According to the school’s president, Michigan football coach Jim Harbaugh isn’t anywhere near the hot seat. Should his seat be warming up, though?
For Michigan football fans, the past decade has been a bad nightmare from which they simply cannot wake up.
No, the Wolverines haven’t been the laughing stock of the conference nor have they had anything wildly controversial happen to the program but rather they’ve been stuck in the middle. For Michigan fans, there’s nothing worse than rooting for an average football team.
The winningest program of all time isn’t use to average. The Wolverines are used to winning Big Ten titles and contending for national championships but it’s been decades since either of those have happened.
In fact, it’s been since 2004 since Michigan won its last Big Ten title and 1997 the last time the Wolverines won a national title. They’ve shuffled through multiple head coaches over the past decade, landing on ‘savior’ Jim Harbaugh.
The former Michigan quarterback who played for Bo Schembechler has adopted his former head coach’s tough attitude and he doesn’t accept anything less than the best.
However, he’s gotten just about everything but the best since taking the job in Ann Arbor back in 2015. He’s 28-12 through 40 games, which is eerily comparable to Brady Hoke’s 27-13 mark in that span, and he’s 1-5 against Michigan State and Ohio State, his two biggest rivals.
Coming off arguably the most disappointing opener of his tenure, Harbaugh has had to answer some questions.
Why can’t Michigan seem to win the “big” game? How is the offense still as bad as it was last year? When will Michigan finally be Michigan again?
Understandably, many have thrown Harbaugh in with the ‘hot seat’ coaches despite the fact that most fans still believe in the turnaround of the program. They still buy in to the head coach’s promises and mutter the ‘who’s got it better than us?’ mantra.
Is it time to put Harbaugh squarely on the hot seat?
It very well should be at least warming up, but according to the school’s president, that won’t be the case any time soon.
.@DrMarkSchlissel on @CoachJim4UM: "He's not on the hot seat. He's under contract for four more years." #econclub
— Detroit Economic Club (@deteconomicclub) September 5, 2018
Is that what Michigan fans want to hear? If there’s no steady improvement throughout this season with at least one win against a rival, this quote will be looked back on and criticized.
Michigan deserves better than an average football program and can Harbaugh really provide that? As of right now, it’s tough to tell.
Harbaugh’s seat should be adjusted from chilly to lukewarm, at the very least.