#6: Is Jim Crazy or Misunderstood?

Jim is famous for his eccentric, and some would even say crazy, personality. Family and close friends weigh in on the revered coach that’s captured the nation.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Last time on Man of the crowd, what the coach?
Thank you very much. You know how to make a
guy feel at home and my family and I appreciate

(00:21):
it very much and I love you too. Thank you
very much. Somebody asked me if I was going to
come to an arbor and see them as Siah. I'm
wondering how comfortable or uncomfortable you are with this perception
that you're the savior of Michigan football. And Jackie has
a great philosophy, and that is that she wanted her
children to know what their father did. And I can

(00:42):
remember when they could just barely walk, John and Jim,
and she would bring him out to the practice field
and all I went, a ball would go over my
shoulder and I didn't look back. I said, oh, please,
dear God, don't let this be one of mine. And
then Bull wouldn't say that, He just glare at me.
Those damn kids off. What do you think Bo would
say right now if he saw Jim leading this program? Oh,

(01:04):
you'd be so proud. And I think he does know
how about that? I think he looks down. I get
an emotional just talking about it. Bo was very, very
very proud of Jim and then what told me one
day that he thought he would he would be back
and he would be coaching at the University of Michigan
before he got chill, before he passed away from the

(01:25):
Baltimore Ravens. This is Man of the Crowd, a multi
episode podcast that pulls back the curtain on Ravens figures
personal lives this season the HORRORBA Family. I'm Sarah Ellison. Look,

(01:45):
we're going to at this day with an enthusiasm. Go
very car because you're a fighter and that's what you
are going to be today. To Laul, We'll horthor twice.

(02:06):
Just one last question, I'll let you go here. Um,
everybody in your family that I've talked to you have
all said that they feel like your dad is is
misunderstood in the public eye. Would you would you agree
with that? Uh? I guess I don't know. It kind
of depends on what I say what the public eye?
What's that? What's that exactly means? I feel like kind

(02:29):
of a divisive guy. So it's like I feel like
a lot of people feel strongly one way or another. Uh,
I don't know. I don't know if if I'd say
totally misunderstood. Yes, if you give me a little more
to work with there may yeah, yeah, no, just in
terms of you know that he's um ultra competitive and

(02:49):
maybe um uh maybe inflexible a little bit um. This
is me doing a phone interview with Jay Harbaugh. He's
Jim's son. Can you tell him waffling? It's true, I am.
I wish I could have been a little more direct
in the moment, less awkward. But I didn't expect Jay
to ask me to define the public's perception of his father.

(03:11):
I thought we'd be working from the same unspoken description.
I mean, I asked other family members like Jack, Jackie
and Jonie, and they didn't ask me to define it.
So I was struggling to tell Jay that this is
how some people described his father. To me, what are
your impressions of Jim crazy? That's Ravens owner Steve Bushotti.
There's more to a statement, which I'll get to in
another episode. But I heard that c word more than once,

(03:36):
or sometimes people would use a variation of it. Nuts
was a popular one, especially with Ray Ratto. He's a
reporter for NBC Sports in the Bay Area. Why do
you characterize him as nuts? Well? One because he is true.
Because while all football coaches are nuts, Jim is hyper
hyper competitive. He can never lose. Even when he's won,

(04:00):
He's always seeking the next thing to beat. You know
the famous game at usc where he basically ran up
for score on Pete Carroll and thought nothing of it
because he wanted fifty. And the only reason why he
wanted fifty is because he didn't have time to get
fifty seven. He's just that tightly wound, and he's tightly

(04:24):
wound all the time, so he's not. When I was
talking with Jay, I didn't want to be as rough
as Ratto was, even if Jay is a grown man
and has probably heard plenty of rough things about his dad.
Jay's twenty eight years old and actually works at Jim's
running backs coach and special team's assistant at Michigan. He's
down to earth and a super nice guy, and that

(04:47):
was his reputation around the Ravens practice facility too. Ravens
fans may remember Jay from when he worked on John's
coaching staff in twenty twelve. In two twelve, you know
the Super Bowl season. Yeah, that means not only was
it brother versus brother in the Super Bowl, but it
was father versus son too crazy? Right? Anyway, Let's get

(05:09):
back to Jay's response about whether he thinks his dad
is misunderstood. I just didn't know. I guess the public
perception might be that he's a borderline competitive or borderline
crazy competitive. There it is. I finally mentioned the C word,
not competitive crazy. Okay, I'll stop interrupting now, I don't

(05:30):
know that, so I'm kind of accurate to me. I
don't know that I squeeze your whole deal, but I
mean also competitive. And when he feels a certain way
about things, they want something done, and he's certainly inflexible.
If he thinks that something is the right way, that's
what he wanted to do. And then but I don't

(05:55):
think that's I was surprised that Jay didn't say his
dad was a misunderstood not because Jim is an ultra
competitive he is, there's no denying that, but because every
single one of Jim's family members that I personally pose
that same question too up to that point, they quickly
responded saying, yeah, he's misunderstood. Here's Jack and Jackie. Jim
said that he feels like one of the things that

(06:16):
separates John from him are just his people's skills, and
then he's joked that he wears people out. What is
it about Jim that can maybe be misunderstood? Well, and
it is misunderstood. He is a kind, caring He has
two qualities. One as competitive as John is. They are

(06:38):
intensely competitive. They share that, that competitiveness. And the second
thing is sensitivity. But he's very, very, very very sensitive,
I think, as John is too, And those qualities sometimes
don't come together. Conflict very they conflict. They conflict. You're
so competitive, you're so set that sometimes that cannot be

(07:03):
read as well as you would like it to be read. Yeah,
I do think Jim is misunderstood sometimes because he probably
in a way he may in a way put up
a little barrier there, you know, I got like I
I'm afraid I'm a little bit like that myself. Well,

(07:25):
let's back up a second. I want to explain why
I was even asking the question in the first place,
and it has to do with where we ended things
in the last episode of this podcast. Remember how we
left at We had just gone over what a stud
of a head coach Jim was. He had turned the
fortunes of team after team after team as such, everybody
wanted to hire him. After the San Francisco forty nine

(07:47):
ers let him go, and out of his many opportunities,
Jim chose to go back to the college rinks, return
home to Ann Arbor, and become the messiah of Michigan football.
That's the title he wasn't comfortable with, but it's a
title he's living up to so far. He's restoring the
standard of excellence that his mentor and Michigan legendary head

(08:08):
coach bo Schembeckler helped build in the nineteen seventies and eighties.
Then I left you with this final SoundBite from Detroit
Free presses Mark Snyder to follow in the footsteps of
his mentor bosche Beckler really carried him. I think that
that drolled him to be the guy to save it,
and I think that that's something that he's done, and
I think that that'll always hold legends. Especially he ends

(08:30):
up winning a national championship here, you know, he'll have
legend status forever. So if Jim is on the cusp
of becoming a legend at Michigan, if most football teams
would salivate it just the idea of having him lead
their programs. Why would the forty nine Ers fire him?
Why would they fire a guy after he took them
to the NFC Championship Game and a Super Bowl in

(08:51):
his first three years of being on the job. They
hadn't been to the playoffs in eight seasons before he
got there, and they haven't advanced to the postseason since
he left. And then there's some answillary questions to the
forty nine ers situation. Why do coaches from the SEC
seem to despise Jim? And is nationally much talked about
satellite camps? Why does Jim seem to constantly be in

(09:12):
the news with one zeny headline after another. Well, as
we explore all that, I think it'll help us understand
this bigger question of is Jim misunderstood? As we explore
the San Francisco history, it's important to point out that
neither the forty nine Ers nor the Harbas were very
interested in diving too deep into the details. Both Jackie
and John told me that the details should remain private.

(09:35):
And as rich Eisen told me, things always happen for
a reason, And that makes sense because Jackie said that
she's never seen Jim happier than he is right now
at Michigan, and meanwhile, forty nine Ers CEO Jed Yorke
seems very happy with his new head coach, Kyle Shanahan.
So I get white. Both sides just want to move on.
So while I'm not here to create any new waves

(09:58):
on the topic, at the same time, getting some answers
helps us understand Jim and the Harbaugh family dynamics better
Jim and the Wolverine. So so the youth impact program
just this last summer, and one of the little tykes
asked Jim what happened in San Francisco. Jim posted his
response to his own YouTube channel recently, and here it
is with some interesting background music put to the clips,

(10:22):
calling them but they had was fourth year to the
fourth year? Was there the order? The team came into
my office and said one talks, So he said down
and Drew was talk and he said, Jim, we want

(10:46):
to go in a different direction here at the San
Francisco before the nine And I said, great, let's going
to direction. What direction is that? That direction doesn't include youth.
We're going in a direction you're not going with. I'm
sure I'm not the only one who is curious about
what direction York wanted to go, you know, given the
team's trajectory with Jim had been nothing but a legitimate

(11:09):
shot at the Super Bowl each year. So I reached
out to Rey Rodo because he's been a San Francisco
Bay area sportswriter since the nineteen seventies, and he told
me that things started to fall apart between Jim and
the front office. Ironically right after they made it to
the super Bowl, and just Jim's second year, they lost
the Super Bowl, and he then went in and asked

(11:29):
for a significant raise that the forty nine ers perceived
as wanting the super Bowl winner salary, and their response was, well,
with a super Bowl and then we'll do that. And
that became either the genesis for the first real old
burden sign that he didn't view himself as working for

(11:50):
Jed Jord. He viewed Jed Jord as a guy he
had to beat. I think Jim thought that he had
the upper hand because he was giving them football victories,
but they had the upper because Jed York has all
the money, and so it sort of just broke down
from there. Did you feel like either one side had
a more compelling point or did you feel like they

(12:10):
both had points but just couldn't work it out. Well,
I think they just came from such diametrically opposed places.
It wasn't toxic. It we just sort of you know,
sand paper and bad wood. It's just they just round
against each other. And I think it was sort of stylistic.
It was Jim needing to compete all the time, It

(12:32):
was Jed needing to win because he was the boss.
And the third thing that happened, And I mean, I
think some people think of this as less important than
I do. But when the forty nine ers were at
Candlestick Park, the only thing that mattered was winning, because
you weren't monetizing the ballpark. It was just it was
a place where football happened. Then they go to the

(12:55):
new stadium, which is Jed's baby, and all of a sudden,
the stadium start to matter and ancillary income started to matter,
and those things didn't matter to Jim Harball. Jim Harball
wanted to win more football games. And so when you've
got two guys who are that driven in such opposite ways,
they can't help but turn on each other. Doesn't it

(13:17):
seem odd that if I'm hearing you right, For a
CEO of a football franchise, if the goal is to
make money, is it winning the best avenue to do that?
It's not the only avenue. How did fans take the
whole thing? Did they did they just say get along?
Or did they take anybody's side? Oh no, they heavily

(13:39):
took Harball side because he was giving them what they
were interested in, which is wins. The fans today would
take Harball in them in art. What about the players,
I think they weren't crazy about the cow, but they
sure like the milk. But he could wear on people.
I mean he had the same experience at Stamford, where

(14:02):
you know, he turned them into a national football power.
But there were players who were fed up with him
because he never stopped. He never let up. It was
day after day, you know, find something new to compete about.
And it wasn't that players were unmotivated, but they were
the ones doing the colliding and doing the running and

(14:24):
doing the hitting. And you know, and they were going
to wait a minute, we're twelve and three, we clinched
our division. Why did this next game Arma get? And
because Jim doesn't know how to gear down in the
sport where sometimes you have to learn that he wore
on him. Did he lose the locker room? No, because winds,

(14:46):
you know, Trump everything else. When the forty nine ers
put out the press release that said that they were
mutually agreeing the part ways of the Jim, do you
think that's true. Do you think it was mutual? No?
I think it was one of those one things where
we both agree that you can't work here anymore. Do
you think at all there's any sense of regret of

(15:09):
not being able to work that out on the forty
nine ers part, No, I think I think the name
Harbaugh j Jill rings a lot of ankst in the
front office. Yeah, I'm gonna let you go after this,
but I just am still trying to make sure I
understand Jed York's point of view. Do you think that
he just was he just worn down by him, by Jim.

(15:32):
It's just so hard not to understand why you would
give up all that winning. It was that dealing with
Harbaugh every day, which I've never had to do, can't
be a grind, especially when you consider that Jed Yorke
is the entitled son of multimillionaires. You know, it was

(15:55):
always the chosen child and had reached a point in
his life where his great accomplishment, the one that he
wants to be remembered for more than any other, is
not hiring Jim Harbaugh. It's building the stadium, and he
wants his level of esteem and credit for that. And

(16:17):
j Harbaugh, you know, to some women, what do you
mean football is not the most important thing in your
life too? You own a football team, And Jed York's
response would be, no, I to run a business and
the football team is part of that business. At some point,
all professional sports revolve more around internal office politics than

(16:38):
anything else. Just in jan they just came from from
different planets, and ultimately, you know, you had an alien war.
Ratto is right about there being a strained relationship between
York and Jim. I talked to John about it, and
I asked him if he tried to give tips to
Jim since he had such a good relationship with Steve
Bashotti here in Baltimore. Yeah, it was hard. I mean,

(16:59):
I just right, you know the details, you know, I
know the ins and outs because we're brothers. We talk
all the time, and I know what's going on in
Michigan right now. Intimately, so you know the ins and
outs of what that means to have support and not
have a support or what to de agree and all that,
and you know, those are those are stories that are private,
that are between you know people, and that that don't
get hered. But there were times when I would talk
to Jim and he was struggling with you know, the

(17:20):
management there, and I could see it was completely different
than the situation I had in Baltimore. So it was
a little bit hard for me to say, but I said,
We'll try this, you know, try talking to him this way.
Try to have this kind of relationship. I talk to
him many times. Try to have a direct relationship, you know,
with with Jed Yorke. I mean, that's your that's your owner,
that's the guy, you know. Do whatever you can. And
he did. He tried to do that, I believe, you know,
and for whatever reason, he wasn't able to have the

(17:43):
same kind of relationship that Steve and I have, which
you know, which is just it's too bad, you know,
and hopefully all parties can learn from that if they
want to down the road. The second thing that Ratto
was right about was that their parting was not mutual.
Jim confirmed that much when he talked to the youth
in that earlier SoundBite, and did it even more clear
when talking to San Jose Mercury News is Tim Kawakami

(18:05):
in twenty fifteen. So much comment from Jed Yorke that
it was a mutual separation, two sites mutually agreed that
you wouldn't be the coach? Is that at all true?
Is that? Is that what happened? Or were you told
that you wouldn't be the coach anymore? Well? Yeah, so
I was told I wouldn't be the coach anymore and
then even called mutual. I mean, now employs are going

(18:26):
to put the forty nine ers in a position to
have a coach that they didn't want anymore. But that's
that's the truth of it. I was I didn't leave
the forty nine ers. I felt like the forty nine
hierarchy left me. And finally, despite suffering two more losing
seasons since Jim was fired, Yorke told Sports Illustrated's Peter
King that he doesn't regret the decision. I don't know

(18:49):
if regrets the right word. We had a lot of
success together. We tried several times to get an extension
done with Jim, and for whatever reason, those didn't call
and ultimately as successful it was here, I think Jim
is very happy and he's doing an unbelievable job at Michigan.

(19:10):
You know, we obviously didn't have success after Jim left.
I don't know that we'd be sitting here with John
Lynch and Kyle Shanahan if something happened, and I don't
know that it would have worked long term if we
did get something. Going back to that phone conversation with Ratto,
you may have been able to tell that I was
struggling to understand York's point of view. That's why I

(19:31):
came back to the question again at the end. There
were reports that Jim also but it heads with general
manager Trent Bulky, but Ratta doesn't think that ultimately played
as big of a part as the relationship with York.
Just about every American knows what it's like to work
with somebody that you don't really mesh with, or it
feels like you come from two different worlds, and that

(19:51):
makes sense here. Jim is the son of a blue
collar football coach. He grew up eating, drinking, breathing football,
essentially growing up in that Michigan locker room. Meanwhile, Jed
Yorke grew up with a lot of wealth and came
to the forty nine Ers with the business background. He
was appointed by his father to be the CEO of
the NFL franchise at twenty eight years old. So it's

(20:14):
easy to see why they didn't mix. It's understandable. But
what's not understandable, at least for many media members, is
why they were leaks to the media that started undercutting
Jim in September of twenty fourteen. September is the beginning
of the season, and it was right after he had
taken the forty nine Ers to the NFC Championship Game
for the third time in a row. Here's what Sports

(20:36):
Illustrated columnist Michael Rosenberg wrote at the time about those
leaks and Jim's dismissal. Quote, the forty nine Ers inexplicably
sabotaged their season before it began with leaks about Harbaugh
losing the team. The players never quite on the coach,
but the owner did. You can't fire a coach who
wins to bring in a coach that you like more

(20:58):
that never works. Don't tell me about personalities. Clashing in
the organization, because personalities clash in every organization. Winning in
pro sports is not about avoiding dysfunction. It's about managing dysfunction.
Players want to play more, Assistants want their ideas heard.
Scouts want their players drafted. Head coaches want personnel input.
General managers don't like the play calling. You can't avoid

(21:21):
all that. You have to find a way to make
it work. Close quote here's jim in Kawakami again. When
you talk about them letting you know that they didn't
want you to be there, do you think they had
decided that long ago? Let me know early in the
season almost I don't know all that. I don't want
to speculate. And you know, you may know, you may know,

(21:45):
you know, you know better than I know. Well you did,
you did? You did ask me on that last game
and after that last game, to you know, investigate where
those leagues came from. And I know I understood that,
and I believe that's a thing that we should do.
I asked Jed York point blank if he was the league.
He denied it. I have since written that I believe

(22:05):
he was. How do you think I've reported it so far? Jim. Um, yeah,
I haven't. I haven't. I've read everything. I have a
good idea. I have a pretty good understanding of some
of the things that took place, and I don't think
we were playing out of the same same playbook. Maybe
there'll be a book someday. Maybe I'll write a manuscript. Okay,

(22:27):
So there is no confirmation on who leaked those reports,
only suspicions, but I bring them up because I thought
that whoever leaked them might have hurt Jim's reputation. York
told the media in twenty fourteen that he parted ways
with Jim because of philosophical differences. The media say it's
a personality conflict, But either way, what does that say
about Jim's philosophies or personality to say no to all

(22:51):
that winning? Could it really be that bad? Or was
Jim just misunderstood? So that's what I asked Rata. I
don't think he was misunder stood over the four years
with the forty nine ers, because you have plenty of
times to show that you have other gears, and I
think you know he is who he is. I don't

(23:12):
think he's inherently evil, but I do think his nature
is to be that tightly raft guy who must compete,
or it's like a shark if he stopped swimming, he's dad.
I just think that is, you know, his greatest attribute
at his achilles seal. He is competitive on a level

(23:33):
that most people aren't. Well, that kind of sounded like
what Jay told me. Jim really is just ultra competitive.
And the comments about Jim being like a shark that
dies if he doesn't swim, that's actually not too far
off either. Sports had never been invented and you were,
you know, picturing yourself growing up, what would you have
wanted to become? Honestly, this is Jim on the Pardon

(23:55):
My Take podcast. I knew from the very youngest age
that I was goin to play football as long as
I could, then coach, then die. See football then death.
There's probably some stuff in between, like family and friends,
but in terms of a career, that's all Jim wants.
It's what he lives for. Okay. The other note Fromato

(24:17):
that probably shouldn't be overlooked is this one. His nature
is to be that tightly rapt guy who must compete.
I just think that is his greatest attribute and his
achilles seal I wanted to explore this idea. How could
Jim's greatest strength also be considered his greatest weakness. What

(24:38):
I learned is that it is completely in the eye
of the beholder. You have to decide whether extreme competition
is a good thing or a bad thing. And I
notice some people change their minds depending upon their relationship
with Jim. But I can tell you right now, Jim's
parents have always seen it as a very good thing.
When they were lack in the fourth or fifth grade,

(25:00):
Jim was having a tough time in school on the playground,
and the problem was that he would plan, he would
plan to win, and some of these kids in the
fourth and fifth grade didn't understand. It'd be a pop
fly and he would go knock two kids down, get
into the ball to catch it. And so the coach
told him a couple of times and obviously didn't listen.

(25:21):
So next thing, we're invited to the principal's office, and
so I'm coaching. I couldn't go, so Jackie went. The
principal said, missus Harbor, we've had discussions with Jim and
he's just too competitive on the playground and we want
you to help us with it so, Jackie, we share
the same philosophy. If you do anything to knock that

(25:44):
out or think you can handle that, then you and
I have a problem. Jim can probably thank his mom
for sticking up for him all those years ago, because
as an adult, his extreme competitive streak is surely what's
made him so successful as a coach. Heck, it's what
made him an All American quarterback in college and a
Pro Bowl quarterback in the NFL. Jim enjoyed a whopping

(26:06):
fifteen year career in the NFL and earned the nickname
Captain Comeback for rallying his team when they were down.
I reached out to Peter King because he's been covering
sports in the NFL for nearly forty years, so he
remembers what Jim was like as a player. Well, King
told me that Jim wasn't the most talented quarterback in
the league. But and I'm quoting King now, I always

(26:29):
felt like this was a case of a guy who
maximized his ability every time he took the field, So
that's a tribute to him. His will to win was
as elite as any player who has ever played close quote.
Talking with friends, family, and reporters. They pointed to a
host of attributes Jim possesses as a result of his

(26:51):
competitive nature. I'll focus on three that came up the most. One,
his competitive shriek fuels his incredible work ethoic. Two, it
fuels his creativity, and three, it fuels his ability to
completely block out noise and just not care what people
think of him. The funny thing is each of those

(27:12):
attributes have been both criticized and praised. However, you look
at them, you can't deny that they're why Jim wins
with whatever team he's given. But let's break the three down. First.
His work ethic. He does a great job of giving
you that spark, that initial boom, but after a while
you just want to kick his ass. Alex Boone played

(27:34):
for Jim all four seasons. He was the head coach
of the forty nine ers. He's talking here to HBO's
Andrea Kramer. Just keeps pushing you, and you're like, dude,
we got over the mountain, stop let go. He kind
of wore out as welcome. He just pushed guys too far.
You know, he wanted too much, demanded too much, expected
too much. You know, we gotta go out and do this.
We gotta go out and do this. We gotta go

(27:55):
out and do this, and you'd be like this guys
might be clinically insane. He's crazy. Sometimes when you want
to do things your way and only your way, that
doesn't bode well, especially in the NFL. You have to adapt,
You have to learn to work with other people to
you and the GM, GM and you. So what advice
would you have for the players at Michigan. Be ready
to work? I mean, in all honesty, Jim's a great guy.

(28:19):
He lives by a code accountability, responsibility, working hard. I
agree with that code. But at the same time, you're
ready to work hard. I admit all that work sounds
taxing and miserable. It's not for the faint of heart.
And if you're the one being pushed, I bet that's
when Jim's unrelenting competitive drive starts to transition from being

(28:41):
a strength into a weakness or is Achilles hill as
Ratto said, because it's starting to wear you down. One
of your former players said that they wanted to knock
your teeth down, and you're like, oh good, that's a compliment.
Why is something like that a compliment? If I recall
what he was saying was that I was pushing him
and push him to be a better player, be a

(29:03):
better team, and at times he wanted to knock my
teeth out, and uh, that's that's Uh, that's what I remembered.
And he did. He did become a better player, and
we did become a better team. And he was saying saying,
thanks for pushing him, for pushing him. We all need
a little push, we all need Human nature requires that
somebody's somebody's pushing us. And I've been in that role

(29:27):
too that I've been in the role both ways where
I've appreciated somebody pushing me to be better, appreciated that
you know that you can push somebody else also to
be better. Yeah, there's a time sometimes when they turn
around and look at you like they want to knock
your teeth out. But then there's a there's another time
where they look back to you and say, I give

(29:48):
you a little nod like they got it and thanks.
And I think that's that's the moment that that you
really lived for as a coach, and that's why you
do what you do and you understand it along the way.
There maybe that look where they want to knock your
teeth out, But it's all part of a process to
to get to a point where you're the best that

(30:09):
you can be. See that's the thing. It's not like
Jim is oblivious to the effect he has on people.
He wants to knock my teeth out, No big deal.
He'll actually love me for it. One day, Jim's son Jay, well,
he told me that hard work is actually the secret
to Jim success. Can you at all from like a
big pictures like what is it that he does that

(30:32):
make it me? He goes into any program and he
starts winning. That is not normal, Um, how do you
think he does it? But that's fascinating about it, which
people wouldn't really leave out perspective that it's not complicated.
It's actually it's the opposite of what you think. You know,
people people are like a big deal, whether it's some

(30:54):
sports are in business not changing the culture of a
program or a business or that kind of thing and
how it's a transition. But I think people will be
shockasy that there's really nothing that that's not something that
talked about their focused on. You know, it's just all
all all that it's about it every single day, getting
everybody within the organization to try to do their very

(31:17):
best to get better individually and do things that make
it seem better. And he's kind of just strip away
all the energy that's wasted on other things, extraneous distractions
and all that and just focus in improvement. And that's
just kind of one of the essential kind of to
the programming that's improvement will need to success. And that's

(31:39):
really all that it is. I mean, big pictureized that
you were asking people like to try to mystify that
and try to act like there's some some secret to
it or some kind of secret ingredients that kind of thing.
But in my experience and from watching in first and
there really isn't. It's just so simple as this might

(31:59):
work that kind of that kind of thing at all. Yeah, No,
it's it's totally I mean, you're right, it is mystified.
It's hard work all the time. Well, yeah, I think
I think that people want there to be a secret,
they want their shortcut or a secret ingredient kind of thing,
because that would that would make it appear that they
could get out of doing work. That really the secret

(32:22):
is that there isn't a secret, and that's where a
lot of people are kind of weeded out is that
when such comes to stuff, they can't maintain that same
focused enthusiasm and dilligence for months or years. They can
do it for a day, or maybe every Monday and
Tuesday or or when they feel like it. But it's

(32:44):
about bringing that mentality twenty four seven and so you
get to where you want to go. But it's not
like Jim only expects his players or coaches to work hard.
He embodies hard work. One of my favorite quotes from
Jim Harbaugh is, I don't take vacations, I don't get sick,
I don't observe major holidays. I'm a jackhammer. I love that.

(33:04):
I'm a jackhammer. You don't get sick. You don't get sick.
You don't take a sick day. Have you ever taken
a sick day? It's a coach. Where's the last time
you had a sick day? Is at any time of
the year, offseason, during the season. I mean you just
you don't get sick. Yeah, you go to work in
yet and you get the job done. So when the

(33:26):
Jackhammer returned to Michigan, Jim hit the ground running with
his sheer willpower and hard work. And I have to
say he almost seems omnipresent because he's in the news
all the time and sometimes it's for zany headlines that
have nothing to do with football. And just the first
two years that he's been there, he's still on the

(33:47):
ceremonial first pitch for the Detroit Tigers, and he coached
first base for them once too. He's attended the State
of the Union. He and his dad were at a
Judge Judy television program, Jim loves Judge Judy by the way.
He was seen on the front row of a WWE
professional wrestling event pumping his arms in the air, getting
fans hype. Then there's a story of him rescuing a

(34:09):
woman whose car hit the center median of I ninety
four near Anne Arbor because of slippery road conditions. She
was ejected from the car despite wearing a seat belt. Well,
Jim pulled over and assisted her until police and emergency
vehicles arrived. Then there's also him taking his entire team
to Italy just this last April for an educational experience

(34:31):
and three spring football practices. While there, Jim met the Pope.
He and his wife, Sarah researched the pope's shoe size
and gave him a pair of Air Jordan's and a
Michigan helmet. I mean, you can't pick the stuff up.
All this stuff reminded me of when I asked Joni
Jim's sister if she thinks he's misunderstood. Well, she said yes,

(34:54):
because people don't often get to see this side of
Jim and Jim's sister really fun person to be around.
He loves the game of football almost at a childlike
you know me, just enjoys every moment like a kid
would you know, when they're going out and playing something
in their backyard. He's probably approaches that every day like

(35:17):
he's just going out and playing football and it's back yard.
And I think that's pretty cool, yeah, for someone in
his age. Well, I haven't even scratched the surface in
terms of the attention Jim has gotten since returning to Michigan.
I haven't even talked about the football headlines he's made
over the last two years. So this is where I
want to get into his creativity and love for the game.
Jim has absolutely shaken up the college football world with

(35:39):
his revolutionary ideas. Two of the most noteworthy are as.
Much talked about recruiting tactics and his highly controversial satellite camps,
and once he got the recruits to commit to Michigan,
he created what was called Signing with the Stars. It
was on National Signing Day, which is when all high
school recruits across the countree announce which colleges they will attend.

(36:03):
But in Michigan, Jim made this day into a complete
media spectacle. He had a custom set built in New
York and transported to Ann Arbor, where the event was
live streamed across the country. Some of the highest recruited
athletes announced their intentions to join the Wolverines with the
nation watching, and as they did so, they rubbed shoulders

(36:24):
with some of the biggest stars in sports. You know what,
I think it's time for another Jim Harball media mashup. Thought.
Every day, Ryan, you see a college coach climbing a
tree and a recruits front yard. But that's a day
in the life of Jim Harball right now. Under the
exact rules. He's going to be at my house at
twelve oh one, and he said we would have a

(36:46):
sleepover after that. I was in tears laughing when he
said that he would go to every class with me
and go to lunch with me. I was laughing so hard.
He told me that if I had a six foot
three inch piece of carpet for him to sleep on,
that would be enough. Hello, r Michigan. This is the
signing of the stars as welcome Mike Shanahan, Lou Holtz

(37:07):
and Todd Mchein, Derren Zeter, Desmond Howard, John Harbaugh, Jessica
Zoor and Jake Ryant, Nature Boy, Rick Blair. Hardball's Michigan
summer camp schedule. It's unbelievable, isn't it? And it continues
to grow, and they're gonna be going to American Samoa

(37:28):
and Hawaii and Australia. You wonder how he's gonna get
there and how he's gonna do it, and it's but
he does it. And what's amazing to me is somebody
didn't stand up and say, here's gonna be the unintended
consequences of what you all are doing. I mean, this
is the wild, wild West. Do you blame Jim Harball

(37:49):
for wanting to get outside of it? I'm gonna blaming
Jim Harball. I'm not saying anything about it. I'm just
saying it's bad for college football. Staben's comments made their
way back so Hardball. He responded on Twitter saying, quote,
amazing to me Alabama broke NCUBA rules and how their
head coaches lecturing us on the possibility of rules being

(38:11):
broken at camps. Truly amazing. Hey, hare Ball, how you
doing You leave our team alone? Don't you come down
here and messing with our boys? Yes, she is bad.
They belong to Mama, not you, and you're not gonna
come down here. Hey, Bama, don't you let him take
you anywhere. I'll ride back to the North with him,
but I can't promise he'll make it back there. Sorry,

(38:36):
I had to use that last clip from Phyllis and Alabama.
That was amazing. Anyway, I could do a whole episode
on the satellite camp controversy. I won't, though, that's not
the purpose of this podcast. I'm bringing it up to
show how Jim's competitive drive fuels his creativity. But in
a nutshell, satellite camps simply allow coaches to travel long

(38:57):
distances and work as guests at camps hosted by other institutions.
Because NCAA rules prohibit colleges from hosting camps outside of
a fifty mile radius of their own campuses, but there
are no rules about them participating as guests at these
other camps. It's a loophole, for sure, but Jim got creative.
He found it, and he blew it out of the water.

(39:19):
ACC and SEC coaches like Alabama's Nick Saban didn't like it.
Their specific conferences prohibit them to participate as guests, but
Jim's Big Ten conference doesn't. Well. After much complaining, the
ncaa A closed the loophole with the ban, but then
just a short while later they rescinded that ban after

(39:40):
public backlash. Jim visited a whopping thirty eight camps across
twenty two states and Australia, and of course it was
a recruiting tactic. Nobody was denying that, even though it's
debatable how helpful it was in actually recruiting prospects. But
Jim also insisted that those camps were good for young
kids across US the country who otherwise wouldn't have been

(40:02):
exposed to such football programs like this because of financial
or other limitations. And the Detroit Free presses Mark Snyder
says that Jim getting in there with the young kids. Well,
it was not a show you watching run in these
satellite camps, and the way he gets involved with these
kids is really unique for someone who's making seven million
dollars a year. Do you still see stuff like this?

(40:23):
I mean, these other college coaches are all standing there
and they're talking to each other or they're on their phones.
They're at one in Atlanta, and Kirby Smart, the Georgia coach,
came in on a helicopter and was there for twenty
you know, half the camp watched, stood around, watched, got
back on his helicopter and last Jim is in there
and he's throwing passes and he's got kids bouncing off

(40:44):
of him. He's fifty something years old. You know, he
doesn't need to be. He could be delegating this thing.
He could have the high school coaches running like it's
supposed to be run. But he's in the mix and
he's judging the kids, and he's putting his hat backwards
and he's getting them. He's getting down on the ground
with them. I mean, that's you know, that's Jim. Jim
Hackett who you heard from last week. He was the
interim athletic director at Michigan, who hired Jim Well. Before

(41:06):
becoming the ad Hackett was the CEO of an office
furniture company called Steelcase. He's now the CEO of Ford
Motor Company. He said that people can misunderstand or even
twist Jim's creativity into something bad, like cheating. Well, that's
this is a spectacular strength of his. So Jim's inventing things.

(41:26):
If anyone questioned me about satellite camp, that would start
to brew after I left. But if I one of
the Detroit reporters asked me, I said, you know, the
irony for me is when Paul Brown invented game film,
they said he was cheating, you know. And it's like that.
The innovators always been accused, and it's because they're far ahead.

(41:47):
So because they're far aheaded, there's must be something untoward
about it. But remember, I'll give you this. This thing
to know is that in a lot of times, when
the competitor is further ahead, instinct is where they're doing
it the wrong way. It's just they're more clever. And
he's more clever than lots of the people he competes with. Wow,

(42:07):
And that's why you will see him every now and
then he'll speak back to people who are criticizing that.
You know, Like, I won't call any of him out
because you have to find him. But there are people
who criticize him for things that aren't wrong, and they
are coming from a position where they are in trouble
in their program or something. I mean, how can they
what position are they standing on? You know, because he's

(42:32):
being innovative, you'll be careful about that. That's interesting, mistaking
creativity and innovation for cheating. Never, Yeah, he loves the
game too much to do that. Well, no, yes, But
bigger than that, it's not competing. Think of it as that.
It's it's a reductionist problem. You can't you can't win

(42:53):
knowing that he cheated. You can't win that. I asked
both John and Jim if they can steal one coaching
as from the other, what would it be. I've mentioned
before that Jim wants John's all around grass for the game,
But what would John rip off of Jim? Maybe I'll
say two things. The first thing is his unbelievable creativity
and the energy of his intellect, if that makes any sense. Yeah,

(43:16):
I mean he is always thinking outside the box, and
he's always so focused on becoming better and being great
and finding a new better way to do something or
to reach his guys or better scheme, and you see
it play out and now especially in college football, with
all the things he's doing. But I really do I
kind of envy his creativity and his ability to bring

(43:36):
just to be himself and to be real and to
be unapologetic and to go for it and to not
be afraid of what people are going to think because
he knows he's doing it for the right reason. I mean,
he's a guy that wears cleats on the plane, you know,
on the road trip. You know. I love that. I
love that. I just think it's it's so awesome because
it's an unabashed statement of love for the game, what

(43:57):
they're about to do in the mission that they're on,
and you just and you can't, you know, you can't
question it with him because it's genuine and it's real.
It's who he is. And like I would love to
have the audacity to put cleats on on the plane
and do that, you know, But that's him and that's
who he is. And I just think he's just so
unapologetically and so true to himself, just because we got

(44:18):
back to Jim. I forgot to ask it earlier. Ask
your mom, this, your dad, Janie, Jay and Jim. Now
I'm gonna ask you, and they've been split. Is Jim misunderstood? Oh?
I say, yeah, okay, I would say I'd say I'd
say maybe it's fifty fifty half half get him and
half don't you know. I mean some of the stuff
I read, it's written about him, you know that people say,

(44:39):
I'm just like I think people that like just have
a natural tendency to be cynical and assume, you know,
like the malign intent, you know, and people that don't
trust people that don't are kind of our haters to
start with, and assume the worse than people, which is
like a big part of our society. Yeah, you know,
so they tend to look at Jim and go and
just sluff it off and say and you think the worst.

(45:01):
But when you get to know Jim, you just completely
get him and you understand it. It's genuine, you know.
So yeah, I would say, yeah, we did. People some
people who do say your mom and dad and Jonil
said he's misunderstood. Jay said that he's not misunderstood, And
I think it's because it's like it's like what you
said at the top. He doesn't apologize for who he is,

(45:23):
but you may not understand who he is and like
what makes him tick. And so to some And I've
had people reporters say this to me. They're like, well,
he's crazy. He's crazy, but maybe that's a good thing
in terms of crazy competitive, Yeah, and and and fighting
for what you believe in, right, Yeah, just because he's
not your your your personality, you're you don't you're not

(45:45):
wired the same way. Yeah, it doesn't mean it's crazy.
It's just it's you just don't understand it. I mean,
he is he is just like he is transparent and
and he and he's not afraid to be real like
like as competitive as he is and as you know,
as as aggressive as he is, like and trying to
find a way to to to Hey, he's bringing he's bringing,

(46:06):
he's bringing football down. He's bringing he's you're introducing a
football program and a football school and busting his tail
for you know, twenty twenty five days. Those are hard days, okay,
And he goes down or takes it down there and
it's yeah, so these kids get a great experience. But
you're gonna say, well, it's just generous. He's doing it
for recruiting. Well, of course he's doing it for recruiting.
Of course he's he's bringing the program down. It's part

(46:28):
of that's that's how you that's how you how to
expand it. But so you do it. Oh, I'm sorry,
it's a lot of work to do. Well. He loves it,
he's willing to do it. But you want to criticize
him because it's not something you would do. You know,
it's too hard, and it's not to say that you
should be doing it or whatever, But how can you
say the guys crazy for for contributing and for working hard,

(46:48):
and for busting his tail and for and having fun
out there. I don't know. I mean so in the
sense he's not really misunderstood. But but he's not afraid.
Like a lot of a lot and all these coaches
are really really super competitive, but a lot of them
are like beneath the radar. They don't want to make waves.
They want everybody to think that they're they want to
present a certain image of themselves, and Jim just doesn't
care about that. You know. Jim is, like he said,

(47:10):
he wants to be transparent. He wants it to be genuine.
It says in the Bible, I think it says it
says long lines of make no oath you know to
any man you know, something along those lines, and basically
what it's saying is this, don't be a fake, don't
be a fraud. You know, don't have gile. You know Nathaniel,
Jesus saw Nathaniel. He said, here, here's here, here, here's
a man with no guile. Gyle's a great word. The

(47:31):
world is full of guile. Okay, Life's too short to
be living with guile. I mean, you know, I don't know,
trying to be something that you're not, trying to pretend
you're somebody you're not. Can we get past all that finally, right,
you know? And that's that's one of the things I
love about Jim. It's not just the family that says
Jim is misunderstood. Detroit Free Press is Mark Snyders, He's

(47:52):
the same thing. Why did you think that everyone views
him from the outside in individual places, they take moments
and say he's crazy, but they don't step back and
look at the larger picture that everything is a means
to an end. He doesn't do things by accident, you know,
I think everything either is. He does things because they
enhance his life. In terms of these life experiences that

(48:13):
she talks about, and they seem meeting with all these
celebrities and stuff like that, well, he says, well, I
have a platform to meet these people. Admit, I think
anyone want to meet all these people. So he wants
to take advantage of that. In terms of things he
does with the program, they're finding in wa loopholes. He's
trying to make his program better if it's not in
the rules. He wants to follow the rules. But he says,
if it's some of them, it's not banned in the rules,

(48:34):
then why don't I take advantage of it. I think
that a lot of people on the outside view it
in small doses, whereas Jim it's all part of a
larger plan for him, and I think that people viewed
in that way, they'd see him from a different perspective.
Being true to yourself at all times that has its consequences.
It's not the popular path to take, and Jim knows
at the risk of competing, pushing people to their limits

(48:57):
and just not caring what they think sometimes that means
he winds up alone. When John was immortalized with the
statue in the Cradle of Coaches at the University of
Miami and Ohio, Jim gave a speech of the banquet
honoring his brother, and then he made this joke. And
there were times I didn't have a friend, as you know,
I sometimes I wear those out. Sometimes he was my

(49:20):
only friend. Jim got a lot of lass were poking
fun at himself, but he also seems keenly aware that
he can wear people down, that he can lose friends
over time. So I wondered if he's ever considered just
taking it easy every now and then, not completely changing
who he is, but just chilling out once in a while.
As you talked about how sometimes John was your only friend,

(49:41):
and you kind of poked fun at yourself saying that
maybe maybe you wear people out, Nan, and I'm I've
just wondered if you've ever thought, you know, if if
I wear people out, should I take it easy a
little bit? Or were that just undermine your ability to win?
I think the Age n of Change is never really
the most popular room person in a in any room,
and I found myself in that position. You know many times,

(50:04):
many times have been and probably pretty much my whole
life where you're in competitive situations, you know, people are
coming after you, they're trying to beat you. I've had
a long experience of that being my entire life, and
also people trying to intimidate you, and so I have

(50:26):
a long experience of that, and I've learned how to compete.
I've learned how to attack each day with an enthusiasm
unknown to mankind, and I've figured out how to do
it and a healthy and fair and competitive way. And
it's like life giving energy to me. And the best

(50:48):
part of life to me is competing. And you just
figure out if that offends somebody, then then so be it.
If it kind of figure out who you are by
the time you get to fifty two years old, I
have a lot of I do have a lot of
allies and a lot of friends and great family and
whist Churchill said, if if you can, if you die

(51:11):
with this, you know, there you're zeroed out with as
many people that love you as many people that don't
like you, and you've price stood for something in your
life paraphrasing, But yeah, id resonates with me. I just
want to say I've interviewed a ton of people, your mom, Dad, Jonie, Jay,
Jim Hackett, Rich Eisen, the list goes on and on.

(51:35):
You do have a lot of allies, a lot of allies,
and it's really been actually quite heartwarming to to listen
to all of them. Uh. In fact, I've actually asked
one recurring question to all your family members, and that
question was, is Jim misunderstood? But I'm wondering if you
ever feel misunderstood? No, I don't, as you as you said, um,

(51:55):
one of the biggest blesses. I have so much support
from my wife, my friends, my allies, my family. I
feel feel very blessed, and I don't feel misunderstood. I
feel I feel like I'm as transparent as a as
a as a plastic baggie, and I tell the truth

(52:17):
to the best of my ability as I know the
truth and believe it to be and I feel I
feel good about that and onward. Man, I'll admit I
love that first quote, the agent of change? Can anyone
deny that Jim was the agent of change at San Diego, Stanford,

(52:41):
San Francisco, and now at Michigan and the entire college
football scene, so he's not feeling sorry for himself. But
he's also never lasted longer than four years any of
his three previous coaching stops. So I wondered whether Hackett,
one of the allies I named a Jim in that clip,
was it all worried out that history. Were you at

(53:01):
all concerned that, you know, he could wear people out
in that at Michigan and may not stay for long.
I hope you, hope you trust the authenticity of this.
It's a circular thing, which is I feel like Paul
brown Wood, he hates Boschembechler, all the great coaches, Nick Saban,

(53:24):
Mike Ditka, people would say the same thing about all
of And what I mean by that is these folks
had strong points of view about what it takes to win.
They really, they really are not not He's not mean people.
He's a very human, caring guy, but he's unrelentingly competitive.

(53:45):
So if somebody, you know, comes in any kind of
thing with him that's casual, they could have a bad
day because he you know, this matters to him so much.
But he was not disrespectful, He was not mean, He
wasn't beliving, He just was He had high expectations. So

(54:06):
to see a guy like me loves people like that,
I can't get enough of him. I feel like, where
you should get those comments from people, I don't think
they you know, I don't want to diss everybody that
says up, but I don't think they've bless big organization
or has to deal with diverse capability. And so when

(54:28):
I hear that people will have trouble with him, it's
because his standards are high in relationships and if they
weren't kicking up, he wasn't gonna fake it, you know,
he couldn't. I mean, he got mistreated really badly in
one of those jobs. I won't tell you which one.
It was really badly, and I know that. And he
was first class in the way he dealt limit And

(54:50):
so he's unrelentingly certain about what makes great things, great people,
great relationships. This is the way I felt about him.
I could spend all the time in the world with him.
If somebody wanted to critique him for that, I mean,
they just didn't get him, you know I did. I
just want to make sure I understand one thing. I
want to make sure I get Jim right in this podcast.

(55:13):
You keep mentioning that he has integrity in whatever it is,
like you know, the arguments or whatnot. Would you also
would you say, there's really not an ego there. It's
more about doing what's right and not what he wants.
I have a charge that I use in business, where
there's a vertical access called ego and a horizontal acts

(55:34):
is called empathy. You actually want your best leaders I
can we we could do an hour in military, in sports,
in business, there's very few of them where the ego's
not high. But you got to think of ego as
a sense of what needs to be done, you know,
as strong. And what makes bad people is if your

(55:56):
empathy is really low, but he has extreme empathy, you know.
And so it's the intersection of empathy and ego that
makes them such a fantastic coach. And so yeah, there
are people that will say they don't like this strong
point of view. But I'm telling you I'll make a
list of all the best coaches and there will be
no one on that list that has what you'd say

(56:19):
a weak point of view. That's what you're searching for.
And if you want to have a Michigan football program,
that's number one in the world. We will have a
coach that has a strong point of view. Oh, High
of State does, Alabantas because you know, Notre Dame does,
and so people they get criticized for being strong people.

(56:39):
That's what you want. But if you don't have the empathy,
and I keep emphasizing the integrity means that their sense
of the issues that they're arguing are out there for right,
for being on the side of right, for being trying
to be principled about things. Now, I think I think
Mark Swissel would tell you that they all get Jim

(57:01):
and they love him. You know, they understand them. I
think they wanted for a long long time. Turns out
Jim actually lasted longer at Michigan than Hackett did, which
was expected since Hackett only agreed to be the interim
athletic director until the school found somebody more permanent. Hackett
left for Ford Motor Company after thirteen months on the job.
It was just after Jim's first season with the team,

(57:23):
when they natched a ten and three record and finished
with a number twelve ranking in the country. You know
today I told him I was leaving. I thought I
was telling him I had cancer. I was so upset
that I was telling him because if a guy I
wanted to work with the risk of my life. I
mean that. And I and you know, I knew I
wasn't going to be able to stay as a d

(57:44):
and I got this big job at board and I
came to him and said, I got something to tell you.
He goes, okay, we shut the door. And I thought
you when I told me, because that's great, you know,
And I go, yeah, I mean, I thought, you can
tell me cancers, you know what's But I didn't want
to tell him this because I don't think I don't
get to be with you. But that was it, you know,

(58:05):
it was I miss him. Next time on Man of
the Crowd in a family that hates comparisons, will explore
the differences and similarities in the brothers personalities. Will also
take a deeper and emotional look at the shadow that

(58:29):
one walked in growing up with those two guys. Jim,
you always knew he was going to be a great athlete,
and you always knew John was going to be a coach. Sorry,
I wasn't a very player coach. I apologize. I did
my best. I swear a guy, I did my best
Why would you have battled more with Jim? Because I
don't think Jim's might might have been as good a

(58:50):
listener as John. I find that's what makes John such
a good partner is that he lets me bitch. Never
I'm I'm looking. You're right, Kneye. Never did he ever
show any kind of feeling of remorse or resentment or
why not me? It brings turns from my eyes. Thank
you about it because they both traveled a different path.

(59:14):
When John traveled a long path, you I change Jim shadow.
My thing was I got to hold up my end
of the bargain. I mean, look how great he's doing.
I just need to hold up my end of the
bargain to do something here. And they win the game
and they're going to the super Bowl. It's like my
brother's going to the super Bowl. And then it hits you,
it's like, I need we got to go to the

(59:34):
super Bowl. I can't. He can't go to the super Bowl.
Before we go to the super Bowl, we'd have to
win this game. Hey man, are the crowd listeners before
you go? I just wanted to say thank you for
such a strong showing of support for the podcast. We're
very happy with how many of you that are out

(59:56):
there listening, and we'd love to have even more people
find us, so please consider rating the podcast and writing
a review. The more subscribers and positive ratings Man of
the Crowd gets, the more others will be able to
find it. Also, don't forget to continually check back to
our microsite at Baltimore Ravens dot com backslash Man of
the Crowd. It has content that compliments what you're listening

(01:00:18):
to here, including biographies of key interviews I've conducted, photo
galleries and more. And as always, I want to hear
from you after each episode. If you have any comments
or questions or whatever, hit me up on Twitter. My
handle is at sg Ellison. I look forward to your
feedback and would love to interact with you. Okay, that's it.

(01:00:39):
That's all I've got, but I'll be back next week
with episode seven. Plug Your Ears, Hardbaws, Comparisons and Shadows