Harbaugh News Roundup:
Jim Harbaugh is a marvel.
He’s no avenger, but he holds himself to a similar standard. He’s imperfect. He’s human.
The Harbaugh that was rumored to be Michigan’s next head coach while he was the head coach of the 49ers is the same Harbaugh that was rumored to be the next head coach of the Vikings while he was still recruiting for the Wolverines.
Unpredictable. Unabashed. Undeniable.
That’s Jim Harbaugh, like it or not.
In 2021, he was highlighted for a perceived evolution of character but nothing has changed about who he is at heart. He loves football, every breathing second of it, and he embraces competition. He likes control, he’s hands-on and prefers to have a fingerprint on every piece of whichever program, franchise, or roster he’s in charge of. If it’s going on in his building, he wants to know.
Something that did change, though, is his willingness to listen. Quarterbacks coach Matt Weiss was hired last offseason and brought a strong analytical presence with his arrival. How he would evolve Harbaugh’s decision-making shaped a 2021 season that flipped the narrative on Harbaugh’s Michigan.
In the season’s most important games, the offense’s fearlessness to go for it on fourth down had everything to do with Harbaugh’s willingness to listen to Weiss. Michigan went for it on fourth down in 12 of its 14 games, including against Iowa, Ohio State, and Penn State.
Mike Macdonald came in last year as the team’s new defensive coordinator and revamped the defense two weeks before spring ball. Harbaugh let his coordinator do his thing and in turn, U-M’s defense went from 93rd in scoring defense to 7th in a year.
Harbaugh didn’t change who he was last season. He evolved, ironed out some wrinkles, and allowed his new staff to flap its wings. The result was a program-shifting win over the Buckeyes and a Big Ten Championship.
Following a historic season, nobody drew this type of offseason up. When Brian Kelly was ducking out of South Bend like a dude climbing out of the bathroom window on a bad first date, and Lincoln Riley put his whole staff on a private jet to Hollywood, Michigan was laughing. Little did it know, Harbaugh would wind up doing a month-long hokey pokey with the NFL.
Though, through all of the disapproval from fans and backfiring from pundits, anyone who knows Harbaugh knows his competitive nature and the personal business he’s had in the back of his mind since he left the league.
When the building slowly learned of his rumored interest being legitimized and materializing into an interview with the Vikings, there wasn’t shock among the staff. Harbaugh and the NFL have always seemed inevitable.
That being said, after the staff was told to take a vacation on Wednesday, it didn’t know if it would have a job by Friday, why? Because the internet was telling them that their boss had already accepted a job he, inevitably, was never offered. Strongly considered? Yes. Interested enough to interview? Absolutely. But the utter obsession with taking things and running with them to produce news in real-time resulted in an incomplete story being staged as a credits roll.
The issue wasn’t exactly what Jim Harbaugh was doing, it was how he was doing it. Because how he was doing it was allowing anyone to run with anything without any refute, and that gets to coaches, players, recruits, and fans. More times than not, they’re going to believe what they read.
No matter how much you’ve changed a program, if you fly to an interview on National Signing Day three days after telling recruits you’re not going anywhere, it’s going to harm your reputation, regardless of the full story’s details that we’ll likely never know. If you’re hopping on a plane for an interview, Jim, it’s for a job you’re ready to take. Harbaugh wasn’t buckling his seatbelt without knowing that’s what he wanted to do.
So we can speculate until the end of time whether both sides mutually had a change of heart, if Harbaugh bombed the interview because of his own regrets, or if the Vikings simply didn’t want to risk hiring an experienced head coach who has the occasional power trip.
No matter the reason, the perception of the situation won’t improve, however, in due time it will wear off. If Harbaugh meant it when he told his boss that this is it, and he won’t flirt with the NFL again, then who the hell will care about this if he’s holding a silver football above his head in December again?
Jim Harbaugh is 58 years old and despite his polarizing reputation, he’s a well-accomplished football coach by Michigan standards, a school that hadn’t won a conference in 17 years until this season.
Approaching 60 with likely the last contract he will sign in front of him, Harbaugh thought about change. He gave some thought to doing something different than what he’s done for the past seven years at a place that was in the bunker when he took it over.
When he signed his first and second contracts with Michigan, he didn’t sign his life away. He agreed to be its head coach. In the world of contract law, there’s a way to get out of one if there’s a party willing to get you out of it. Harbaugh had teams prepared to explore the option of doing that. In turn, he wanted to explore it, too. And in a world where more people are quitting and leaving their jobs more than ever before, who are we to blame?
He’s a marvel, unlike any other in his profession. In an industry so public, Harbaugh is private to a fault.
It’s nothing new, he hasn’t changed, he’s the same coach that left the 49ers before he was done coaching them. This time, though, after a season that seemingly refreshed his reputation, his privacy and lack of transparency painted a picture that even Michael Scott wouldn’t hang in his office.
There will be questions and if Harbaugh has any idea on how to handle this situation, he’ll answer them, truthfully and honestly. He’ll open up the curtain and tell all, as he should, for his employer, staff, players, and recruits.
Through the process, he’ll humanize himself and bring light to a situation that sat in the dark for much of its duration.
This is Jim Harbaugh. It’s who he’s always been and who he’ll always be, like it or not.
Soon, this will pass, a loaded roster will return to defend its Big Ten title, and if the head coach handles the aftermath of this saga the right way, there will be no worry, there will be winning football.
Around here, that’s the only way to make up for it.
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