WATCH: Chip Kelly on UCLA Football’s Quarterbacks, NFL Draft

Kelly said he called Broncos quarterback Russell Wilson to get him in touch with Greg Dulcich.

UCLA football coach Chip Kelly spoke to reporters before the Bruins’ final practice of spring camp on Saturday morning. Kelly talked about his depth at quarterback, his options at running back and tight end, Greg Dulcich and Sean Rhyan going in the third round of the NFL Draft and how the pass rush is developing.

FAIR TO SAY YOU’RE AS WELL-STOCKED AT QUARTERBACK AS YOU’VE BEEN SINCE YOU’VE BEEN HERE?

That’s fair. Dorian’s back for Year 5, and we’ve got a bunch of young kids, I think Justyn, Garbers, Chase—all those guys are really working hard at it, so today we feel good. Now, I’ve been in this before and two guys get injured and then all of a sudden you’re scrambling but those guys have worked really, really hard and with the addition of Justyn – they’re not just trying to remember, hey, this play is if the ball is snapped, they’re going through all their reads and doing a really good job, so we do feel confident with the group we have there.

NEXT STEP FOR DORIAN OR JUST CONSISTENCY?

I think it’s both. I think the No. 1 thing in that position is you have to be consistent and can you go out every day and continue to get a little bit better and he has done that through the course of this spring, you’ve seen him improve from practice one to practice 14, so it’s the subtle things, how he uses his cadence as a weapon, some other little integral things. For him, just like in school, he’s not an undergrad anymore he’s in grad school, he’s going to be here for Year 5, but the cool thing about him is you can see him getting better and better and he’s gotten better in practice 14 than he was in practice one, so.

RUNNING BACKS BEHIND CHARBONNET?

Obviously, Keegan’s played a ton of football and we feel really confident in Keegan. Deshun has not been in a game yet, but I think he’s really coming along and then we have Kaz there also who has done a really nice job for us. There isn’t the Brittain Brown that we can just say, ‘Hey, we’ve got Brittain,’ when Brittain had an opportunity to go, he was a great runner for us, so I think those guys are still continuing to develop at that group, but I think we’ve got confidence in both Kaz and Keegan because they’ve both carried the ball in games so we feel good about that and then we’ll see where Deshun has gotten better since last fall, he’s had a really good spring for us, but he hasn’t gotten in a game yet, so we’ve got to get him in a game and see what he can do for us.

GOOD SIZE AND PASS-CATCHING AT TIGHT END AND DEPTH?

We do. We feel as good about our tight end position as we do about our quarterback position from an overall depth standpoint with Mike and Priebe and Mike Martinez, Mike Ezeike, Hudson Habermehl, the four of those guys, and then adding Carsen, Carsen came in in January and has done some really, really good things for us, so we feel like we’ve got some really good depth there and it’s not if one guy’s down we have to drastically change anything, I think we’ve really bolstered that position

KIRKWOOD LOOKS LIKE A STAR?

Yeah, I’m not going to throw ‘star’ out there, but I think Devin has really gotten a lot better, played a lot of football for us last fall, he’s a real student of the game, he’s arguably one of our hardest workers, but I think his development at corner, along with John Humphrey—I think John Humphrey has had a great spring for us on the other side—has been really beneficial and I think we finally have two tall, long corners, what we’ve been looking to get, both of those guys physically I think can match up with anybody and the one thing you love about both of them is they’re so dialed in to what their technique is and how do they get better and what their work ethic is that you can see them getting better, so it’s good that people are recognizing the work that Devin’s put in.

RHYAN AND DULCICH DRAFTED?

It was awesome. You know, I was happy for both of those guys. I talked to Russell Wilson last night – he had reach out after they took Greg and I gave him Greg’s number so they could hook up. I think it’s a great spot for Greg, being there with Nathaniel Hackett and his staff and Russell Wilson as your quarterback, it’s got to be kind of a dream come true for him. And then I’m really happy for Sean. Obviously Krys Barnes went there a couple of years ago, I know their personnel group really well and Matt Malaspina, who’s their director of college recruiting, was really high on Sean, and then Ramsen Golpashin was a G.A. for us and an analyst for us in the last four or five years is now a quality control coach for the Packers, so Sean will have a familiar face there to be able to help him once he gets there to get settled. Green Bay’s an unbelievable organization, so I was happy for both of those guys and hopefully there will be a couple of more names today, rounds four through seven, so I’m sure there will be a few more Bruins today. So that’s a credit to those guys for the work they put in when they were here and we’re excited to see what the next step is for those guys.

ABILITY TO GET PASS RUSH BETWEEN PLAYERS AND NEW COACHES?

I think it is still a work in progress because it is four months, but we feel like we’ve got some individual guys at times when you do rush, guys have to win their one-on-ones and I think we have a couple of guys right now that have demonstrated through the course of the spring that they can win in some of those one-on-one matchups, so that makes us feel a little more comfortable in it, so you don’t have to always all-out blitz just to get people home. You know, when you do rush four and sometimes three, you can still generate a pass rush. That allows us to put more people in coverage, so we obviously have to shore up our pass defense and pass defense is a combination of both the rush and the coverage, but if we can get home with not having to blitz every down, that makes any defensive coordinator happy and any head coach happy, but I think we’ve got some guys right now that have demonstrated their ability to get to the quarterback in one-on-ones, so we feel good about it and we’ll continue to work on it. We do feel better about it.

WHO ARE THEY?

The Murphys have done a really, really nice job on the edge, I think Bo Calvert and Carl Jones have gotten a lot better on the edge and then you’ve seen those guys kind of grow into their roles out there and are doing a really, really good job there and then inside Martin Andrus has really helped us a lot, Jay is getting a great push toward the quarterback and kind of making the quarterback uncomfortable to be able to step up. If you have two really good edge rushers that can make the quarterback step up in the pocket but then you have some push on the inside, and we can get the pocket to kind of collapse on them, so those are a couple off the top of my head that I think are doing a really good job.

MURPHYS BOTH PLAY INSIDE SOMETIMES?

I think Billy – sometimes on third down, you try to get your best guys on the field, so can you play a package with the Murphys and Carl and Bo and whomever, maybe move one of the linebackers over there, just some of the versatility and some of the things that Billy kind of derived from the NFL, I think. You know, I think those guys can play multiple positions and we’re just trying to experiment with what’s the best combination of those guys, so the more reps they can get at different spots, I think it’s going to benefit them in the long run.

TRANSFER PORTAL A NET POSITIVE?

I don’t think you can gauge that until you play games, so you’ll figure that out, but we’re really excited about the guys we’ve brought in. We have a plan and a method in terms of how we do things and I think the kids we have brought in have made an impact so far, they’ve made an impact in the classroom. We just got our grades back from the (winter) – Jake Bobo got an A and two A-pluses, they’ve made an impact in the locker room with their work ethic and their mindset for all those guys have done that, so we feel really good about the guys we’ve brought in so far, so we’ll continue to look and may add but it’s got to be the right add.

POSITION OR TWO YOU’RE TARGETING?

No. I don’t think you can target because it doesn’t work that way. It’s just, when somebody becomes available and they enter the portal, then is that a good fit from all the things we look at because you can say, ‘Hey, I want this’ but they may not be that so I think it’s more of, when someone enters, do they fit for what we have and that’s how we’ve always approached it.

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