"Our chatter" vs "Their chatter"

Is that Rappaport or Kawakami?

makes this comment easily ten times funnier

There were all running towards the grassy knoll!

Rhode Islands.

Unless you live in SC territory. College football easily rules the south. Everyone I know is a GA, AL, FL, fan. Very few could give a rats ass about any of the pro teams in the area.

Ha.  Yep.  And the Lakers, even (perhaps especially, because drahmah?) when they stink. 

Or NFL reporters are basically sycophants who parrot whatever NFL GMs tell them.

The NFL being the most popular is a relatively new thing. As such it's much easier to rattle off a longer list of legendary college coaches than it is NFL coaches. 

When I saw a list of legendary NFL coaches earlier today, I read up on them to better inform myself of NFL history.   The only one active was Bill Bellichek.  Everyone else Shula, Walsh, Lomabardi, Pacells, Gibbs, Noll, Brown, etc. either retired or had glory days squarely in the last century.  And Bellichek is considered a cheater, utterly despised by many.

NFL players just seem to outshine the coaches these days, whereas even Heisman winners in college seem overshadowed by their coaches.

It could just be me.

Hackett either has a firmest handshake "yes" from Harbaugh once the season is over OR from a big time(Stoops, Mullen, Miles, Mora type) with the deal being that they have guaranteed to take the job if Harbaugh says no. If the high salary numbers we've seen floated out there for Harbaugh are close to true then we could also guarantee the "B" choice a pretty hefty sum as well so one would be agreeable to the aforementioned scenario of having to wait for Harbaugh.

Bottom line for me is I believe the current leadership at M knows they can't botch this hire, and the complete lack of real, legitimate leaks tells me this is done, and professionally. Unfortunately we have to wait a few more days but the payoff is going to be incredible.

I agree with you on number 2.  I think Harbaugh is torn between the competitor in him wanting to compete at the highest level and achieve a victory in the Superbowl, while his heart loves the idea of saving Michigan and returning it back to glory.  I HOPE that he already has a silent agreement with Hackett to coach Michigan once his season is over, but the non-homer part of me can appreciate the desire of a competitor wanting to achieve a championship at the highest level in a profession, in this case, the NFL. I just hope that his sentimental side wins out.  Would love to have him back in AA.

It's a bit of a refresher hearing from an OSU fan who says something other than OSU is going to dominate Michigan until the end of time.

I'd hope OSU fans want this too. They want to know part of why they're getting disrespected? Having Urban Meyer as your coach doesn't change the fact that the Big Ten is a shitty conference. Playing Purdue and Minnesota doesn't do much to prepare you for Alabama. Michigan has done a lot to contribute to this conference's mediocrity, but having Michigan back would be a huge boost to everyone's credibility in this conference. Especially OSU's.

Plus, it'd be nice for us to actually make The Game an actual game again. I'm sure OSU fans like the winning, but beating a bowl-less Michigan team can't be as exciting as beating a 10-11 win Michigan team with title aspirations.

So you're saying, you're gonna light my country music award on fire?

I'm gonna pistol whip the next guy who says Shiano!

Since you are new, chatsports is NOT legit at all. 

As is the headline. It says nothing. Oh, so he intends to say yes, but that could change.

Non-news of the millennium right there.

Hackett would not have put in his best offer on the first round. Gotta save a few bullets for the end.

I believe the process leading to the disclosure of Michigan's offer and the $49 million figure which is a curious number given the circumstances, came after Michigan had informal backchannel discussions with both Harbaugh and his agent through the search firm.

I don't think Hackett has ever spoken with Harbaugh, or if he has it's only been to confirm a meeting date with him over the current offer. If you go back and look at  some of the previous reporting early in the search process about the time or shortly after Hoke was fired, you will see will see how this probably came about.

Jim has had many contacts with former Michigan players and some reportedly went to see him and supposedly watched a college game with him. I find this kind of dubious except that Saturday afternoons before a Sunday NFL game are a dead period for most teams whether at home or on the road. They typically have meertings Saturday night and go over assignments by various units and meet with TV media types.

In any case, I think this particular meeting Harbaugh had with his Michigan contacts was sought to disover what it would take to get him to Ann Arbor both from a coaching standpoint and on an emotional one. I don't think they necessarily talked money because that would have been done through his agent. Harbaugh is represented by a company which employs a Michigan grad as their lead guy in client management, recruitment and contract relations.

There was a story reported not long after the process began about the cost of hiring Harbaugh and how there was a discussion with Schissel and the regents about this. The point of this, obviously, was to let the Michigan decision-makers know what it would take financially to hire this coach and how it would be done if they approved. I think this was just a private discussion between Hackett and Schissel with perhaps a couple fo regents kept abreast.

The point was not to scare anyone about the money that would be needed to land Harbaugh, Shortly after this, there were reports indicating that Hackett planned to work directly and go through the 49ers as part of this search.

That is why now in recent days you've seen in some NFL insider reports references to how Michigan was rebuffed and presented an earlier offer that wasn't accepted, when, in fact, Michigan was only talking numbers without a formal offer present.

The leak of the proposed deal came likely from either Harbaugh's agent or a Michigan source familiar with the process of the number crunching. That is where most leaks originate because the agent has ulterior motive in reporting the offer for his client.

In this case, the disclosure bernefits Michigan because it shows it's dead serious in hiring him and is willing to go all in to get him. That satisfies a number of audiences and both puts a timestamp on the proposal and makes it clear Michigan didn't interfere with Harbaugh while he was still coaching his team for the playoffs, since the offer came after the 49ers were officialiy eliminated. It also comes before the NFL season is over preventing other teams from making competing offers. And it sets up a trigger date for a decision by Harbaugh which takes the money issue as a competing concern off the table, because nobody else can negotiate till the end of the NFL season, before which Michigan needs an snswer from Harbaugh. This was a very effective manuever and puts all the accountability for acceptance or rejection on Harbaugh.

No matter how this turns out, in terms of trying to get Harbaugh, Michigan did it right.