The Five Most Interesting Things Jim Harbaugh Said: Aug. 7, 2020
Jim Harbaugh spoke with Jon Jansen during the In the Trenches podcast earlier today and covered a variety of topics now that it looks like football is actually going to happen.
During the back and forth, Harbaugh had some very interesting things to say. He seemed pretty positive and very optimistic about the season and, as always, was just excited to actually talk about football. Here are the five most interesting things he said to Jansen.
1. So many [team leaders] from all different classes. I mentioned Zach Charbonnet, also Kwity Paye, Aidan Hutchinson, Carlo Kemp, Erick All, Joe Milton, Dylan McCaffrey, Caden Kolesar, Joey Velazquez, really read off the list of the top guys from this conditioning test.
It's really good to see some of those names in there. Charbonnet apparently killed it during the offseason coming back in great shape and faster than he's ever been. Seeing Paye, Hutchinson and Kemp all among team leaders solidified what we already thought — the defensive line is going to be the biggest strength on the team. A young guy like All who needs to take a big step this year is great to see. And obviously, both quarterbacks are mentioned by name. Maybe Harbaugh did that on purpose, or maybe they both just really, really want the job. Michigan fans are hoping for the latter.
2. I really believe our team is ready for [football starting]. We've had two great weeks of training and walkthroughs. Really, it's all been good news. The players have a tremendous amount of juice, especially when the schedule came out and the protocols for testing. All of our tests came back negative yesterday; well over 100 players tested and all of those tests came back negative. That's how we're doing it. We're putting it in God's hands and moving forward.
Michigan has done a great job to be ready for right now. Positive cases are among the lowest in the country and it seems like everyone involved with Michigan football is taking things very seriously in order to ensure that football is played this fall. Harbaugh mentioned the players having "juice", which has got to be a large understatement. The players must be champing at the bit. They're ready to play, they want to play and they've done everything they can to make sure that they'll be ready to go when the time comes.
3. The medical personnel here — so many individuals who are going above and beyond for all of us. Not just football but for all of our student-athletes, for our community and for our state. People who are working 15, 16 hours a day and sometimes you have these conversations with them at 10, 11 at night and they still have three or four hours of contact tracing they have to do and then up the next morning to do it all over again. You can’t under-credit all the medical folk. I can tell you, they are tireless in their work ethic and their study. What they’re doing is so remarkable.
This isn't at all surprising. At a place like the University of Michigan, you'd expect health protocols to be top notch and results to be about as good as possible. I'm also not surprised by the 15, 16-hour days Harbaugh referenced. Medical people are cut from a different cloth when it comes to their work ethic and approach as professionals. It's really cool to see Harbaugh giving them a little bit of love because it really is because of them that we're heading towards football.
4. The last week has been with helmets. I feel like from a movement standpoint and from the standpoint of cardiovascular, our guys are in a good place. There’s going to be some catch up to the physical part of the game because we didn’t have spring practice and we didn’t have the tackling. Starting [today] we’ll be able to use equipment with blocking sleds, tackling dummies, those kind of tools.
This is one area that everyone is going to be curious about, coaches included. What kind of shape are the players in? How ready will they be to play and play a physical brand of football? Obviously Harbaugh, a football nut, is ready to get going with real tackling, real blocking and real, hard-nosed action. Today is the day that it will really ramp up and I know everyone around the football facilities is excited about that.
5. I don’t know that [playing Ohio State earlier than normal] will or won’t [feel weird] right now. We’re ready to play right now — anybody, anywhere. We just want to play football games. There have been so many guys who have trained so hard, not just now, but their entire life for this opportunity.
Maybe I'm in the minority, but I don't really care when Michigan and Ohio State play. Will it be a little weird when they play in October and then U-M still has four games left? Yeah, but I'd rather them get The Game in when they can if the season has to be cut short. I hope Michigan plays all 10 of its games, but if they don't, hopefully they can at least get through six and face off against the Buckeyes.
