Harbaugh.
The name itself screams football. Between John, the quiet and tame head coach of the Baltimore Ravens and Jim, the loud, brash, in your face leader of the Michigan Wolverines, the duo have been at the top of their games for nearly two decades.
But there is something inherently wrong with the duos perception.
John is a former Super Bowl winning head coach who year after year is a loss or two away from getting fired. Rarely is his name found alongside the upper echelon of NFL coaches like Bill Belichick and Pete Carroll.
Conversely, Jim has seen his name mentioned alongside some of college football's best coaches such as Nick Saban and Urban Meyer. However, he does not deserve to be in the same class with Meyer and Saban, arguably the Belichick and Carroll of college football today. Instead, his NFL counterpart is Andy Reid.
For one, Reid and Harbaugh's beginnings are eerily similar. Much of Harbaugh's head coaching career has revolved around taking over underachieving programs and quickly turning them into contenders.
Harbaugh’s first major stop was at Stanford University in 2007, where he took charge of a team that went 1-11 the previous season. By 2009, he took them to an 8-5 record and a bowl game, followed by a 10-1 record the next season. This led him to his first NFL gig, taking over the San Francisco 49ers, who went from 6-10 the year before he arrived to 13-3 his first year. Harbaugh would take the 49ers to three straight double-digit win seasons and three straight NFC championship games.
Then, when Michigan -- a storied program looking to finally get back to its former glory -- came calling in 2015 the same result occurred. In 2014, Brady Hoke's final year at the helm in Ann Arbor, the Wolverines stumbled to a 5-7 record. In the four years since, Harbaugh has led Michigan to three 10-win seasons and four bowl appearances.
Reid is the same. In 1999, after a great career as an assistant for the Green Bay Packers, he was named the head coach of the Philadelphia Eagles.
The 1998 team went 3-13. The Eagles were marginally improved in Reid’s first year, a 5-11 season, but in his second, they finished 11-5 and second in the NFC Wild Card.
Fast forward nearly a decade and a half and he has since taken a Kansas City Chiefs team from 2-14 in 2012 to 11-5 in 2013. They remain Super Bowl contenders today.
And while the regular season track records are comparable, both Reid and Harbaugh also have similar big game tendencies.
In Harbaugh’s career, like Reid, he has come up just short time and time again in the postseason. During his college coaching career, the khaki-wearing head coach has made it to six bowl games, losing four of them. Most recently, his Michigan team was clobbered by the University of Florida 41-15 in the Peach Bowl on Jan. 1.
The reality is Harbaugh was tasked with two goals upon his arrival in Ann Arbor: get to the College Football Playoff and beat arch rival Ohio State. In four years, he has accomplished neither.
Reid faces the same struggles. Despite leading the Eagles to five NFC Championship games, including four straight from 2001 to 2004, he won just one. When he did finally get to the Super Bowl in 2004, his squad fell to Tom Brady and the New England Patriots.
With the Chiefs, Reid faces the same woes. He has made the playoffs in four of his five seasons, but has yet to win a single game.
But their most striking similarity is what may hurt fans the most. They're both seemingly unfireable. Reid and Harbaugh's track records speak for themselves. Both win plenty of ball games, leaving those in charge wondering, “Is there really anybody else out there better?” More often than not, the answer is no.
And thus fans are left to suffer through successful regular seasons and failed postseason runs year in and year out.
