“There were times when I was going with the threes, times when I was going with the twos, things like that,” said Eagles WR DeSean Jackson in a one-on-one conversation with Birds 24/7. “There was a point where I went into Chip Kelly’s office and talked to him face-to-face to see what was going on with that.”
Kelly told Jackson what he has stated publicly: that there is no depth chart, everyone on the roster will get a shot and nothing will be handed to you based purely on past performance.
“He just expects everyone to do things a certain way. He was asking everybody to do the same thing. For myself, I just had to really hear it from his mouth to get that rapport with him and be on the same page with him. When I went in there, he said he expects everybody to buy into the system and do everything the right way,” said Jackson. ”And if there is any little thing a player doesn’t want to do, that’s his way of reacting to it. The best thing I did was go talk to him instead of just sitting back and being mad.”
“I think one of the biggest reasons was the offense was kind of new to myself and I never really had to learn every position in the offense [under Andy Reid],” said Jackson. “At the beginning of the process I didn’t know the full offense and I didn’t know every play, so that probably had to do with why I was moved to different teams and things like that. Now I am all-in on the offense and I’m very familiar with the whole system. It’s a good thing that I am able to learn that and know what everyone is doing instead of one person.”
It's a good sign that Jackson has the maturity to deal with the situation the way he did, instead of letting things fester and possibly spin out of control. In 2012, Jackson had his worst season as a pro, catching just 45 passes for 700 yards and two TDs, and missed five games in the process. He is likely to be used in different ways in Kelly's new offense, but we're not expecting a big jump in carries. Expect a few more end-arounds and more quick-hitting WR screens.
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