Chip Kelly quotes extensively from 'A Few Good Men' while discussing ejection rule

NFC coaches met with the media on Wednesday, and that meant an hour on a wide array of topics for San Francisco 49ers head coach Chip Kelly. He hit on plenty of expected topics, but he also got a chance to speak about the NFL's decision to require ejection if a player is flagged for two unsportsmanlike conduct penalties.

Kelly and other coaches are not fans of the new rule, in part because referees already have the opportunity to eject players for rule violations. One coach brought up the point that if a star player gets one unsportsmanlike conduct penalty, the other team could decide to have one of their end of the roster players try and goad the player into another penalty. Obviously the player should have the discipline to not do something stupid, but these things happen.

Kelly took a different approach to discussing the rule change. He quoted extensively from A Few Good Men. Matt Maiocco and Greg Bedard both discussed the comments. Here are the first two paragraphs.

"Ever see A Few Good Men? Why the two orders? Right?" Kelly said, in a rare moment of levity during his 60-minute Q and A with the media. "If you already have the ability to throw them out of the game, why do we have to put a second order in to throw them out the game? Throw them out of the game. If they're not playing it the right way and you have ability to eject them, why do we ... There is already a mechanism.

Private Santiago. Don't touch him. Why the two orders? Right, you tell me. Maybe they ordered a code red we didn't know about, we have to investigate. It is important to know. And I don't think anybody's ordering a code red in the National Football League."

Kelly went on even longer name-dropping Col. Jessup and Lt. Kaffee, and wondering why we didn't have Jessup and Kaffee in there going back and forth about the truth. It's worth a read.

I have no idea what got him going on that, but it's pretty great stuff, and some nice levity.