Well, folks: here we are. Michigan has still not announced an extension for Jim Harbaugh. Warde Manuel has said he will talk with Harbaugh after the season…

“Jim and I will meet — as we have said — at the end of the year to discuss the program and where we’re going to go and all those different things,” Manuel said. “How rumors get started about things before both Jim and I sit down and have a conversation, I’m not going to get into. That’s not for me to try and track down.”

…which is hypothetically the 19th if Michigan is able to play this bonus crossover game. That happens to be after the early signing day, which is the 16th, and there is much consternation about this timeline.

Now: a lot of people are reacting to things that have not been said. In the same press availability the above quote comes from Manuel mentioned that he is in frequent conversation with his head football coach:

“You know we sit down we talk, you know, sometimes we’ll talk in November and and just in general to get a sense. We’ve had a lot of conversation in between. It’s not like we don’t talk, almost on a sometimes daily basis depending on the issues, sometimes weekly. It just... I don’t want to make anybody feel or think that Jim and I have been sitting around just waiting and not talking to each other about things we have had a lot to talk about.”

Manuel isn't sitting in his office wondering what's going to happen when he talks with Harbaugh. If there isn't something signed by now there's a reason.

[After THE JUMP: take a breath]

Waiting is fine

One issue with waiting is fairly easy to address: if recruits sign and Michigan makes a coaching change they can let recruits out of their LOIs, as is standard practice. The lack of landing spots then isn't going to be much different than the lack of landing spots now since the early date is now the de-facto Signing Day and most classes are complete or close to it.

Meanwhile, Michigan's gotten plenty of on-field data in year six of Harbaugh's tenure. One crossover game isn't going to change the equation significantly. But there is a variable out there: the interest level of NFL teams. Harbaugh has a ten million dollar buyout and you may have heard that there's a pandemic.

The coronavirus is stressing athletic departments to the point where Texas, one of the schools in Michigan's more-money-than-God tier, might end up sticking with Tom Herman. The context here is unprecedented:

Horns247 reported Sunday if Texas couldn't land Meyer, there’s a chance Tom Herman will remain as coach of the Texas Longhorns.

"There was an opportunity here too good not to pursue with Urban (Meyer)," the university source said. "If he's a definite no, we just need to step back and assess."

Paying a $25 million buyout to let go of a four-year coach who is 31-18 (.632) and replacing him with a three-time national championship coach like Meyer is one thing. Paying a $25 million buyout without a clear-cut alternative to Meyer is another thing, the source said.

Texas has already shot Herman's recruiting to hell with a very public flirtation with another coach. Sticking with him for a do-or-die season because you can't justify the dollars for the candidates available is hard to imagine in a normal year.

Harbaugh's buyout isn't as punitive as Herman's but it would be much easier to make a change if Michigan was off the hook for it. This was a theme of one of those Sam Webb posts in which he puts OPINION in bold and italics several dozen times in the gossamer hope people will read and comprehend: "In my OPINION, that will open the door wider for NFL dalliance. And if it gets to that point, my OPINION is that will be a mutual preference."

Extended timelines are justified here.

What about decommits?

There is a MAKE A DECISION NOW camp that dreads the possibility that Michigan will tank this recruiting class by dawdling. I find this argument unpersuasive. We've gotten unfortunately familiar with what happens with transition classes, and it's usually a few departures that don't wait around to see whether there's actually going to be a change. When Hoke got fired only one decommit happened within a month of the announcement, and a couple months later Mike Weber was a February signing day decision between OSU and Michigan that apparently swung when Michigan signed Karan Higdon.

Michigan did lose a handful of players during the season (decommits from George Campbell, Damien Harris, and Shaun Crawford were months before the 2014 spiraled into the ground); the bulk of what Hoke was able to cobble together stuck. Extending Harbaugh now might save Michigan a commit or two, but if this is actually going in the direction of a change that was likely to happen anyway.

What about getting candidates poached?

This is really about candidate, singular. Matt Campbell is the hot name after leading Iowa State to its first regular season conference championship since 1912—not a typo. He's come up in connection with Texas, but now it looks like Texas might not be in the market. The only other open P5 job right now is Vanderbilt. USC is 4-0 and Clay Helton is set to continue his tightrope walk. Dennis Dodd's hot seat list as of a couple weeks ago is 1) ludicrous (Jimbo Fisher's 10-year, fully-guaranteed contract is on it) and 2) completely devoid of potential openings that would tempt Campbell if Texas and USC stay on the sidelines.

Speaking of Dennis Dodd saying things, he was apparently on the sports talk radio saying Campbell wasn't interested in anything other than Notre Dame or Ohio State. This is immediately suspicious because neither of those jobs is likely to open any time soon, and then a Toledo-based reporter—Campbell coached the Rockets for four years—who knows Campbell personally detonated that:

This is 10000% false. Just blatantly wrong about Michigan. @dennisdoddcbs - I can unequivocally tell you this is not true. Period. https://t.co/DNQweZMpUt

— Jordan Strack (@JordanStrack) December 8, 2020

If Michigan makes a change, Campbell will be there.

Okay but is the NFL interested?

This is a league that will put anyone named Schottenheimer in a head job. Hereditary? Awesome. Retread? Hell yeah. College? Doesn't count. Mike Florio writes the same "Harbaugh to the NFL" article every year. This year's edition:

Per multiple sources, Harbaugh is believed to be eyeing a return to the NFL, as a head coach.

Another source said that teams are doing their homework on Harbaugh, who instantly took the 49ers to the NFC Championship and who nearly led the team to a Super Bowl win in his second season with the team.

While Harbaugh has lost plenty of luster during his tenure in Michigan, it’s impossible to forget his accomplishments with the 49ers. The fact that his brother, John, continues to be one of the most successful coaches in the NFL won’t hurt, either.

Hard to take Florio seriously on this topic since he literally does this every year and has been completely wrong every year. There was an outburst of articles yesterday, all based on a couple of John U Bacon tweets:

Harbaugh can now accept, negotiate, or decline. At least five NFL teams have expressed an interest in hiring him – per usual – though not clear if any have made firm offers yet. (2/2)

— John U. Bacon (@Johnubacon) December 8, 2020

This got extrapolated into "bidding war!" by folks aggregating Bacon when the original tweet does not state anything close to "there will be a bidding war for Jim Harbaugh." I think it's likely that someone takes a shot on Harbaugh if he's available.

Burying the lead

Is he available? Bacon reports that the extension on the table for Harbaugh is for less money with a lower buyout. These are circumstances where coaches will often look elsewhere if there are acceptable options.

Also in John U Bacon: he apparently asserted that if Harbaugh's back next year the only assistants to return would be Ed Warinner and Sherrone Moore on XM yesterday. So your options here are all new staff or almost all new staff.