I finally got to see the entire Chip Kelly breakfast talk. For those brave souls with an hour to kill, PE.com has the whole thing posted. I enjoyed it, but I’m one of those wackos that loves listening to football coaches speak.

If you try to compare some of what Chip says to his actions, to what Jeff Lurie said and to other bits of info, you will find some inconsistencies. Sheil Kapadia noted a couple of these in an excellent piece he wrote. Here’s one of them.

6. Kelly and Lurie offered two different stories when discussing the McCoy trade. Lurie said Kelly preferred a different style of runner, a one-cut back who didn’t dance. Kelly said it was purely a financial move to free up cap space.

We’ve been over this before, but believe the owner here. I can understand why Kelly doesn’t want to sound like he’s criticizing McCoy, but the Inquirer reported that the Eagles didn’t approach the running back about redoing his deal.

And in the end, the deal they gave DeMarco Murray is essentially the same over the next three years as the one McCoy was on. The only difference is Murray’s getting $18 million guaranteed, and McCoy was not. In other words, they had more flexibility with the McCoy contract.

Yes, it’s true that McCoy had a bigger cap hit in 2015, but that could have easily been restructured by guaranteeing some of his salary.

Bottom line: Kelly wanted a different style runner, and he wanted Kiko Alonso. That’s why the deal was made, not because of McCoy’s contract.

Kelly had a love-hate relationship with LeSean McCoy for 2 years. Like all of us, Kelly loves the dynamic runs. McCoy makes guys miss better than any RB in a long time. The problem is that McCoy struggled to embrace the 4-yard run. He was always looking to bounce a play outside or to cutback and find wide open space. That led to too many negative runs. (See this great ChipWagon post for some examples of poor decisions)

McCoy also made strange decisions down the field at times. Most notably, he made a cut in the Snow Bowl that turned a 70-yard TD run into a play where Ndamukong Suh caught him from behind and the play only went for 20 yards. That really bugged Kelly. The play worked. The blockers did their part. The offense had a long TD. Instead, a poor read and poor cut turned it into simply a nice gain.

As great as the highlight runs are, there is something about a physical, downhill runner. They are going to have fewer negative plays. They are going to wear down defenders. Good look at a list of Super Bowl winners. I don’t think you’ll see many in recent years where the leading runner’s best quality was elusiveness. I’m not saying you need Earl Campbell, but you want RBs that get behind their pads and attack up the field.

Instead of talking about football philosophy, Kelly chose to focus on money. He mixed in some comments about liking one-cut, downhill runners, but he didn’t focus on that.

It doesn’t benefit Kelly to talk about what he really wants in RBs. He’d rather have the other 31 teams think this is all about money that to truly know his thinking. If those teams study things, they’ll figure out the truth. But why make it easy on them?

A good coach will pick and choose when to be honest. Fans and the media want honesty. It eliminates guessing and tells them exactly what is going on. Coaches are trying to protect their ideas, strategies and desires. Can you imagine Seattle telling the world they were targeting Russell Wilson in the 3rd round going into the 2012 draft? Andy Reid really wanted him and would have known to move up.

Heck, sometimes teams go out of their way to deceive others. Under Tom Heckert and Howie Roseman, the Eagles would bring in a few draft prospects to the NovaCare that they actually didn’t have on their draft board. They wanted to keep the rest of the league guessing. Do the Eagles like that guy or not?

Kelly’s primary goal when lying is to protect the team, not to deceive us or fool the media. Andy Reid did much of the same. Reid often lied to protect his players. That drove fans nuts, but led to guys being incredibly loyal to him. As much as fans wanted Reid to rip Todd Pinkston, it served no purpose.

Study actions, not words, and you’ll have a better idea of what a person really thinks.

When Chris Polk took over on goal line plays last year, that was a big hint that McCoy might not be in the long term plans. Does anyone remember Ricky Watters, Duce Staley or Brian Westbrook leaving the field inside the 10-yard line in the prime of their careers?

There is no real benefit to spilling the beans and sharing all your thoughts and ideas in the NFL. That’s one place where honesty most certainly isn’t the best policy. Lie, lie and lie some more.

Those of us who want to know the truth will follow the bread crumbs and try to figure out what’s really going on.

* * * * *

I had an interesting thought tonight when thinking about RBs.

This will be Kelly’s third year. Look at the RBs he’s had here.

LeSean McCoy

Bryce Brown

Chris Polk

Darren Sproles

DeMarco Murray

Ryan Mathews

Wow, that is one impressive group. Long way from the days of Anthony Toney, Mark Higgs and Robert Drummond, huh?