The offensive coordinator has been implementing concepts from other systems that the quarterback has played in
Going back to his days at Oregon and his brief stint as the Philadelphia Eagles’ head coach, new Las Vegas Raiders offensive coordinator Chip Kelly has a long-standing reputation as an offensive innovator. One way he earned that distinction is by never being stuck in his ways and constantly willing to adapt his scheme.
Now that Kelly will be working with new Raiders’ starting quarterback Geno Smith for the first time, the coach is making sure to adjust his offense to Smith’s strengths, which the coach shined some light on recently.
“The beauty of Geno is that Geno has been in multiple systems now, and there’s a lot of things Geno can do,” Kelly told reporters during OTAs in Las Vegas on May 29. “I don’t think you can just pigeonhole him. I think he runs better than people really give him credit for. You look at the two-minute drive against the [San Francisco] 49ers at the end of the game, and he runs it in for the winner.”
In the contest the offensive coordinator refers to, the Seattle Seahawks trailed by four with 2:38 to play. Smith led an 11-play two-minute drive that was capped off by his 13-yard scamper for the win. In that contest specifically, he had four carries for 29 yards in addition to the touchdown. He finished last season with 53 rushing attempts, 272 rushing yards and two scores on the ground.
“I think [Smith] can beat you with his feet,” Kelly continued. “He can keep plays alive with his feet. He’s extremely accurate. He gets the ball out of his hand quickly. He can be a movement guy, but he can also be a drop-back guy, and Pete [Carroll] and Greg Olson, our quarterback coach, had a great understanding, because they’ve coached him for such a long time.” Carroll coached Smith for five seasons in Seattle and Olson was there for one year.
“And what we saw in terms of Pete’s evaluation, Oli’s (Olson) evaluation of him is what I’ve seen here. I think whatever we fit into schematically offensively, I think Geno can handle all that.”
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When it comes to putting together the Raiders’ offense in 2025, the play-caller and quarterback have been working together as Kelly has been picking the quarterback’s brain for concepts that Smith liked at previous stops.
“Geno is a football guy, like Geno loves ball,” Kelly said. “We’ll talk on a Tuesday night about what transpired that day, ‘How do you see this?’ And I really lean on him a little bit, because of his wealth of experience, and he’s been through different coordinators in this league, and some really good ones.
“So like, ‘Hey, how did Shane [Wadron] do this when you were with him?’ Or, ‘How did [Ryan] Grubb do this when you were with him?’ And kind of pick his brain that way, and then put together what’s the best thing for us going forward.
Kelly went on to say that Smith is “a blessing to coaches” and has been a great leader so far.
“Geno is literally like a second coach. When you’re in that room with him and Greg Olson, there’s a lot of ideas going around, and then it’s just a matter of corralling it…His football acumen is really off the charts, and it’s impressive to be around him.”
The respect between the offensive coordinator is mutual, as the former Seahawk said during OTAs that he’s been interested in playing for the former Oregon head coach for over 15 years.
“In many ways, it’s a dream come true, because I’ve always revered Coach Kelly, and I’ve always thought he’s been an excellent coach throughout his career, and a guy who I’ve, really, wanted to play for. Even back then, when I was in high school,” Smith told reporters. “It didn’t work out that way, but God works in mysterious ways and here we are today in Las Vegas.”
In 2009, the Miramar, Florida native was a four-star recruit who had scholarship offers from several major college programs, including Oregon, according to 247Sports. However, Kelly was entering his first season as the Ducks’ head coach at that time, and Smith opted to play at West Virginia instead.
Now, they finally get to work together and seem to be hitting it off, both on and off the field.
“Being with Chip, you get to know him as a man, know what he’s about,” the quarterback continued. “[He’s an] outstanding human being, but also just a great mind. And he has a great mind for football and understands how to motivate guys. And I think that’s a really good trait that he has.
“…I think the offense is, like I say all the time, we want to be efficient. That’s the main thing, right? We want to do well in the situations, the third downs, the red zones, but also, we want to be explosive. And so, when teams come up and play us in man-to-man, we’ve got guys who are going to win those matchups. And I really feel good about where we are.
“Still a work in progress, but we’re in a good spot, and we just got to keep working hard to get better.”