Jim Harbaugh on Rich Eisen Show Full Interview - 9/13/22

Thanks for sharing, so glad everything worked out the way it did over the last year with coach.  Couldn’t imagine having anyone else right now.

Good golly.  It's like pulling teeth.  2:30 in and it's painful.  Say SOMETHING, Jim.  Maybe he opens up eventually.  I can only hope for those enduring the entire interview.

Thanks for posting

Jim seemed tired but it was still a good listen

Great listen. Thanks for sharing. Such a genuine guy. Carefully chooses his words. Very glad to hear Cade is working hard. Very thoughtful guy. Glad he is speaking out for players. 

Harbaugh’s almost always a tough interview because he’s so guarded. When he coached the 49ers, he had a weekly radio show where he was interviewed by talk radio hosts and the most entertaining thing about it was how frustrated the hosts would get over his almost total refusal to say anything of consequence.  In this case though, he has to be especially careful when talking about the QB situation so as not to disrespect McNamara.

He knows he has to do interviews—to "make himself available"—for the sake of the entertainment of it, that is, what gets listeners & viewers.

But not wanting to do interviews, partly because he knows anything he says that's not as limp as wet bread might become a scandal or a crisis. 

So, he rope-a-dopes it, leaning against the ropes and letting interviewers try their best without really getting to him. 

I listened to this on the way in to work this morning. Harbaugh may be an oddball, but he is OUR oddball. You have to respect how genuine he is and he doesn't compromise on this no matter the situation. I wouldn't want anyone else leading our program right now. He has always been a rough interview to listen to, however if you know this going in it makes it easier to listen knowing you won't get specifics on certain subjects. That all being said, he gave me a new response when i get a spelling lesson from buckeye fans going forward....NEVER!! Go Blue!!!!

I met JH his first spring as head coach at a clinic at Crisler.He sat by himself with a note pad by the stage wearing cleats,khakis,cap, and a Michigan sweatshirt Tucked In.Who tucks in a sweatshirt???? He may be odd but he is not fake.I walked up to him and he was very genuine and a regular guy,just another coach at a clinic.As a side note I had written him a letter about working a camp in the summer and he wrote me back on Michigan stationary and was very personable.

Jim knows that any interview that isn't being conducted by a Michigan guy (Eisen, Jansen, etc) he has to be guarded because they're looking for a 'gotcha' that gets blown out of proportion by the national sports media....   He certainly sounds much more relaxed and open when he can trust the interviewer, IMO.

Much of Harbaugh's oddness with reporters is some normal questions seem antithetical to how he perceives the world and football. When he's asked such a question he awkwardly pauses and seemingly asks, "Why would someone ask that?" Not to be dismissive of the person asking - but because he fundamentally doesn't understand such a question he himself would be incapable of asking. 

Oh my goodness… did you hear some of the words and phrases Harbaugh used?

Apparently, Harbaugh is “very happy” - his words - not mine.  He’s “committed to the program”.

Then there was this… “We’re fortunate to have two QBs who can lead the team to a championship.”

I can only imagine the controversy those remarks will cause.  Oh the humanity…

JH is very thoughtful in his answers, for the obvious reasons everyone cites.  He gets the same questions asked again and again, and he's very good at being consisent in his answers, as well.

I think he's at his best when telling stories about things that have actually happened.  Examples in this interview are the encounter with Bo on State St, and how he himself responds to OSU and MSU fans.  Another in a separate interview earlier this summer was the story of CJ Stokes taping his ankles before going to class in order to save a few minutes of practice time.  And, yes, his genuineness and enthusiasm always come through.

He's an odd duck, processes things differently, "on the spectrum", overly thoughtful, [fill in the blank for one of infinite reasons people feel he "is why he is"] but I've started to view him in a different light since his interviews at the BIG media days before the 2021 season. 

A lot of the same...but also a lot different...and that was before they won 12 games and beat osu. With oddness still present, something occurred after that 2020 season going into 2021 with his entire persona it seems (to me). 

Great interview.

For the rest of us odd ducks out there, I hope we stop using the phrase odd duck and just say he thinks on another level or another plane.

He's hard to put into a box, and if we could, he probably would just be an armchair quarterback like the rest of us and not the interesting spectacle winning at Michigan.