Harbaugh Open Thread
A bunch of people seem to have a problem with this statement, "COVID is part of our society. Wasn’t caused by football or caused by sports. And there’s no expert view right now that I’m aware of that sports is going to make that worse. It’s part of our society; we’re going to have to deal with it.”
Full statement is much more reasonable.
"These kids are going to have to do the same thing. They’ve got to go to school. They’ve trained their whole lives for the opportunity to play their sport. That is my view with the knowledge that we have and time to learn more about it. It would be my responsibility, our responsibility and the players’ responsibility also, to keep themselves safe and get the schooling and training that they need.”
"If students are on campus, then my personal belief as a parent of a daughter who would also be on campus that this is a safe place," Harbaugh said. "As safe as possible, would be within the university, in our athletic buildings and complexes. The safety precautions that have been put into place. I would feel good with the medical oversight of the students, student-athletes. I would want the responsibility. I would want the responsibility of keeping our players safe and educating them .... I share the same opinion as our players. They want to play."
Much more to discuss (argue about) in his presser. Discuss away!
Not a lot of team related content – which is not that surprising given the lack of contact over the last 4 months. He did note he felt Dylan McCaffrey has been very strong from a leadership perspective a few times during the call – that is a positive. On the o-line he seemed to indicate a few positions are set with guard being the area of most competition.
He also talked some about recruiting and indicated he thought zoom meetings had been effective and a tool he would keep using moving forward to connect with recruits and their families. It sounds like they were in fairly serious discussions about a contract extension and that is now on the back burner with Covid. It will be interesting to see if they try and get something done before the season or if this now becomes a winter 2021 activity.
To be more explicit, it looks like Hayes and Mayfield at tackle, Filiaga, Steuber, and Barnhart at guard, and Vastardis and Carpenter at center. I think most of us were predicting Steuber to move inside, but it is nice to see the coaches are confident in Hayes at a tackle spot. Hayes-Barnhart-Carpenter-Steuber-Mayfield is my projection.
Also it sounds like Jeter has gained 30 pounds and now weighs 320-325.
I respect Harbaugh for not filtering every word through six focus groups before speaking. He is more candid and more entertaining than most of his peers because of it. That does, however, sometimes lead to these snips and soundbites that can blow up. Part of who he is.
Nothing to see here from my perspective.
Jim Harbaugh has been a players advocate on issues ranging from compensation to social justice Since his days at Stanford. Time and again he has proven to be ahead of the curve in attempts to give better opportunities to student-athletes and help shift the power paradigm away from the corrupt NCAA. He is also a man with common sense who is wiling to listen, learn, take in information, be flexible in thought, and change his stance on issues if he sees something in a new light (as was the case with his opinion on Kapaernick kneeling protest). Jim changed his mind and supported Colin after taking to him about it, long before the media, the NFL, or any of the latest and loudest voices in this current social justice movement were making a stand.
Jim has not beaten OSU, Can be quirky, and rubs the media the wrong way-and therefore takes plenty of shots from the “haters”. That said, and this is a completely objective take, I would send my child to play for Jim HArbaugh any day of the week and twice on Saturdays. No coach, nobody, has been as outspoken and active about changing the current NCAA model as Jim. He has earned more capital and legitimacy on issues regarding the well-being and advancement of the student athlete than any current college football coach I can think of.
Is he always right?- Of course not. Is he beyond reproach?- Of course not. But an attempt to attack his character and intentions when it comes to student-athlete well being (By taking A cherry-picked Section of a quote out of context) Is absurd, disingenuous, And swarmy.
Wear masks and social distance. It works and it's not that hard.
Festivus in July?
He's right. Whether college students play football games or not isn't going to make much, if any difference in our society's ability to combat the virus. To be OK with students on campus and not OK with them playing a football game is irrational.
OTOH, there are very large stakes at hand for the schools here. They're certain to forgo much (if not all) ticket revenue, but could at least receive TV revenue for these games. They lost a lot by not playing March Madness. To also not play college football would hurt them severely.
Although traveling in planes, buses, staying in hotels, and spending time in the locker rooms and film rooms are areas where you're more likely to have prolonged indoor contact with people that are infectious. There are ways to mitigate the risks certainly but you have to admit they exist first.
Sounds pretty level headed and reasonable
Over 150 infected students (and climbing) in from 15 lightly populated frat houses at the University of Washington.
Until there is a real way to stop this kind of outbreak we have no business cramming kids together on campuses and in sports, then sending them home all over the country at the end of November.
I don't like it either, and it's the reality of the epic bungling of this country's collective response to the pandemic.
Harbaugh is spot on. He has access to some of the best doctors on the planet also mind you, to help form his opinion. These docs might not state their opinions publicly, as it's such a volatile subject...but they would tell him off the record.
I disagree with some of his coaching decisions. But one thing I know - he always has the players best interests at heart. He wouldn't make the statement to play ball, if he thought some players were at risk for something bad.
Go Jim go.