manager - as an evaluator of football talent.

"I thought he was good," Kelly said.

Lurie said Tuesday, though, that Kelly wanted to "integrate scouting with coaching" and that the new systems he brought to the Eagles required a different set of eyes during the evaluation period. Kelly said again that Roseman had final say in free agency and the draft during the coach's first two seasons with the Eagles.

"I didn't have final say," said Kelly, who did have final say over the 53-man roster, "so you always defer to who is in charge."

Did that mean Roseman wasn't getting you the players you needed?

"Nah, some of that it depends on who is available," Kelly said. "You can all evaluate and say whoever the top pick in the [2014] draft was that [receiver] Sammy Watkins was really talented, but you don't have an opportunity to get Sammy Watkins. A lot of it depends on where you have an opportunity to make selections.

"I said it a year ago - I thought Odell Beckham was the best player in the draft. I was right. We didn't have a chance to get an Odell Beckham. A lot of it depends on where you're selecting."

Kelly said he had only some input on the draft. The Eagles chose outside linebacker Marcus Smith in the first round last year, but he struggled as a rookie and played sparingly. Receiver Jordan Matthews thrived as a second-round pick, but third-rounder Josh Huff was inconsistent and fifth-rounder Taylor Hart (defensive end) was never active.

Huff and Hart played for Kelly at Oregon, but he said he had nothing to do with their becoming Eagles.

"I stayed out of those guys," he said. "I've done it with every guy from Oregon. I said, 'You guys make the decisions.' I had nothing to do with it. I let our scouts and coaches do that."

Kelly has specifications for each position, but he said most teams follow similar guidelines when choosing players. Lurie, though, said that Kelly's scouting approach was different from most teams' "because it's so tied to a particular series of requirements and modes of play."

If true, would that shrink the pool so much that it could be a detriment to finding the best talent?

"That's the $64,000 question, but you can say, 'You know what, our parameters are too tight, so let's expand them,' " Kelly said. "If you accept it, accept it. So if you accept that you're going to take a 5-7 corner and the ball gets thrown over his head, you can't say, 'Boy, he should have made that play.' He ain't going to make that play. The receiver is 6-4.

"So there's a give-and-take. . . . If you take overachievers that aren't the right size at every position, eventually you're going to have a 5-10 nose guard with a 5-9 inside linebacker with a 5-8 safety and they're going to run the ball right down your throat and you have no one to kick in the pants but yourself because you decided to make those selections."

Kelly said that Marynowitz, who was named vice president of player personnel in January, will oversee the scouting department and be in charge of staffing. The 31-year-old was the last candidate to be interviewed for the opening after a nearly four-week search that Kelly headed.

"I was impressed with his work ethic and impressed with his knowledge," Kelly said of Marynowitz. "Just sitting in draft meetings, sitting in free-agent meetings, listening to him talk, listening to him describe players, and it was always, 'Hey that guy is really sharp.'

"And then he was the last guy I interviewed and the last guy Mr. Lurie interviewed. I think he blew both of us away. It was like, 'Wow, this guy is extremely organized, extremely detailed, has a real good vision of what we are trying to get accomplished,' and I thought he was outstanding."