The NFL rumor mill is percolating as we come down the home stretch of the 2016 NFL regular season, and the San Francisco 49ers will remain involved in it until we get some kind of resolution in January. Last night, we came across a report about the 49ers potentially being interested in Packers personnel man Eliot Wolf. Today, Bleacher Report’s Mike Freeman offers some rumors about Chip Kelly’s future.
Freeman took a look at all the teams with a coach potentially on the hot seat, and spoke with assistant coaches and team executives across football to get some insight into each job. His 49ers insight does not offer much more than what we have already heard:
Chip Kelly's work with Colin Kaepernick may have given Kelly one more season, one assistant coach said. But other team executives believe the entire operation will be obliterated and rebuilt. There were few names I heard associated with the 49ers.
He does not clarify if the assistants or executives are 49ers people, or just people around the league. And so, we are left with, “he might get another year, or he might get fired.”
All of this really does depend on what happens at the general manager position. If Trent Baalke somehow does not get fired, my guess is Kelly would be back. If Baalke is fired and Tom Gamble is promoted in his place, my guess is Kelly would be back. If Baalke is fired and the Yorks look outside the organization, my guess is Kelly would be fired.
None of these guesses is anything close to certain, because we really don’t know what the Yorks actually want to do. I just don’t see a complete overhaul being in their nature, but maybe they’ll surprise us.