Tom Gamble could be the key for making Chip Kelly, Trent Baalke work

The San Francisco 49ers have hired Chip Kelly to be head coach, and one of the main issues brought up repeated before, and again now that he has been hired, is his potential relationship with Trent Baalke. Jim Harbaugh departed after a prickly end to that relationship, and there is concern by some that Kelly will bring a similar prickly nature.

While the personalities will always be a concern, the 49ers could have the person to make this work. Tom Gamble is reportedly close with Chip Kelly. He worked with him in Philadelphia, but was fired in what some reported as a power struggle with general manager Howie Roseman. Gamble had worked in San Francisco before, so it was not surprising to see him return in a personnel role.

I bring all that up because Gamble could be a buffer for the Baalke/Kelly relationship. Jim Harbaugh did not seem to have such a buffer, and we saw how that ended. That's not to say this will work out well, but if it is going to work out, I feel like Gamble will play a critical role. Obviously you'd like a strong relationship between coach and GM, but one upside to all this would be that the 49ers and Kelly know there is the potential for conflict. This could all blow up in their faces, so let's not pretend this is a sure thing. But, it's going to be interesting either way.