Lowell Cohn: Chip Kelly an interesting coach to watch as he watches 49ers training camp

SANTA CLARA - Chip Kelly watches.

During 49ers practice, he stands to the side. An onlooker. He holds a tablet with a screen. He watches the plays - mostly the offense - and he looks at the screen and makes notes. He is a man thinking deeply.

He hardly talks. Too busy watching. He is not tall, and when he's near all those huge men in motion, you lose sight of him. He blends in. He comes and goes from your field of vision.

He wears an old T-shirt and shorts and sneakers and a cap. Like he climbed out of the clothes hamper. Not a fashion plate, not like Bill Walsh, always in crisp, pleated clothes.

Everything about Walsh cried out, “Look at me.”

Everything about Kelly cries out, “Don't bother looking at me. There's no show business here. Just the hard work of football.” He's too wrapped up in football to worry about the look of his look.

When Kelly talks, he uses words like “undulations.” He says things like, “On Day One respect is given and over time trust is earned.” Mostly, he doesn't talk. Except when he teaches.

He teaches on the field. Has ‘teaching periods.' A drill ends. A teaching period begins right there on the practice field. Kelly approaches a player - like Colin Kaepernick after he just threw an interception. Kelly and Kaepernick look at the tiny screen together, the video already on the tablet from the men on the tall platforms taking film of practice.

You can see Kelly explaining the route to Kaepernick, telling Kaepernick how to do it right. How not to get picked. You can see Kaepernick nodding his head. You understand Kelly does not interrupt practice to teach. Not productive. Does not force the other guys to stand around doing nothing while he explains things. He uses these teaching periods. So do the other coaches.

Teaching is an essential part of practice.

Kelly wants things to move fast. Fast is everything. His offense never huddles in practice. Never. A play ends. The players rush to the line of scrimmage. Men on the sideline give hand signals like those people at airport arrival gates signaling the pilots. The signals come fast. The play starts fast.

Fast.

Entirely different from Jim Harbaugh, the last meaningful 49ers coach. His players huddled up. He thought about power, not speed. His practices lasted three hours. Kelly's last two. In and out fast. Do your work. Grab lunch. Harbaugh is a grinder. Kelly is not. Harbaugh is a great coach. Kelly has something to prove. He's perfecting his proof.

Harbaugh participated in drills. Like he was a player. Kelly, no way. He stands on the side. Watches.

Sometimes, Kelly touches his toes. Or swings his torso side to side. Or twirls his whistle on a long chain. Twirls it this way, twirls it that way. Looks like the cop on the beat. Thinking. Judging. Watching.

He talks scheme with media, “scheme” being the key word. Talking scheme is talking particular plays, talking philosophy in general. This scheme talk is an important theme.

Walsh rarely talked scheme with anyone who wasn't a player or coach. Certainly did not talk scheme with the media. He considered his ideas too complex for regular people - and he was right. He did not talk scheme because he refused to waste his time.

Harbaugh did not talk scheme with media for different reasons. You'd ask about a specific play and he'd get that Harbaugh look. Face contorted by deep suspicion. Probably thinking, “Why is he/she asking that question? If I answer truthfully, other coaches will get a shred of information they can use against me.”

That kind of stuff.

When he decided someone asked about scheme, Harbaugh would shoot back, “That's scheme.” Meaning don't go there, it's a forbidden topic, like his sex life or his address or his personal belief in God. This vigilant attitude bordering on paranoia works for Harbaugh.

Scheme is all Kelly wants to talk about. He is the man of scheme. Ask him about scheme and he goes into long lyrical descriptions about what he does and why. Never freezes up like Harbaugh around scheme.

Kelly is in love with football talk, with the words of football. Kelly wants you to know what he knows. Wants you to know he is smart. This pleases him. Harbaugh doesn't care if you think he's smart, even though he is. Harbaugh wants you to think he's a winner. Kelly must prove he can win in San Francisco.

But ask Kelly a personal question and he freezes up. Freezes up like Harbaugh hearing a scheme question. Going personal with Kelly is entering the forbidden land.

Kelly is a personal blank. Wants it that way. He may be a laugh riot in private. May be a good friend. A lovely man. I have heard he is all of that. I'll never know firsthand. Neither will you. He does not give one-on-one interviews. Too dangerous.

Or something like that.

Different from Harbaugh, who loved to lavish his personality on you - when he was in the mood. Tell you all about his preference for Larry David or how he got a kick out of British mysteries on TV, or how he played Little League baseball or how the pinkie on his right hand got crooked. Harbaugh is a big personality. Kelly is a personality in hiding.

Even Walsh got personal. Would tell you his insecurities and how he needed insecurities so he could overcome them. It's what motivated him. He wanted you to know him. To empathize. To appreciate.

Kelly doesn't care about that. Doesn't want you to know him. Wants you to know him only as the scheme coach. Wants to teach plays and teach speed and teach endurance and teach his coaches to coach. Wants to watch. To quietly watch.

And he wants to win. Yes, win.

For more on the world of sports in general and the Bay Area in particular, go to cohn.blogs.pressdemocrat.com. You can reach Lowell Cohn at lowell.cohn@pressdemocrat.com.