CFB coaching carousel

The mountain for Penn State to get good (that is, REAL good) again just keeps getting steeper and steeper.

If Harbaugh gets Michigan going again, that'll put PSU about fourth in the B1G East Division pecking order -- and that doesn't even count having to recruit against ND, or against Pitt if Narduzzi gets THEM going.

 

Assuming this is happening -- which certainly does seem to be the case -- it will be pretty funny when someone goes back and revisits Harbaugh's comments about Michigan's sham of an academic reputation for football players. He said it as a clear marketing tactic to Stanford recruits, but Harbaugh vividly recalled being steered to an easier major than what he preferred, so as not to undermine his dedication to football.

It set off a big firestorm in Ann Arbor, including a very well-done series by the Ann Arbor News that for the most part confirmed Harbaugh's comments. That article disclosed that Alan Branch got credit for an independent study class that involved learning how to use a day planner.

 

Tennessee, Notre Dame, Penn State, Colorado, Nebraska and, at a notch lower, Iowa all keep telling themselves this.

Over the past 15 years, Michigan has mattered in the national title conversation once, in 2006.

So much has changed in college football since the split title of Michigan/Nebraska in 1997. Spread offenses. More of an emphasis on speed. SEC schools are now NFL factories and it's damn hard to get a kid who can be training outside 10 months of the year to go north.

Not saying Harbaugh can't do it but I think his resurrection of Stanford was actually easier than trying to return Michigan to a Top 5 status. He didn't have to kiss any rings at Stanford, could do it his way - both in his temperament and a running/physical attack at a time where Pac-10 schools were playing pitch and catch.

The SEC is American Idol and the Big Ten schools are Cheap Trick or Whitesnake playing at the Cuyahoga County Fair.

 

You think Jim Harbaugh is going to be doing a lot of ring-kissing at Michigan, do you?

 

I don't know how the families of football coaches deal with the holidays. You feel college and pro staffs get used to the uncertainty, but I wonder if their families ever do. Whether an assistant or a head coach, you never know what is coming - but I figure they are able to shut that out in order to have a "normal" Christmas with their families. Must make for some fun dinner table conversation.

 

I suspect Harbaugh's recruiting hurdles at Stanford were tougher than they will be at Michigan.

I don't think anybody will care much about his comments of several years ago -- unless he starts losing at Brady Hoke-level. Then they'll care.

 

He'll have to kiss some. Comes with the expectations of $8 million a year.

 

I've always been fascinated with the football coaches (especially the assistants) that I've met through the years who will have a stretch of something like: Fort Hays State (2 years), Chadron State (1 year), Arkansas State (2 years), Memphis (1 year), South Florida (4 years), Wyoming (3 years), Illinois (1 year).

So many of them are tethered to whomever their head coach is.

A dear friend of mine was a head coach in college basketball for about 20 years. Division II, pretty successful. We often talked about how our jobs were similar in that, if you get a call from a "big market" (or a Division I school), you go -- no matter what.

He also brought up a great point.

"You can leave anytime some great opportunity comes up, 12 months a year. For us, we have three weeks in March and April to find a new job. Otherwise, we're at the mercy of an NCAA scandal taking someone down in the summer time."

I imagine December and January is that time for all of these assistants and their families at Christmas time. If you've gotten fired, you're scrambling for anything. Likewise, if you're successful and being wooed, that's also an added (but lucrative) layer of stress for a family.

 

Does Nick Saban or Urban Meyer kiss rings?

Harbaugh has to win. That's it.

 

Alabama and Ohio State don't exactly hold themselves up to be elite academic institutions. They are truly football factories.

 

Not saying Michigan will win the national championship next year if Harbaugh coaches, but the leap from where Michigan is now to Top Ten status isn't nearly as big of a leap as what Harbaugh faced both at Stanford and with the 49ers. If he can recruit his kind of players, Michigan will be Top Ten within 3 years.

If Michigan wasn't certain that Harbaugh was coming, I suspect we would have heard a lot more rumors about that job by now. What else could they be waiting for?

 

Yeah, that is certainly a crazy business where people move a lot. Gotta be rough on the families.