This May Be Jim Harbaugh's Last Shot

I've had it. I've had it with Jim Harbaugh's inability to develop a quarterback. I've had it with the inconsistent offenses. I've had it with the failure to beat rivals. I am through with it, and I know many Michigan fans are also done, especially after the way things went last year. And yet Jim Harbaugh is not only still at Michigan, but he received an extension last January. Now look, I hope that the Jim Harbaugh era at Michigan somehow figures itself out. I hope it becomes the well-oiled machine that so many of us thought it would be when he was hired here early in 2015. Nothing would please me more than for Jim Harbaugh to prove so many of us wrong. Sadly though, I feel like the writing is on the wall.

Six years is a huge sample size, and in those six years, Jim Harbaugh is 0-5 against Ohio State (it would be 0-6 six, but last year's game got canceled due to a Covid breakout). He still hasn't figured out the Michigan State hurdle even though Michigan State last year was in disarray before the Mel Tucker hire. He's had embarrassing losses to Wisconsin; he's had embarrassing losses to Penn State. He had an embarrassing loss to Indiana last year, a team that Michigan hadn't lost to since the Reagan administration. I mean, what's a guy gotta do to get fired around here? He has had enough time. There are no more excuses anymore. With that said, I would be shocked if Michigan doesn't return to that 7 to 9 win range that they've been in since the Harbaugh era began. As my friend and former boss over at MaizeNBrew Anthony Broome has pointed out, this is year seven. But in many ways, as he's told me, it's year one, part two. These are the lowest the expectations have been for the Michigan football program since Jim Harbaugh arrived in 2015. I don't know a single person who has this team winning 11 games. If there was ever a year in which nine wins would look pretty good on a résumé, it would be the season. 

The biggest reason Jim Harbaugh is still allowed to be the head coach of the University of Michigan has nothing to do with wins and losses. If it did, he would've gotten canned after last season. The University of Michigan football program got to a place under when Rich Rodriguez and Brady Hoke that no program wants to be, and that's a place of genuine irrelevance. People stopped talking about the University of Michigan football program for a short time. Jim Harbaugh, quirks and all, still keeps the Michigan football program relatively lucrative. One more lousy season will change that because you can only watch a train wreck for so long. This may be his last chance. It doesn't necessarily mean that he has to go 10-2, but he has to prove that there's somewhat of a light at the end of the tunnel. If not, his tenure may be fed to the wolves.