SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- Never scared to try something new that could help his football team, San Francisco 49ers coach Chip Kelly once worked on developing a robotic tackling dummy while he was coaching at Oregon.

It was a good idea; it just didn't work.

"It broke after the first tackle," Kelly said, chuckling at the memory. "It went really fast, but we had a great guy that was a local guy in town at Oregon that did a great job with it."

Technology has come a long way since then. On Monday, the Niners received a shipment of three remote-controlled tackling dummies. The dummies, which have been seen in various other camps around the NFL and got their own segment during an episode of HBO's "Hard Knocks" with the Los Angeles Rams, are also known as Mobile Virtual Players, or MVPs. They are still in the testing stage but are making the rounds in the NFL and on college campuses.

While 49ers coach Chip Kelly sounded enthusiastic about the possibilities for robotic tackling dummies, the reception from players was more mixed. Courtesy Mobile Virtual Players

Former Dartmouth coach Buddy Teevens helped develop the current models, which are gaining popularity quickly in football circles. Kelly said he and Teevens go way back.

“We liked them," Kelly said. "I know Buddy Teevens from Dartmouth very well. They are the ones who designed them and came with up with the original idea. But, to put it together where it’s also safe, because you also don’t want to get an injury from it."

Therein lies the ultimate appeal of the dummies: Teams don't tackle live in practice for fear of injuries, but with a dummy, it can help alter the way you practice.

"I think it’s advantageous that you can do some live tackling," Kelly said. "We used it with the offensive line yesterday in our screen drills and some of them were cut-blocking it when obviously you’re not going to cut-block a player in practice. But you can cut-block a bag. So, I think it’s a huge step for everybody. You want to get accomplished a lot of things in training sessions, but you also want to do it in a safe environment. A lot of times, it’s not the guy doing the tackling, it’s the guy getting tackled. So the fact that the guy getting tackled is an inanimate object, lends itself to ... I think we’ll continue to do more with that.”

The 150-pound dummies can be controlled by coaches, who are able to manipulate them to move in any direction at speeds up to 18 miles per hour. The technology for the dummies originated at Dartmouth; their first documented appearance at the NFL level came during Pittsburgh Steelers camp in the spring.

Kelly said as he and the Niners get accustomed to using the MVPs, they'll be able to incorporate them in different ways during practice.

“Everybody on defense can tackle them," Kelly said. "So you get the whole defense who can use them to work on pass rush, trying to come up and under. I think, the longer our coaches put their heads together, there’s a lot of different things you can use them for. It’s, basically, we do a lot of work with sleds and dummies, but now you have a sled/dummy that can move. So, kind of, I don’t think there’s a limitation in terms of where we are from that standpoint.”

Not everyone is all the way on board with the dummies, though. Linebacker NaVorro Bowman said he didn't attempt a tackle on any of them, but saw a player he refused to name make an effort and fail.

"No, I haven't -- actually one guy tried to do something on it and it didn't turn out well for him," Bowman said. "He tried to tackle the robot and the robot tackled him a little bit.

"So I'm going to leave the dummies alone."