Hyde: Ross certain to pursue Harbaugh, Gamble again

It's amazing that when asked point blank, gun to your head, why do you like the guy...fans cannot produce real answers.

There's no interesting debate going on because no one wants to really make a good case.

It all ties back to the same very unstable logic.

 

...

 

It's called moving up the ladder. He wasn't forced out of his previous gigs, he moved onto a better job. SF is the lone exception.

 

I guess having an impressive resume isn't enough to convince you. I hope you're never in position to hire someone for an important position in a company.

 

It's sad, isn't it?

No one wants to build a legitimate case for Harbaugh. If you're not sold on the record alone, you're a fool to these folks.

There's nothing you can do about it.

Thankfully, I think most of this stems from ESPN-like entities building up Harbaugh and is more or less confined to internet forums and to the twitter feeds and blogs of ratings-seekers.

 

Wait. Wait. WAIT. Dude, are you serious?

He was at USD for 3 seasons. Won two consecutive Pioneer League titles. Gets promoted up to Stanford.

Takes the Cardinal from a 1-11 program to 12-1 in his four years there, ending with an Orange Bowl win and being ranked #4 in the nation. The Cardinal had not been a top ten program since Bill freaking Walsh was the coach there.

Leaves Stanford to coach in the NFL, because multiple teams are begging him to come coach them. Takes the 49ers from a 6-10 team that had been suffering through an entire lost decade of ineptitude, and goes 13-3 in his first year, despite him being a rookie coach in a dang lockout season.

You're saying that his 3 year stint at USD and 4 years at Stanford, which were wildly successful, are somehow strikes against him? So what, someone taking a promotion to a bigger, better job after kicking butt at their old position is now a negative to be used against them? There is not an emoticon hysterical enough for this.

 

FANTASTIC post, Greg.

Well said, dude.

 

Your guy's arguments for not pursuing Harbaugh are even weaker than those of us who would be ok with that move. But whatever, facts are tricky things I suppose.

 

I posed a hypothetical that if we lost our last four games including the vikes and jets at home would you still keep philbin, the answer I got was a definitive yes, and that keeping Tannehill and Lazor together was the top priority, and that the only way to assure that was to keep phibin...the mind was already made up..

so even if we win the next two he really can't use those wins to defend..

 

Just admit that you kinda like Joe on a personal level and would like to see him get one more year to prove everyone wrong as a human interest story already. Because the argument that "Harbaugh won too much in college and got promoted quickly" is not fooling anyone.

 

Except for all the answers they give that you throw away based on specious reasoning.

 

Again, perfect example.

Poster doesn't have a good response so he resorts to debate tactics from 9th grade.

I'm just asking for a line of logic that doesn't stem from the basis that His record was good, so therefore he must be as well.

But alas, there is no real argument beyond that.

What's he doing with the offense that you like?
What's he doing with the roster that you like?
How has his QB development gone so far in your eyes?


There's nothing embarrassing about asking very basic questions. This is exactly what you do when you hire someone actually.

The logic that is being presented is based on big assumptions that aren't being defended. It's a little too simplistic for some of us who actually operate in the real world and who are witness to individuals' success being the product of outside factors.

 

This whole thing is just another case of angry fans wanting a pound of flesh. Harbaugh's name just happens to be recognizable.

 

If "This coach has taken over three bad football teams and made all three of them championship contenders within four years" isn't a compelling argument for a coach being good, then what kind of argument are you looking for?

 

And of course there is the old understanding where the real loser in any debate throws insults 1st.

 

You're right!

I posed him a real question and his choice was to insult me on a personal level--something about hoping I don't hire people.

My comment about the 9th grade debate tactic was a fact, not an insult.

The approach of avoiding the tough questions by attempting to shift the focus of the debate by insulting the person posing the question is quite commonly taught in high school debate classes.

It's very annoying.

It's doesn't help resolve real debates.

It promotes sustaining an invalid argument.

 

Sadly I think you're right.

I'm not emotional nor does that appear to be any way to make good decisions so I guess I just can't relate to the folks on the hill with their pitchforks.

 

The 49ers success was short term under Harbaugh and it was directly tied to much of what was there prior.

The team is currently eroding because of decisions he made.

If we had the 49ers roster, I'd believe these arguments.

We don't.

If Harbaugh had developed Kaepernick into something special, I'd be more sympathetic to these arguments.

He didn't.

If Tannehill was a bust under Philbin, I'd believe our need for change was more urgent.

He isn't.

 

What decisions did he make that are "eroding" the team?

Keeping in mind he has never had personnel authority except on the quarterback position, and they took that away from him recently.

Also keeping in mind he took over a 6-10 team.

 

What was there prior was 6-10. What is short term about three consecutive NFCCG appearances followed by a .500 season in which multiple key starters are on IR or were suspended for significant lengths of time? You're just assuming that because they're a 9-7 type of team this year that they wouldn't bounce back? Yet we need to be patient and not demand our 'pound of flesh' for a coach who can't break out of .500 territory?

 

It's funny to me how after otherworldly success, Colin Kaepernick goes on a bad string (coincidentally or not so coincidentally his best skill position players being 31 and 34 years old, and with people like Jonathan Martin trying to keep pass rushers off him) and all the sudden he's the worst thing ever and because Harbaugh picked him in the 2nd round (he had autonomy on QBs back then) it means Harbaugh is a bad coach.

Because Kaepernick has an 85 passer rating.

Christ, Ryan Tannehill only has a 90 passer rating.

 

Did you not read my prior post?

The answer is contained within it.

 

Go back over the last 2 pages of this thread.

Many of the posts from myself and Larry Little speak to the issue you're talking about.

 

When Colin Kaepernick was scoring 25 TDs and gaining 3700 yards with only 9 turnovers, coming within a pass of beating the Super Bowl champs in the NFCCG...he was pretty special.

He goes on a bad string (which for him entails an 85 passer rating, 16 TDs and 3500 yards with only 11 turnovers) with some questionable supporting play and suddenly the guy is the worst thing ever, and evidence that a coach who has succeeded demonstrably at every level he's coached...sucks.

Riiiiiiiight.

 

Again, leave the debate tactics at home, please. No one is saying that Harbaugh is a bad coach.

We're simply asking how he is going to improve our QB and our team as a whole in ways that Philbin is not.

Please provide an answer to that question.

 

Myself and others on this thread have given you a multitude of reasons for hiring Harbaugh. You choose to dismiss them. We can't convince you. It's cool man, you know what they say about opinions.

 

Simple:

1. Harbaugh believes in running the football with a balanced attack, rather than throwing the ball 75% of the time. That's an improvement over Coach Philbin.
2. Harbaugh doesn't 'get queasy' and order his offensive coordinator to SHUT DOWN THE OFFENSE with 2 minutes to play in the half of a tight game. That's an improvement over Coach Philbin.
3. Harbaugh oversaw Alex Smith making TREMENDOUS progress in just one year on the job. Smith was considered a bust when Harbaugh got there, and Jim instantly turned him into one of the better starting quarterbacks in the NFL.
4. Harbaugh got great production out of Colin Kaepernick, a player who I think has severe limitations at the position when it comes to reading coverage and finding open receivers consistently.

In short, if you like Ryan Tannehill, how could you not be pulling for Jim Harbaugh to come here? Joe Philbin has done his damnedest to set his quarterback up to fail over the past three years. First he hired an unqualified schmuck to be the quarterbacks coach. Then he shipped off Brandon Marshall. Then he shipped off Reggie Bush. Now he decides to keep starting Dallas Thomas, even though Ryan Tannehill is lucky not to be on injured reserve with that bum out there blocking for him.

Your argument is that you like the quarterback and want to improve him, and you're arguing for Joe Philbin to be kept over Jim Harbaugh? Wow.

 

Because he's done it before?

 

Thank you.

 

Yeah....but what "facts" do you have?
-rolls eyes-

 

In his first 5 years in the league, Alex Smith was a marginal football player who had a low yards per pass attempt (below 7), a low percentage of touchdown throws, and a high percentage of interceptions thrown. His career passer rating had never been higher than 82.1.

In two years under Jim Harbaugh, throwing to all stars like Ted Ginn, his yards per attempt jumped to 7.1 and then 8.0, his touchdown percentage soared to 6.0 in 2012, and his interception rate over those 2 years was extremely low (a ridiculous 1.1% in 16 games in 20011). This was all while his completion percentage jumped more than ten points above his career average. This is during a period that he registered more fourth-quarter comebacks than during the other 7 years of his career combined.

That's right, not only did Jim Harbaugh suddenly get a dramatic improvement in play out of Alex Smith over his then career to date, but Smith's play dropped off once again in Kansas City under Andy Reid. But hey, Joe Philbin used to do power points for Aaron Rodgers...

 

Philbin won the Wisconsin State Championship for most gum wrappers picked up.

 

#1) I want to run the ball more as well but we don't have the interior players to do it late in games thus when we try to the outcome is bad and when we avoid it, we look dumb. If your solution doesn't entail getting better Guards as a first priority, but rather firing your OC, you don't understand what's really happening. Your plan will handicap our developmental QB into starting from square for the 3rd time in his 4-year career likely making him a bust or killing what upside he had. I don't love Lazor honestly, but we're stuck with him because we can't mortgage Tannehill's future by starting anew, or at least I'm not in favor of taking risks like that.

#2) Philbin is surely to blame in some regard but this is not an offense that can dictate to the defense what is going to happen late in games. Until we turn the tide in the trenches with Guards, we WILL play conservatively in the latter stages of games in the same way that we do early.

#3) Despite the "tremendous progress" you cite, Harbaugh elected to get rid of Alex Smith and roll with Kaepernick, who is getting by with running ability and a very strong arm, which are not sustainable routes to a winning tradition.

#4) Harbaugh got great production out of Kaepernick early on until things fell apart. It was not sustainable and therefore the league very quickly caught up.




Again, my contention is not that Harbaugh is in any way a bad or unproductive coach.

My contention is that people are citing stats which are the product of many things and attributing them solely to Harbaugh. I'm not sure that is wise.

Alex Smith improved under Harbaugh. Wonderful, but that's more of an indictment of who was there prior, isn't it? Harbaugh managed average production out of an average QB. Fantastic for him but we're already there with Philbin and Lazor most likely planning the "next step" for Tannehill.

Why would we start anew with a coach like Harbaugh who's best success in the NFL is a short-term tenure with Alex Smith followed by a decision to roll with a guy who can't manage to do the things that NFL QBs do?

 

Now do 4 for Philbin

 

First off, Jim Harbaugh has a strong record of EVALUATING quarterbacks. That's where it all starts because contrary to popular belief we don't know if Tannehill is the guy or not. And EVALUATING the quarterback is the integral first step in DEVLOPING that quarterback because if you don't have an accurate view of what that player can and can't do, you make it that much harder to develop him in a meaningful way.

Harbaugh managed to bring in NFL quality talent (Josh Johnson) to little ole San Diego University (mind you, not San Diego STATE, but San Diego U). He brought Andrew Luck to Stanford. When he got to San Francisco the easiest decision he could have made would have been to jettison Alex Smith, who at that time was very much considered a BUST by...well, pretty much everyone. But Harbaugh said no, and he stuck with him. He developed him. He got the best play out of Alex Smith that anyone has ever gotten out of Alex Smith, and Smith is still playing fairly well even today. This was a guy that in 2011 when Harbaugh was hired was basically considered a Joey Harrington. And then he took Colin Kaepernick in the 2nd round. That would be Colin Kaepernick who enjoyed all that enormous success and won all those games in 2012 and 2013 before he had a few bad games in 2014 that makes him suddenly awful.

Oh and speaking of Joey Harrington there's also the quarterback evaluating that Harbaugh did prior to leaving the Raiders for San Diego U. He was asked to evaluate that 2002 quarterbacks class, the one that featured David Carr and Joey Harrington at the top with Patrick Ramsey hot in trail. And infamously, and this is a well known fact that scouts still talk about today, he turned in an evaluation which asserted that the best quarterback in the class was Tony Romo. And the second best was David Garrard. I believe he had Harrington and Carr no better than a 6th round picks.

And you say he doesn't develop quarterbacks, which is absurd. He developed Josh Johnson at little ole San Diego U into a guy that DOMINATED that level of football, and then even went on to play in the NFL. I'm sure the short-sighted will look at the fact he never became some clear Hall of Famer and say Harbaugh didn't develop sh-t. Yeah. Sure. A recruit to San Diego U dominates that level of ball and even goes on to play in the NFL and that's not a credit to the former quarterback who developed him. Right.

He developed Andrew Luck. You're damn right he developed Andrew Luck. Was Andrew Luck a five-star prospect coming out of Houston? Some ready-made superhero whom everyone agreed was the best? No. Terrelle Pryor was BY FAR considered the best QB recruit in the country, followed by guys like Blaine Gabbert, Dayne Crist, E.J. Manuel and Mike Glennon. Harbaugh went from Cali to Houston to recruit the guy, then developed him to such a degree that Luck became a widely agreed upon GENERATIONAL prospect in the NFL Draft...the best QB most scouts had evaluated in 30 years.

So then Harbaugh arrives in San Francisco where nobody has been able to coax anything resembling solid NFL play out of Alex Smith, but somehow Harbaugh gets a 91 passer rating out of him, very high quality analytics, and an NFC Championship Game appearance. I suppose that's all coincidence? Just like it was a coincidence Alex Smith had a 104 passer rating in 2012? Coincidence that Smith is still playing well today after being developed by Harbaugh (mind you, not quite as well as when he last played in Harbaugh's system)?

Oh I'm sure you'll find some mickey mouse reason to toss all that out. Just as you toss out the incredible success achieved by Colin Kaepernick under Harbaugh's development in 2012 and 2013, just because he's had a few rough days in 2014 with some mediocre to bad play going on around him.

 

Hey leave the debate tactics at home! Like facts and stuff!

 

So.. I guess I'm hoping Harbaugh thinks Tannehill is the real deal. I sure would like to know what his opinion on Tannehill is.

 

its no coincidence that Kapernik is playing poorly while Harbaughs fate was determined before the season started.

 

If Jim Harbaugh is here, then regardless of what I feel about Ryan Tannehill, I do not worry about the quarterback position NEARLY as much as I would otherwise.

If Tannehill is the guy, great. If he's not, Harbaugh will find another. But he'll probably get good play out of Tannehill until that happens.

It's like I said, to develop a quarterback and get the best out of him, you have to first be able to evaluate them. We KNOW that Jim Harbaugh can evaluate them. And we KNOW that he can develop them (well, all but the most hard-headed know). So don't worry about it. Unless your name is Lauren Tannehill, it doesn't matter which guy is wearing the laundry, just matters whether we're getting good play or not.

 

LOL.

#debatetactics