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Notre Dame’s Brian Kelly disputes leaving Fighting Irish for NFL

By Patrick Schmidt

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Brian Kelly is getting out in front of the coaching rumors this year and the Notre Dame head coach is already putting an end to any talk he’ll leave for the NFL.

It’s only mid-July, but Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly is doing his best to squash any talk he could be leaving the Fighting Irish for the NFL.

Related: 10 College Coaches Who Would Thrive In NFL

So this Kelly won’t be following the path of former Oregon Ducks coach and current Philadelphia Eagles coach Chip Kelly and leave for the professional ranks where he wouldn’t have as much control as he currently enjoys.

In an interview with Rivals’ Notre Dame site Blue and Gold Illustrated, Kelly downplays the notion of leaving college for the NFL and even thinks it’s a crazy notion to suggest he would.

"“I don’t know how to stop that other than to say there’s no other place, first of all, in college that I would want to coach,” Kelly said to Blue and Gold Illustrated..” No. 2, I get to pick the players that play for me, I get to negotiate the contracts. I’ve got the salary cap, I’ve got all that. In the NFL, you don’t get to do any of that. Look what [Philadelphia Eagles head coach] Chip Kelly‘s going through. He tries to control all that and he gets killed for it. I can do all that here at Notre Dame.”"

No matter what Kelly says today, you can’t rule out a move to the NFL at some point, but his points are well stated.

In college, he doesn’t have to worry about a salary cap, players holding out for a new contract or working for a general manager who has final say over personnel. At Notre Dame, Kelly can get as many four and five-star recruits as he can convince to play for the Fighting Irish as opposed to the NFL where he has one first round pick.

We’ve seen college coaches have success in the NFL, but many college coaches flame out in the NFL, including Nick Saban, Bobby Petrino and Steve Spurrier, but thankfully for Notre Dame it doesn’t look like Kelly has any interest in trying his hand in the NFL.

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