CC: Harbaugh should reject Michigan and coach the Raiders... according to NFL.com
Headline says it all. If this isn't a huge sign that the NFL is getting nervous about having one of their premiere names leave for the college ranks, I don't know what is.
http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000445451/article/jim-harbaugh-sho…
December 18th, 2014 at 3:56 PM ^
Seems like a quality, unbiased source.
December 18th, 2014 at 5:40 PM ^
December 18th, 2014 at 3:57 PM ^
December 18th, 2014 at 4:16 PM ^
to go coach at Oakland, the place where coaches go to die, way to look out for his interests
December 18th, 2014 at 4:41 PM ^
Anyone else find it interesting that NFL.com is willing to publish this, suggesting that a coach who is still in-season, who still has a signed contract with a current team which runs through next year, should go work for another organization?
I guess the NFL would not opt to accuse itself of tampering.
December 18th, 2014 at 5:07 PM ^
Their anger is blinding them to how improper this artcile is on multipel levels.
December 18th, 2014 at 4:01 PM ^
The NFL is the greatest institution that has ever existed and that could ever exist, as Leibniz demonstrated in Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil (and the badassery of the NF-fuckin'-L).
December 18th, 2014 at 3:58 PM ^
Aren't they the same ones that employ that dickweed Roger Goodell? And have a team called the Redskins?
Yeah, fuck the NFL.
December 18th, 2014 at 4:04 PM ^
What's wrong with the Redskins?
December 18th, 2014 at 4:07 PM ^
Besides the racist name?
December 18th, 2014 at 4:14 PM ^
You have been a member since 2009, so I expect that you know the "no politics rule." Why go there? It's a controversial topic that doesn't need to be discussed on a Michigan blog. I am sure that MSNBC or Foxnews have discussion forums that would love this topic, but not here.
December 18th, 2014 at 4:18 PM ^
We've discussed it here multiple times.
December 18th, 2014 at 8:10 PM ^
and they've all gone exactly as you'd expect a racially-politically charged debate would go on the internet
December 18th, 2014 at 4:24 PM ^
Sometimes sports and politics intersect. Besides the name of the Redskins, which has been discussed on MGoBlog beore, there are things like player unions also being discussed. I think, as long as people can be adults about it, it's a non-issue most of the time.
December 18th, 2014 at 4:56 PM ^
Player unions are polticial because of the nature of unionization and are material to the structure and organization of college football in a way that the name of an NFL team is not to the league. Unions would fundamentally alter the structure of the game.
The name, though political in some sense, is a far more visceral and emotional issue which elicits reactions that player unionization discussions tend not to. And in general people have calmer conversations about issues on which they disagree, even very strongly, on the substance but from which they are emotionally detached.
I agree that adults should be able to discuss most any topic in a civil manner, but the reality is that it never works out that cleanly.
(And I say all of this as a long time DC sports fan who hates Snyder and supports a name change.)
December 18th, 2014 at 4:58 PM ^
What exactly is political about whether the word Redskin is racist?
December 18th, 2014 at 6:13 PM ^
of whether or not the name "redskins" is racist is considered political...that's a pretty comical insight into our current state of affairs.
December 18th, 2014 at 4:49 PM ^
Not racist. But if you have a problem with the Redskins, you should really have a problem with the Vikings. Why celebrate white slavers with their own NFL team?
December 18th, 2014 at 5:18 PM ^
Regardless of the mascot controversy, I just want to point out that your analogy is all wrong. The name "Vikings" is an official historical name given to a people group, and it would be analogous to "Native Americans", which is the official historical name given to the indigenous peoples of North America.
The term "Redskin" is a slang term used to refer to Native Americans, and would be analogous to a slang term used to refer to Vikings. I am not aware of any slang terms for Vikings, though, so I can't give an example.
December 18th, 2014 at 5:29 PM ^
You missed the point entirely. The Vikings were slavers. White slavers. The NFL honors the memory of slavers by allowing a team to be named after a people famed for taking slaves. If you think naming a team "Redskins" is evil - I don't - then naming one after slavers is a heckuva lot worse.
December 18th, 2014 at 5:34 PM ^
You know who else has enslaved or murdered people? Just about everyone and every thing.
There is a reason no one has a problem with the "Kansas City Chiefs."
December 18th, 2014 at 6:27 PM ^
Give it time.
December 18th, 2014 at 7:00 PM ^
December 18th, 2014 at 5:50 PM ^
Well if you are worried about the Vikings, then I've got some bad news for you. Raiders are pirates. They marauded, murdered, raped, enslaved. Same with Buccaneers.
December 18th, 2014 at 5:42 PM ^
As someone else pointed out here a few months ago, "Viking" isn't even a reference to an ethnic group. It means something along the lines of "expeditioner."
As to the idea that vikings took slaves, that's true, but that was a long time ago. Icelanders (descendants of vikings and their slaves) are over it.
December 18th, 2014 at 5:30 PM ^
Come on man, really? Really? I mean, really? You can't use some critical thinking skills to logic this one out? Really?
First of all, I've only ever heard the term "Viking" used in a positive manner in terms of being an adjective. Secondly, the Vikings were an actual group of people. The term is not, and has never been used as a perjorative.
Redskin, on the other hand ,has never been anything but a racist term used against Native American people.
If they were the Washington Algonquians or something, that would be more akin to "Vikings."
I'm Irish, and this is the difference between having an Irish team from an Irish Catholic school calling themselves "The Fighting Irish" and some pro team calling themselves "The Drunky McO'Hooligans."
December 19th, 2014 at 9:04 AM ^
Can I use "Drunky McO'Hooligans" as my Madden team name?
December 18th, 2014 at 6:15 PM ^
why don't we have a problem with the patriots then? i mean considering our founding fathers were also slavers...
December 19th, 2014 at 9:01 AM ^
Because if the team's name was the "Washington Blue Gums" it would have been changed decades ago.
December 18th, 2014 at 3:58 PM ^
December 18th, 2014 at 4:12 PM ^
Other than money - which I've read might not even reach the Michigan amount offered - I can't for the life of me figure out why he'd want to coach the Raiders. That team is absolute garbage and the owner is a nutjob. What's the appeal??
December 18th, 2014 at 4:18 PM ^
Maybe Harbaugh just really wants to coach in the NFL? I suspect that many of us on this board prefer college football to the NFL, but to many people. the NFL is superior. Harbaugh, despite being a Michigan alum, might just prefer the NFL.
December 18th, 2014 at 4:51 PM ^
He wants a video game named after him some day.
December 18th, 2014 at 4:47 PM ^
December 18th, 2014 at 4:47 PM ^
December 18th, 2014 at 4:48 PM ^
December 18th, 2014 at 4:50 PM ^
December 18th, 2014 at 4:50 PM ^
December 18th, 2014 at 6:34 PM ^
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
December 18th, 2014 at 3:58 PM ^
Yes, go coach for this guy:
Who this guy
wouldn't trust with his team until he was fully dead.
Sure, this makes total sense.
December 18th, 2014 at 4:02 PM ^
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
December 18th, 2014 at 4:05 PM ^
And to think I picked the one without the bloody bandages and rotting skin...
December 18th, 2014 at 4:04 PM ^
Judas, that guy is a train wreck. He would be hilariously played by Jim Carrey. Posthumously, Burgess Meredith would take on Weird Al. Not that Weird Al.
December 18th, 2014 at 4:06 PM ^
Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with that guy?
December 18th, 2014 at 4:19 PM ^
Oh, that's a guy. Dude looked like a lady.
December 18th, 2014 at 4:31 PM ^
Coach for him..hell, I'm not sure it would be safe to be in the same room with him.
December 18th, 2014 at 6:18 PM ^
i did not fully realize that the picture was not of a gruden impersonator.
December 18th, 2014 at 6:36 PM ^
Fully dead. Not sure why I find that so funny. But I do.