Jim Harbaugh, John Calipari talk recruiting sleepovers, jive turkeys, more

Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh talked dirty recruiting and more with Coach Cal

By Chip Patterson

Dec 28, 2016 at 10:11 am ET • 1 min read

Not long after his arrival at Michigan, Jim Harbaugh made headlines for his aggressive and unique recruiting tactics. Harbaugh has traveled the country, sitting in on high school classes and even offering to spend the night with a recruit for a get-to-know-you sleepover.

Harbaugh recently discussed the sleepover and the reasoning behind some of his out-of-the-box approaches to recruiting with another giant in college sports, Kentucky basketball coach John Calipari. The conversation, posted to the "Cal Cast," touched on his recruiting practices, including his attire for the sleepovers.

"I wear sweats," Harbaugh said. "I don't know how it works in basketball but the rules in football are a head coach can make a home visit one time, you have one contact. The way the rules read, it's one time in a 24-hour day. You just want to get to know them. I want to get to know the family, want to get to know the teachers, the counselors, the sisters the brothers, everybody, and I want them to get to know me. My idea was I'm just going to knock on the door at 12:01 a.m. and spend a little time."

Harbaugh also discussed negative recruiting with Calipari, another coach who has dealt with his fair share of vicious lies and dangerous rumors on the recruiting trail -- and yes, Harbaugh included his well-received "jive turkeys" catchphrase.

"They're our enemies, they're our competition," Harbaugh said of coaches trying to use negative recruiting against Michigan. "They try to manipulate a youngster and their family any way they can. My philosophy and thought on it is if you have to talk about somebody else and somebody else's program and negative recruit them or their situation, then you're really not concentrating on your own program and the situation that you have at your school. That's what you should be presenting, that's what you should be encouraging a youngster to look at, not the negative side of recruiting. Definitely people use that against you and they use that against me and I long have referred to those people as jive turkeys."