Will Mike Vrabel go back to school to choose the New England Patriots' next offensive coordinator?
Josh McDaniels is viewed by many as the favorite to become the Patriots' OC under Vrabel, thanks to his wealth of experience in that role with New England and his recent work with Mac Jones, who finished second in Rookie of the Year voting in 2021.
But the Patriots' OC search is still wide open -- the team has only interviewed Chicago Bears interim head coach Thomas Brown and Los Angeles Rams passing game coordinator Marcus Brady to date, per reports -- and ESPN's Mike Reiss noted over the weekend that Ohio State offensive coordinator Chip Kelly could be an "outside-the-box possibility" for New England.
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While Kelly has never worked directly with Vrabel, he is the mentor of current Ohio State head coach Ryan Day, whom Vrabel pursued as an OC candidate in his first year as Tennessee Titans head coach back in 2018. Kelly now works at Vrabel's alma mater and just helped the Buckeyes win the national championship with a 34-23 victory over Notre Dame on Monday.
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Unlike McDaniels, who took his first NFL job in 2001 and never looked back, Kelly has extensive experience in the college ranks, with stops at the University of New Hampshire (offensive coordinator from 1999 to 2006), Oregon (head coach from 2009 to 2012) and UCLA (head coach from 2018 to 2023), among others.
Former Patriots linebacker Ted Johnson believes a coach like Kelly would be a great pairing with Drake Maye and could help unlock the second-year quarterback in a similar fashion to Washington Commanders OC Kliff Kingsbury with Jayden Daniels this season.
"I love the idea of a coach that has experience in the college game," Johnson said on Sports Sunday, as seen in the video player above. "Tommy Rees is the name we've been batting around; he's now been elevated to offensive coordinator (in Cleveland). ... We all thought because he had a college background, that he would be a good option. I love the idea.
"It's the same kind of Kliff Kingsbury thing. Even though he's (been) a head coach in the NFL, he was a head coach at Texas Tech, he was an assistant at Oklahoma, at USC. So, he knows the college game, and the college game is more influential in the pro game, now more than ever.
"When you talk about all the different styles of quarterbacks -- there's no more pocket quarterbacks. The best quarterbacks in the league right now are guys that are mobile, can move on the run, and you can create creative plays and game plans around because of their athletic ability.
"You mentioned Chip Kelly; to me, he's a better option and I'd feel more comfortable with him being here than I would with Josh McDaniels."
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Kelly has worked with plenty of athletic quarterbacks, from Marcus Mariota at Oregon to Colin Kaepernick with the San Francisco 49ers to Dorian Thompson-Robinson at UCLA. So, there's a compelling case for having him design an offense around Maye that accentuates the 22-year-old's rushing ability -- 421 rushing yards on 7.8 yards per carry as a rookie -- while importing fresh concepts from the college game.
The counter-argument is that McDaniels also has worked with a wide range of QBs, from traditional pocket passers like Tom Brady and Mac Jones to one of the best running QBs ever in Cam Newton. McDaniels also sounded intrigued by Maye's dual-threat capabilities during a preseason podcast appearance with ex-Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman before the season.
"Is he gonna be a little bit of a runner like Josh Allen was in Buffalo? I don't think he's quite as big as Josh is, but guys like that that have those kinds of attributes, you can use them to run the football too," McDaniels said of Maye at the time.
McDaniels already has had two stints as Patriots OC, so if Vrabel is looking for fresh ideas on offense, Kelly or another OC candidate with college experience might be worth considering. But if McDaniels has his own fresh ideas for utilizing Maye, that might be hard for Vrabel to turn down.