Harbaugh coaching possibilities
Listening to the game Golic made a good comment about Harbaughs contract and NFL teams. Most of us are well aware the current regime for the lions are on their way out. So the question for the board, is there a hypothetical where the lions “pull” Harbaugh away from Michigan?
Personally, This could really be the best of both worlds for Harbaugh. he could still live or be close to AA, while moving on “graciously” to a team that just being in the playoff conversation is being successful.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:15 PM ^
What a new and interesting thread.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:18 PM ^
What a new and innovative way to complain
November 28th, 2020 at 1:21 PM ^
This actually is new and VERY interesting, I hadn’t heard anyone bring up the Lions yet. This actually makes sense, and I’m not a lions fan, just an empathetic friend to many.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:49 PM ^
Harbaugh to the Lions. I thought about this a few weeks ago.
I am ready for the Michigan 2020 football season to end and it can't come fast enough.
November 28th, 2020 at 2:25 PM ^
Can you imagine the uproar if the Lions hired Harbaugh? After the last few years at Michigan, Lions fans will be booing him before the first snap of 2021.
I would be quite surprised if Harbaugh is hired by an NFL team. The last few years suggests that Harbaugh is over the hill. It's not just that we are losing but the way we are losing. Uninspired, undisciplined and uninteresting. Hell, you could get that for a lot less money by hiring Marty Mornhinweg.
November 28th, 2020 at 2:57 PM ^
New this year? It has been discussed almost as much as Oakland in the early Harbaugh years.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:15 PM ^
LA Chargers or Houston
November 28th, 2020 at 1:19 PM ^
I am torn about this situation. The grass always seems greener, but what about this Michigan program since 2008 would make anyone believe that a coaching change will turn things around? Truth be told, there is a good chance that a new coach will come in and do worse.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:27 PM ^
I’m very torn also, and there really isn’t. I question if there are some institutional issues that cause large hindrances to recruiting. but the recent recruiting prowess of basketball and hockey I feel that’s been silenced to some aspect. So fuck it, roll the dice and go for elite status
November 28th, 2020 at 1:31 PM ^
There is more parity throughout college basketball. The top programs don't suck up the top recruits to the extent that Clemson, Alabama, and OSU do in football. I think we aren't using the same recruiting tactics as other schools (I have no evidence for this statement, just a guess). At this point, I am all for "playing dirty" on the recruiting front, as long as it doesn't mean crossing moral boundaries (ex: Louisville)
November 28th, 2020 at 1:34 PM ^
I am also very torn... torn between firing Harbaugh at halftime or waiting until the end of the PSU debacle. I say do it ASAP, we’d likely play better in the second half without a coach.
November 28th, 2020 at 2:34 PM ^
There’s no institutional limit to recruiting. If you meet the NCAA standards, you’re getting in.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:45 PM ^
I would really like to know how you can do worse than what this team is...they're losing to a team that hasn't won a game...the 2008 team would beat this team.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:48 PM ^
Harbaugh was the Impostor (ejected).
November 28th, 2020 at 1:55 PM ^
No they wouldn't. You know it, and I know it
November 28th, 2020 at 1:48 PM ^
Lets see it for our own eyes. If Fickell/Campbell/Stoops teams at Michigan look this bad, I will gladly eat some humble pie.
November 28th, 2020 at 4:11 PM ^
It’s just very clear (or at least should be) that the Harbaugh experiment has been a colossal failure. He was close a couple times and had some bad breaks early that could have tipped the scales the other way if they broken for UM instead of against, but a failure none the less.
Before this season, I was in the “Harbaugh can and will get it done” camp. I am now squarely in the camp of “Since Harbaugh couldn’t get it done, I’m not sure anyone can”. I would love to be proven wrong, but I am no longer hopeful that I will be any time soon.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:20 PM ^
He will take a year off and then decide if he will go back into coaching. Needs to get his health right - lots of smoke and many rumors around the specifics, I'm sure it comes out next year.
More important is that we know where we stand with him and start the search early.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:22 PM ^
One of Harbaugh's major downfalls was he never had a group of "recruiting Rottweilers", as Urban always called them.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:41 PM ^
Huh? We’ve had plenty of very good recruiters and good recruiting classes. Harbaugh’s downfall will ultimately be his own fault and not the coulda-shoulda, hypothetical world of recruiting.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:57 PM ^
coulda-shoulda hypothetical world of recruiting? OSU's stable of 5 stars says "hi"
November 28th, 2020 at 1:24 PM ^
Espn speculating harbaughs contract on live tv knowing recruits are watching? Shocked that they’d purposely throw that out there on live tv. Shocked.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:50 PM ^
Well it's not exactly a secret is it?
November 28th, 2020 at 2:24 PM ^
It’s more shocking that the athletic department let Harbaugh get this close to the end of his deal without an extension. Nobody else in college football would let this situation happen because of the effect on recruiting, but that’s what happens when you hire an AD who no other comparable blue blood would ever hire simply because he went to your school.
November 28th, 2020 at 2:38 PM ^
I have no real problem with Warde. I'm sure he is an able execucrat and politician which are the real qualifications of the job. And the fact that there is not extension in place is just that much less money we have to pay JH to go away.
Warde's two significant coaching hires are Juwan (with zero college coaching experience) and Mel Pearson. Those two turned out OK don't you think? I'm not frightened by the prospect of Warde selecting the next head coach.
November 28th, 2020 at 3:37 PM ^
Yes and it’s hard to judge the Howard hire bc of the timing
November 28th, 2020 at 3:50 PM ^
Didn’t Warde hire the baseball coach who took them to the National Championship? That hire looks to be outstanding.
November 28th, 2020 at 9:45 PM ^
That was Brandon.
November 29th, 2020 at 12:55 AM ^
Money is no object for Michigan athletics, which is why I give him very little credit for making good non-revenue hires, and basketball was a no-brained hire where there was a guy one year away from an NBA head coaching gig who was an alumnus interested in coming home. Michigan has a money cannon to offer coaches in non-revenue sports that few schools can offer.
If the chatter from insiders is correct, Michigan is not interested in moving on from Harbaugh. If Harbaugh had been locked up with an extension like every other comparable coach in college football would be, all of this Harbaugh fire talk in the media would be far quieter. Instead, they’ve basically allowed themselves to be backed into a corner where they have no choice but to fire him because keeping him still sets recruiting on fire as if they made the change.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:26 PM ^
I would pay an nfl team to take harbaugh. What a shitty coach
November 28th, 2020 at 1:27 PM ^
Glad they are talking about it on TV. Make Harbaugh’s future an unavoidable conversation no matter how uncomfortable it is and how many recruits in 2021 it costs.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:29 PM ^
Is there a way some of you can pull your heads away from your butts
November 28th, 2020 at 1:31 PM ^
Sadly this is one of the worst coached Michigan team I've ever seen so something has to happen.
The UFR, if we get one, will be brutal. Nobody seems to know where to go and what to do when they get there.
November 28th, 2020 at 2:31 PM ^
With you there MGrow. The inability of Harbaugh and his staff to accomplish coaching basics is astounding. No long slow decline here, this is more like going off a cliff. Warde can't bring Harbaugh back, can he? Not if he is serious about his cash cow football program. And he is going to need that cash more than ever the next few years to recover from the COVID fiasco.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:32 PM ^
Gee I hope he finds something good ?
November 28th, 2020 at 1:34 PM ^
For Michigan I hope he’s gone, he needs great assistants to be successful period he’s not the great coach people have made him out to be.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:35 PM ^
Hey, lets do this again
November 28th, 2020 at 1:37 PM ^
I cannot understand why Harbaugh should remain coach going forward.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:37 PM ^
He’s already coaching at a place where just being in the playoff conversation is being successful
November 28th, 2020 at 1:41 PM ^
Send him to the Bears
November 28th, 2020 at 1:42 PM ^
It appears Tom Herman is on the hot seat for Texas, I seem to remember him being on everyone's want list a few years back.
Also in Breaking News: Grass is always greener on the other side, more at 11!
November 28th, 2020 at 2:39 PM ^
My firm has a large Texas presence and I’m working with an attorney from our Texas office as his local counsel and we got into a long conversation about the states of our programs. The schools are very similar. Top tier public universities. Basically, they’re both incestuous ADs and arrogant about their pasts and can’t get out of their own ways.
November 28th, 2020 at 3:58 PM ^
Matt Campbell as head coach, then herman as OC. Top notch recruiter. Could work for 2 years until herman gets another gig.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:42 PM ^
Best coaching move for Michigan in 2020, claim covid , don’t play Ohio state. State can’t play in btn championship
November 28th, 2020 at 1:45 PM ^
So this gets interesting on the finance side more than the football side. What would Michigan have to pay for an extension? $7 million? 8? I doubt you can offer a paycut. So what does an NFL franchise pony up. Especially a desperate franchise like the Lions? I can’t imagine the elitist UM board of regents wanting to pony up $8 million a year or more for this crap. It’s the money angle that will ultimately doom Harbaughs extension when the NFL market is in play. And the Lions are just the perfect suitor.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:50 PM ^
They really seem to be. And not saying it’s a smart decision, but I could see the lions doing something stupid like offering him GM/HC
November 28th, 2020 at 1:46 PM ^
JH will get an extension, and if you think otherwise you have not been paying attention to either our athletic or academic administration for the past decade.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:49 PM ^
6 years after hiring Harbaugh he has $50,ooo,ooo in the bank (not counting life insurance contributions and other perks ) and we are still the laughing stock on college football. We don’t belong on the same field with Ohio State - pretty much killed a 100 year old rivary.
November 28th, 2020 at 1:56 PM ^
In fairness Harbaugh just announced the time of death of the rivalry. We thought he could resuscitate the game but he didn’t. He does appreciate the large checks that continue to hit his bank account!