Nov. 18, 2009

Hot Harbaugh rocking The Farm for now

By Dennis Dodd | CBSSports.com Senior Writer
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The coach doesn't ride his bike to work anymore. When he got the job almost three years ago, Jim Harbaugh would slip on his old Indianapolis Colts warm-up jacket to protect against Palo Alto's pre-dawn chill and start pedaling.

If anyone noticed the young, athletic Stanford coach he could have been mistaken for a student. Today? It's risky business to bike. Harbaugh might be recognized, and in the pre-dawn gloom it's not practical or safe to wear Ray-Bans to hide his face.

Such are the drawbacks of being a rock-star coach.

In the third week of November, Harbaugh is the talk of the Pac-10 and maybe the sport. A flake with roots in the conservative NFL. A mastermind with an iron will. An upstart with a punk's attitude. A coaching diva who might be the hottest commodity in both the NFL and college. Except, of course, Pete Carroll.

It didn't start that way. Who knows where it will end up? But with the Cardinal fresh off taking some of USC's manhood and heading toward The Big Game with Cal, there is no more interesting -- or quirky -- coach in the country.

Interesting because the Cardinal are back to relevance after wandering college football's wasteland for eight seasons. Some NFL teams and at least two college powerhouses are rumored to have Harbaugh's name on short lists. Quirky because the success has been achieved in a most unconventional way.

Harbaugh broke every written and unwritten tenet of the coaching profession when he went for two against USC leading by 27 with less than seven minutes left Saturday in the Coliseum.

Asked about it again Tuesday, Harbaugh reiterated that the move was strategic. The list of teams that have fought back from a four-touchdown deficit with less than seven minutes left is a mile long isn't it? Why not make it 29 points?

"We felt it was the right thing to do," Harbaugh said.

To that, the outside world, including probably Carroll himself, has said B.S. The two were witnessed exchanging words on the field after the game. The real list of reasons could go something like this:

• Harbaugh went for two against Pete Carroll because, in the immortal words of Woody Hayes vs. Michigan, he couldn't go for three.

• Harbaugh went for two because of paternal instinct. In other words, it was code for "Who's your daddy?" Carroll has lost four home games at USC. Three of them have been to Stanford, two in the last three years.

• Harbaugh went for two because of Jordan Zumwalt. The Huntington Beach, Calif. linebacker committed to Stanford earlier this year but was giddy last week when he received an offer from USC. In the twisted logic that is recruiting, Zumwalt said he is still "committed" to Stanford but "definitely" considering USC.

Hey, this one's for you Jordan, just in case you're having second thoughts.

"That's Jim for you," Arizona coach Mike Stoops said. "It's so him. That's who he is. That's how he is. That's how he's got to where he is."

It might be all of those reasons, it might be none of them. What's for sure is there's a karaoke microphone lying around somewhere with the coach's name on it. The song: Free Bird.

His original lyrics are even better. Remember how this all got started when Harbaugh called out Carroll in March 2007?

Remember Carroll's response?

"I've been reading some people's opinion that this is somehow personal with Coach Carroll," Harbaugh said. "That couldn't be further from the truth. I'm not trying to make any enemies. Life's too short. The way our relationship has been, it's competitive. I enjoy pregame with Pete Carroll. He's funny, he's loose and we can yuck it up before the game.

"Then you go to war and try to gouge each other's eyes out."

This could get interesting if Harbaugh sticks around. But how are you going to keep him down on The Farm? His name has been brought up at his alma mater, Michigan, which doesn't have an opening. It has been mentioned at Notre Dame, which might soon have an opening.

The timing might be bad at both places. Cincinnati's Brian Kelly is expected to be the top choice at Notre Dame if Charlie Weis is fired. Michigan seems destined to give Rich Rodriguez at least one more year. That could change if the NCAA finds major violations. The Association is investigating allegations that players were overworked in violation of NCAA 20-hour weekly limits.

Harbaugh might never get that Michigan call considering he disparaged the program in 2007, saying it admitted "borderline" student-athletes then steered them toward easy majors.

An extension is due to be signed any day, but that wouldn't really bind him any more securely to Stanford. These days, all an extension means is updated financial protection for both parties if a coach leaves or gets fired.

No matter what happens, Harbaugh is not going to stop speaking of his undying love of Bo Schembechler.

"It's all about the team, the team, the team," he said this week, repeating a shred of Bo's famous speech to his Michigan players in 1983.

Coaching became a vocation growing up. For eight years, Harbaugh was an unpaid assistant for his father, Jack, at Western Kentucky while still playing in the NFL. In 2002, he reached the Super Bowl as the Oakland Raiders quarterback coach. After the 2006 season, Stanford took a chance on a guy who had never recruited a Division I-A player as the coach at I-AA University of San Diego.

Jim Harbaugh is so enamored with two-way starter Owen Marecic, players joked he should've named his daughter Owen. (US Presswire)

Stanford and its high academic standing seem no different than football factories like Michigan. The Cardinal are 7-3, still with a shot at the Rose Bowl. And, hey, what coach doesn't have a $60,000 custom bathroom installed in his office?

Sometimes Harbaugh doesn't make sense until you open the paper on Sunday. The agate type screams that the coach has cut a toughness groove in the previously finessing Cardinal. Owen Marecic starts both ways at fullback and linebacker. So enamored was the coach with Marecic that players joked he was going to name his new daughter Owen.

Tailback Toby Gerhart was recruited by USC as a fullback and a linebacker. Former Cardinal coach Walt Harris landed him, leaving Harbaugh a parting gift after a depressing two seasons. Harbaugh, though, made Gerhart a star. Look who is No. 3 nationally in rushing after pounding the Trojans for 178 yards.

"Everything was much more competitive," Gerhart said of Harbaugh's arrival. "We had this winter conditioning thing where one of the stations in a circuit was a free-for-all wrestling match. ... There were definitely some injuries, some shoulders."

Carroll changed the Pac-10 at the beginning of the decade when his teams played with similar toughness and swagger. In a league known for its high-scoring offenses, the Trojans started smacking people in the mouth. Harbaugh has the same idea.

"It's toughness but it's very innovative, too," said Stoops, whose team was the last to beat the Cardinal on Oct. 17. "That's where people have the misconception."

It's the blocking schemes and pounding Gerhart and using Marecic both ways. But it's also developing freshman Andrew Luck to the point that Harbaugh called him the best quarterback in the country.

It's also those Harbaugh mind games. Gerhart is a two-sport athlete, also playing for Stanford's storied baseball program. Soon after the new coach arrived, the baseball/football star dropped by the office and introduced himself.

"You're the one that plays two sports," Harbaugh said. "Do you love football? Do you love baseball?

"Of course," Gerhart said.

"How can you love both? I want guys who are committed to football?"

"Wow," Gerhart thought, "He's not going to let me play baseball. I'm going to have to get the athletic director involved. He wants committed football players."

It was a test, or a joke or some Jedi mind trick. Maybe just Jimmy being Jimmy. Before the season, Gerhart related the story of Harbaugh heckling him through the outfield fence last season while Stanford was in the field.

"Don't do too well," Harbaugh would say, "I'm going to have to get a mirror and shine a light in your eyes while you're hitting, so I can have you for football."

This week, with his coach's help, that two-timing Gerhart is a serious Heisman candidate.

The rest of us are wondering if the Stanford coach is serious when he says, "The hubris, the overconfidence can be a killer." So far it hasn't been for the rock-star coach who seems to have an abundance of both.

"My next-door neighbor is a USC grad," Harbaugh said. "She's been very defiant. ... She assures me next year will be different.

"I guess that’s what keeps everybody motivated."

For the rest of national notes read Dennis Dodd's blog Dodds and Ends