I'm glad this came out this morning. I needed something to focus on that wasn't the Lions. And even though it's bittersweet I have been at peace with Harbaugh's decision so I enjoy reminiscing.

I think I'm past the Weird Harbaugh segment (but is it ever really over?) so some things that I think were missed:

• Pre-Michigan, this will always be his #1 moment for me: What's your deal?
• Also pre-Michigan: Post-game handshake with Schwartz. I can't believe I just brought up a Niners-Lions game.
• 3rd base coach for Oakland at spring training.
• Poured gatorade on his cereal when he was out of milk.
• I feel like there was some story about him trying to help catch a mouse at a restaurant. Maybe I made that up.

The last three years have been the best, obviously. And the whole idea that we saw him grow up from a boy to a man at age 51-60 is hilarious but also true. But man, I have to say, Early Harbaugh is still my favorite Harbaugh. And as I've said many times, the Good Shit Jedd offense is my favorite offense and I'm sad things didn't fall into place for him to come back.

Last Harbaugh story, until I remember something else.

Following the 2018 MSU game (a.k.a. Spartan Stormtrooper March/Devin Bush Destroys Sparty Logo), Harbaugh called for a press conference on Monday. It was a bye week and usually there isn't one, so he had to specifically call it.

For 10 minutes or something, no one is asking him about the pre-game stuff. Finally, someone asks if that incident can serve as a turning point for the team, or if it will have any carryover affect through the rest of the season. Harbaugh says no, and then says, "Would you just like me to talk about the whole situation?" The reporter says, "Uh, sure." Harbaugh then pulls out a piece of paper and begins to carry on at great length about how this "had all the earmarkings and evidence of an orchestrated stormtrooper march."

Harbaugh then also butchers a Dantonio quote, perhaps intentionally. In 2014, in one of Dantonio's rants, he carried on about the Joe Bolden tent stake in the sideline turf. In the middle of his rant, he became concerned that people might think he was speaking negatively of Hoke. So he inserted, "It doesn't come from the coach, it comes from the program." Harbaugh referenced this and said he was quoting Dantonio: "It doesn't come from the team, it comes from the coach." So it was actually the opposite of what Dantonio said.

Jim Harbaugh, RIP.

I am really going to miss this guy.  What an original.  Most colorful coach we have had since Bo.  And what a Renaissance man on top of it. Thanks for 9 largely good and three absolutely great years.

Sanity check:  is anyone else getting intermittent background noises listening to the podcast or is it my earbuds not playing nice with my dying phone?

Kind of a cursory look at the Harbaugh era TBH.

/s

I remember Harbaugh throwing the football around a public square in Italy, and got in trouble with the security guard.

Nothing but great memories, even if some of the middle years (JOK's arm punt to end the 2017 Ohio game chances) were deflating.

40-3 will not be repeated even if JH stayed. Be prepared for a 2-loss team one day winning the title. 

Plenty of great YouTube moments to watch for years to come.

And Frames is 1-8 in last three years vs. Big 3 (UM, Ohio, Bowl). 

2015 Oregon state second half is when dominance started. The first half was rough until the end. The Utah game was rough all the way around. Go blue. Thank you Harbaugh. 

That Bailey "Who's Got It Better Than Us?" track is a perfect way to end the Harbaugh regime. Shit, they should play that at his funeral.

Back in 2015 Coach Harbaugh actually had his Gmail account listed in his Twitter profile.  Over the years I’d occasionally send him an email.  Usually just words of encouragement.  Sometimes I’d ask him to settle a friendly dispute between my wife and I.  He always replied, and it was 100% him.  
I’ll miss those exchanges, but time to move forward. 😊 

1. People kept giving me strange looks as I listend to the podcast while I walked down the street in New York City, because I kept grinning.

2. "Our State": I especially liked that the logo for that tour of Michigan said "Our State." Instead of the snotty osu attempt to assert precedence with that language-defying "the," it states a fact while also, subtly, suggesting precedence.

3. I used to direct traffic. Wish I'd know Jim enjoyed watching it or I would have contacted him.

this. was awesome. 

This is a great and perfectly pitched Harbaugh sendoff.  Thanks for this.

On the hot take that the program will be better off now without Harbaugh, that probably can't be answered for five years, but put me down as one who believes that is preposterous.  Sherrone has large shoes to fill.  Not saying he won't, but Harbaugh did this.

Oh man I'm sad that I completely forgot about the glorious whiteboard full of Harbaugh-isms!! Here's the tweet from back in the day with a photo of the board. 

Podcast brought to you by Jenny Nicholson.  And anybody who gets that joke on this site is 100% my people.

Reading the sponsors at the end of 4 and half hours during the outro music. Amazing.

First of all, a few "well ackshuallys."

1) Yes, the Peppers slip after his 2-point run back made it on TV.

2) Brian may have just mistakenly said the wrong thing, but The State News headline was not Defeat with Dignity, but "Defeated with Dignity," which just seems even funnier to me.

3) There seems to be confusion over when the Pat Fitzgerald Charlie Brown walk following the punt happened. It was definitely Hoke era. And it was not the M00N game. It was 2013, the M00N's predecessor, nearly as futile offensively. The Dileo slide game.

Michigan settled for a field goal after this. It was 9-9 before winning 27-19 in triple OT.

But we're not here to talk about Hoke.

Incredibly, there are a handful of plays/moments/vibes I feel like should be added, at least to the honorable mention category.

Vibes

• The methodical slaying of narratives. Granted, these were largely earned before having to defeat them. But: Can't beat your rivals. Can't win a big game on the road. Can't beat Ohio State. Can't win a playoff game. Can't beat the SEC (other than Florida). As far as what would have been perfect I would have taken beating Washington in a true Rose Bowl and then beating Georgia in the NCG. But, I'll take what we got.
• Not a vibe exactly, but you guys mentioned Uche. I don't remember which year it was, and I don't know remember the stats, but there was a season when Uche had something like 7 sacks on 11 plays on the field. I remember listening to an Indiana podcast previewing the Michigan game and the host was going over the stats and was like, "Wait, that can't be right. That must be a typo."
• Also not really a vibe, but J.J. showed multiple times, especially in 2021 garbage time but also in early 2022 and 2023 games that he can throw bombs on a dime downfield. You mentioned his first one to Baldwin. It's totally in his repertoire, yet we rarely tried or got to see it. Ah well, doesn't matter now. But I have a feeling a lot of people are going to be surprised by his NFL career.
• 2018, the Revenge Tour. It didn't end well, but it was fun while it lasted. And while I don't enjoy or root for injuries, it was kind of noteworthy when we had something like a 5-game stretch of knocking the starting QBs out of the game.
• J.J. going "Woo!" into the camera after the great games. Also going to miss =) on the Neck Sharpies, or as Seth replied to me in the comments section when I said that, ='(

Also I want to say I did not know in 2022 that Seth was faking it with his optimism going into Columbus. I would not say I was guaranteeing a win but I absolutely thought, even without Corum, we could win that game. I didn't really see what was different about 2021 and 2022 other than we had a better QB. Yeah, no Hutch or Ojabo, but the defense was good and we had a plan for OSU. Now, when it started poorly, I was concerned. But I felt like at halftime we were 100% in it. It was clear at halftime that we couldn't run because of their insane defense. Urban talked about it at halftime. Then we came out and scored on the opening drive of the 2nd half to Loveland and I was like, wow, we're going to win this game. I didn't have to wait for the Sainristil play.

Plays

• You talked about dunking on MSU and Dantonio in 2019. But specifically, I don't recall the mention of Lavert Hill intercepting the ball in the 4th quarter up 34-10, and rather than returning it for many yards, which he could have, he opted to step out of bounds so he could flex at Cody White, lol.
• Also against State, 2018 (so the Devin Bush pregame one), very early in the game Metellus had a vicious, but legal, hit on Felton Davis on a dropped pass. I think everyone's first thought (including Metellus) was "flag?" But there wasn't one and Metellus did some Skip To My Lou dance back to field.
• 2015 Rutgers. Jake Butt play was called back for "Intent to deceive." Still bitter.
• Speight with his Jump Man run into the end zone versus Maryland in 2016.
• The 2019 Iowa game. Maybe this goes in the vibes segment. We had big scores versus MTSU and Rutgers. But this was also after the Army game and the 35-14 loss at Wisconsin. This looked like, this is just our offense this year. As we had 10 Sack Time events en route to a Very Big Ten (and very Iowa) win.
• You mentioned Brandon Peters coming into the game for O'Korn versus Rutgers and throwing a TD pass to Evans. Even before that he came in and immediately engineered a TD drive. Similarly, Cade in 2020 came in for Milton down 17-0 versus Rutgers and immediately completed a couple passes, including a bomb TD to (wide open) Cornelius Johnson. In both cases I remember thinking, wait, we had a QB who can do that this whole time? If you wanted to say Peters/McNamara was not ready before the Rutgers game, fine, but neither of them started the game and were clearly better than O'Korn/Milton. (Maybe Milton was injured, but regardless of the reason, he was ineffective.) Cade brought Michigan back for our glorious triple OT win over Rutgers. Honestly, the game had me questioning Jim's judgment and with the totality of his tenure and the 2020 season, I definitely was in the "If he goes away it's not a bad thing" camp.

2023

There were a couple that I think were missed from 2023. Even in the post-Championship podcast when listing plays, you did not mention my number one play!

Sainristil's pick and run back to 100% slam the door on Washington. Yes, I already felt very confident about winning by that point, but it removed all doubt and was a championship celebration throughout the entire return, that I really wish had ended in the end zone.

A couple others:

• The entire final drive vs OSU. It was mentioned a couple times, but I felt it deserved more shine, especially the throw across the body to CJ.
• Semaj end around TD vs Purdue, which got us back on track after sputtering on offense.

Oh my goodness. What a ride.

Our new S&C guy was involved in moment #1 https://x.com/nezzy21/status/1752112346967720347?s=46

Seth: helots were enslaved by the ancient Spartans; Spartan citizens were called Spartiates. (This is response to you saying that the MSU logo isn't "what the helots wore" -- if we're going to talk about Michigan degrees and our ability to get historical details right, we shouldn't conflate the enslaved helots with Spartiate citizens!)

There’s an old Foxtrot comic where the kid, Jason, starts drooling at the joke of Lord of the Rings being like 12 hours long. That’s how I feel about this 4 hour podcast. Cartoon drooly face. Reminiscent beauty. 

I just realized -- that if this was an audiobook, I would have given it 5* on Goodreads, and a paid a lot for it.

small, semi-irrelevant point, but cam martinez was a quarterback in muskegon (big reds and muskegon catholic REPRESENT), not grand rapids. i don’t believe he was ever a wideout in columbus, but im not sure about that. 

(he’s now at boston college, where - if they’re smart - they’ll put the ball in his hands. he was an electric offensive player in high school)

“Some people choose to travel on the ground, some people by air. George Patton was able to get his job done on the ground. Neil Armstrong through the air. Last Saturday night, we chose to grind it out on the ground…”

I'm just flabbergasted by Brian's hot take. So....Taking it as an actual statement of his opinion (I'm never quite sure).. I won't say it's impossible that he's right, because no man knows the future..

But to predict that Michigan is literally better off with Jim Harbaugh gone feels like a prediction almost insanely unlikely to come to pass.. I mean this:

Ignoring 2020. I find it VERY hard to believe that Michigan will be better off over the next 9 years than they were over the last 9 years. Again, not impossible. Not saying Moore is bad. Just a clear statement that JH is one of the best football coaches ever. I find it hard to believe that we literally had another "one of the best ever" sitting there waiting to take over at 37.

If you want to neg this as "BPONE" or whatever, feel free. I don't think these are "negative expectations". Its a recognition that doing great things like JH has done are not easy. They are really, really hard. A lot has to go right. (Hell, a lot has to go right for Harbaugh to succeed in LA).

Predicting that it was literally a good thing for Michigan for JH to leave...I just can't agree with that.

     Rob

This is why I love college football and Mgoblog. So many memories from these past nine years. From losing to Utah that first game (I remember who I watched it with) to my then six-year-old son losing his mind when Devion Smith disappeared in the pile and popped back out for a TD, to that last INT in the Natty. Thank you for helping me relive this all. 

This was just delicious

I just got done listening to this podcast and I just want to say THANK YOU to Brian, Seth and David.  I will re-listen to this over and over again.

Thank you so much! 😢