This feels like Cary Williams making noise about players hating Chip Kelly's practice regime and turning out to be a lone lazy player. What's really striking me is that posters here completely forget that Joe Philbin isn't necessarily liked by our players. He doesn't bother with the locker room and didn't even regularly talk to his quarterback. In fact, if we're talking about coaches treating players like children, we watched Philbin chastise a player over his shoelaces being untied on international TV.
I think the worries/concerns about Harbaugh are being misinterpreted or misrepresented. Its not that Harbaugh is having problems with the players. Its not that Harbaugh is having problems with the FO. Its both together in light of the fact the team has played so well. These are people that work with more closely than any of us ever have, and if he's so great as a coach you'd think all these different people would know it, yet, they all can't stand him. Since that is the case, it is absolutely fair, to question if the teams winning has more to do with the talent than it does the coaching. If it is more about the talent, then what will he have if he comes here? Not only that, but will he be given full control? This past offseason, MANY people complained that you can not force your coach on a GM (many of which are the same people that want precisely that now). That is supposedly why we were turned down by so many GMs. If Harbaugh is hired, control or not, that is exactly what will happen. On top of that though, he also has the rep that he's impossible to work with and if the team is turned around it will be a battle over credit, just like it is in SF right now. Does that sound like a conducive environment for bringing in the top personnel people? Now, can it all work out? Of course. But people are acting like its preposterous to even question the idea....and that is ridiculous and unfair.
Its never been said Philbin doesn't talk to Ryan. It was said he sat down and had a heart to heart talk for the first time in a long while, voicing his displeasure. People took that and ran with the idea they don't speak. I can guarantee that is false.
Unfortunately. Though my best guess is Dan Quinn. I just think in the wake of a Joe Philbin who couldn't incite fire from gasoline with a match, the idea will build that the next coach needs to be able to have better emotional control of the locker room and that probably means a defensive guy. Ross is naturally disposed toward an offensive guy but I think the presence of Bill Lazor could make him feel like the offense is in good hands, with Hickey supplying the talent.
So much for everyone in the San Fran locker room hating Jim Harbaugh: http://preview.msn.com/en-us/sports/nfl/niners-guard-on-harbaugh-everybody-loves-him/ar-BB6t9oX
I personally feel like we're seeing some sort of Stockholm Syndrome here with the Dolphins fans. We have been subject to bad coaching for so long that we're looking at Joe Philbin and saying "let's just give him another year!" because we don't like the fact that Jim Harbaugh occasionally acts like a jerk. We've reached the point where Dolphins fans don't even seem to care about winning anymore. We're just holding out hope that the perfect guy will come along and do everything exactly the way we wish he would do it, when the truth is that we've been trotting out a parade of incompetent buffoons for well over a decade now, and when faced with the legitimate possibility of actual competence, we nitpick it to death.
No one has said just give Philbin another year. The consensus among the people who don't fall under the "Fire Him Now" is fire him if we miss the playoffs. This is getting silly.
I can only speak for myself here, but I think it's preposterous to believe and state that you wouldn't want Harbaugh anywhere near this team, especially being a Dolphin fan. Since Johnson, we've been through a plethora of coaches: The successful college coach failed The successful coordinators failed and/or may be failing (2 of them) The hand-picked Sparano failed The hand-pick semi-successful assistant failed We finally have our shot at a bona-fide top HC candidate who has had amazing success at both the college and NFL level. He literally doesn't know what failure is. This is the anti-Jeff Fisher candidate. How anyone would want 0 part in that is beyond me and preposterous IMO. As far as the talented team argument goes: How can you dismiss 8 years prior to Harbaugh arriving missing the playoffs? And Alex Smith's 5 Offensive coordinator carousel? All that didn't mysteriously disappear when JH came. He fixed it
Sorry, wasn't really a shot at Philbin or people who don't want to fire him right away, but more my head-scratching confusion at Dolphins fans, not necessarily here, who are recoiling in horror at the thought that Steve Ross will try to get Jim Harbaugh again. I simply don't understand it. The man's resume says that he is an exceptional coach. How could you be upset that your owner identified an exceptional coach three years ago, failed to seal the deal, but is going to try again? If anything, I'm upset that Ross screwed it up three years ago. That said, I will still fully support Joe Philbin as long as he is the Dolphins coach. Hope he turns it around. But when he doesn't, I am not going to turn my nose up at a GREAT coach simply because I don't like his personality.
I think part of the problem is that it feels like the plan is: Step 1: Get Harbaugh Step 2:................. Step 3: Super Bowl I think its important to remember that talent acquisition is a MAJOR part of the process. Look at Saban. You cannot question his coaching and strategy abilities. You can however question his talent acquisition and his personal behavior. What are the two major gripes with Harbaugh? His personal behavior and he's completely untested with acquiring talent. On top of that, he has a reputation of purposely driving personnel people insane. How does that bode well for bringing quality personnel people? SF has a quality FO in place already. Look at Shula, greatest coach of all time, still disappointed without a stellar FO. Again, the people that work with him everyday are willing to let him leave, that raises a huge red flag. Its not just that he's feuding with the GM either because they have the same setup we do and the GM is not Harbaugh's boss. While it may be crazy for some to say no to Harbaugh under any and all circumstances it is equally guano cuckoo bird to act as if its a slam dunk home run without needing to question it ever.
I'm not calling names or casting dispersions, but the "Philbin is great crowd" used to overlap with the "Ireland has done well" also with the "Our talent is good and going to develop crowd". Those same crowds also somehow overlap with the "Blame Ireland, Philbin is the smartest coach we've had in a while" and the "Our coaches are stunting talent development" as well as the "Poor execution is making our coaching staff look bad (a subset of the start Matt Moore club)". This is starting to feel very circular because everyone brings everyone else down but it's no ones fault. We either have talent or we don't, we either have good coaching or we don't, or we have good players set up to fail or we don't. This is in response to Jim Harbaugh needing talent. I'm certain that in a previous argument, probably to do with the 8-8 finish, you made the point that we have enough talent but they just need to develop. Even if that's no longer the case and we need talent, Jim Harbaugh took a 5-11 team and went to the Super Bowl. He turned Alex Smith into a $50 million quarterback. The guy gets the absolute maximum returns out of his talent. I'm of the belief that we probably have enough physical talent to win a lot of games. I don't think we have enough consistently good or dominant players. Jim Harbaugh has shown he can squeeze milk from a rock.
The front office gets a little too much credit in San Francisco. Just look at their drafts. *In the 2011 Draft they took Aldon Smith #7 overall and he has played like a #7 overall on the field. However he's also a drug addict that is in rehab for christ's sake, and can't stay un-suspended and un-arrested. *The only other guys from that 2011 that even play are Bruce Miller and Chris Culliver. Miller is just a fullback. Culliver plays kind of Nolan Carroll-ish and also gets in trouble for making homophobic remarks. *The elephant in the room that was left out? Colin Kaepernick. And I left him out for a reason. The 49ers front office didn't take him. Jim Harbaugh did. Local beat writers are adamant that the one position they've given Harbaugh direct control of was the quarterback position, and they only recently started to impede on that with respect to some of the backup quarterbacks last year. *The 2012 draft was a flipping disaster. Pick after pick after pick of guys who can't play football. I think only one is even still on the team, Joe Looney. And he's a backup right guard...a backup of the very lowest OL position on the personnel totem pole. And he doesn't play all that well when called upon. *All that said, the 2013 draft was almost as if they shared my draft board. Pick after pick of guys I liked: Eric Reid, Tank Carradine, Vance McDonald, Corey Lemonier, Quinton Patton and Marcus Lattimore. Yet despite my personal tastes and my own conviction in some of those players, it's important to note that only one of them has played genuinely well and that was the 1st round pick Eric Reid. And it's not like he's been Earl Thomas good. *It may be early but the only player from the 2014 draft that is flashing positively is Aaron Lynch. And who took Aaron Lynch? Well I can't say for sure but I know what Jim Harbaugh said after they picked him. South Florida head coach Willie Taggart is Harbaugh's best friend in the world. They were best man at each others' weddings. Taggart had made Aaron Lynch his pet project at USF since the former five-star recruit transferred out of Notre Dame amid allegations of being immature and having a terrible work ethic. According to Harbaugh, Taggart wholeheartedly endorsed drafting Lynch. That's the reason he's in San Francisco, and he's the only guy from the draft class flashing positively through four games.
Are you trying to convince me that Baalke isn't the progenitor of talent that he's made out to be? If you can convince me that I shouldn't credit him with player acquisitions before he was GM, then maybe I'll buy this and accept that Baalke hasn't drafted a single good WR, RB, OL, TE, CB, etc., since he took over in 2011. Until then, Baalke drafted the entire offensive line, Anquan Boldin, Stevie Johnson, Frank Gore, and Patrick Willis.
I have a feeling their free agency strategy deserves some credit. I loved the additions of Anquan Boldin and Stevie Johnson. Acquiring Antoine Bethea has been brilliant as well. Glenn Dorsey was a good acquisition as well. Donte Whitner played well but if I'm not mistaken they paid for that. I'm just saying that if Jeff Ireland had those 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014 drafts...and it were commonly accepted knowledge that the head coach and not Jeff Ireland picked Colin Kaepernick...those drafts would be cited as a reason Ireland needs to be fired.
With 2012 being such an aberration it would make sense to find out why. Was there internal strife that year? Did Harbaugh get his hands into the scouting process? Was the head of college scouting distracted with a personal crisis? I mean, what was the deal. I understand there are standard deviations and all that statisical stuff and not every draft is great, etc... but this sounds like a real exceptional circumstance, as you've described it. As such, I'd like to know the true cause before saying the F.O. sucks, or assuming Harbaugh had nothing to do with it.
Statistically it wasn't that big of an aberration and that's the point. All that happened different that year is the 1st round pick was a bust. And late 1st round picks are busts like 60% of the time or something like that. And according to beat writers that draft was part of when Harbaugh decided he can't really trust this front office.
LOL at there even being an argument about who the better head coach is between Harbaugh & Philbin. Gee, let's see here, is it the coach who hasn't lost more than 4 games in a season through 3 years, owned the NFL's 2nd best record in 2011, 5th best 2012, 3rd best in 2013, has 5 playoff wins in 3 years, 3 straight trips to the NFC Championship, and 1 trip to the SB?.... or the coach with a 17-19 record who couldn't beat the 5-9 Bills or the 7-8 Jets to get into the playoffs, has a lousy track record of hiring coaches, and has never been openly supported by his locker room? Harbaugh's last 3 seasons have ended to the team that won the damn SB, that's how good he's been. 2011: lost to the Giants in the NFC Champ game b/c of botched punt returns. 2012: lost a close SB to the Ravens 2013: lost 23-17 to Seattle in the 4th quarter of the NFC Champ game..... then Seattle went on to blowout Denver. Meanwhile, Sparano: 29-32 [.475] Philbin: 17-19 [.472] ..... and Philbin arguably inherited a team further into the rebuild than Sparano.
who in their right mind would even argue this, outside of toogoodfordez, who I'm pretty sure is just a parody account?
When was the last time JH won the Lombardi? You know who has the ring? You know who knows how to win that?
Step 2 is Harbaugh leads this group of players with his own few players sprinkled in leading us to the playoffs Re: Saban. You could absolutely question his coaching abilities....His NFL coaching abilities, which were a complete unknown prior to his Dolphin tenure. Re: Harbaugh's talent acquisition. I'm not exactly sure how it will be structured if he came here. I'm not sure he would want full control. What I do know is that that roster in SF only became this hyper talented roster AFTER Harbaugh signed on. It was a train-wreck prior. I think this team in its current state is a clear playoff team with him at the helm. Aren't you willing to take the risk that you're pointing out? I mean, wouldn't you rather roll the dice with him rather than the next hot Offensive Coordinator even given your reservations? Because even if what you say is potentially true, I'd still rather him here than some unknown.
With all of that being true, the 49ers seem to be willing to let him go. That should be a major red flag. And that's all I'm saying, is that its not crazy to question it or even worry. If we sign him and blows the league out of the water, then I'll gladly scream I was wrong. If I had my choice though, I'd rather have Malzhan.
Good point. I agree. I've long thought Harbaugh did something special by coming in right away and making them an instant winner. To be fair - there were some tasty morsels in the cupboard ... Iupati, Davis and Staley on the OL; Bowman and Willis (one of the best ILB combos in history, imo); Gore; Davis and Crabtree at skill positions (but I do think Harbaugh did something to get the latter two to play as a 'team'). Like any other team - you need talent but you also need really good to great coaching to win. Combo of both are vital. I would hate to trade a draft pick for Harbaugh, though (unless it were late round). I have to say if Ross has intimated that he wants to do that and it got out, that would be another incredible failure in a line of bumbling failures. "Here, let me show you the two cards I have before we even get to the flop."
We probably have enough talent on this roster for a coach of that caliber to turn them into a contender.
It was more of a compliment to Harbaugh, and a pat on the back to Hickey. Guy built a nice d-line tho. And I'll give him Wake, that was huge.
Ireland wasn't Matt Millen bad. But he always had one unit that failed at league-low levels. In 2013 it was the OL and LBers. In 2009 it was the Secondary. In 2012 it was a group of 4,5,6 WRs He would fix one unit and another unit would fall apart due to neglect. Hickey seems to have been able to come in and avoid this. He focused on the fixing the OL, but didn't ignore the loss of Nolan Carroll or Paul Soliai, replacing them wisely with Finnegan and Mitchell. Ireland's answer to Jake's departure and gaping hole at LT was to put in the guy who graded amongst the worst in the league at RT, and replace that RT with a breaking down aging Clabo. It was completely irresponsible to enter 2012 with Hartline, Bess, and Naanee as your WRs. (easy available option: Not trade Marshall) It was irresponsible to expect Yeremiah Bell and Gibril Wilson to work together in 2009. (easy available option: don't recall) It was irresponsible to expect Jon Martin to elevate his game significantly in one offseason. (easy available option: trade for Albert) EDIT: These were my major complaints about Ireland