by Kyle Golik
As the opening voiceover in the soap opera Days of Our Lives went, “Like sands through the hourglass, so are the days of our lives,” the updates coming from Ann Arbor are emptying the top of the hourglass.
Before all the sand falls through, the options Jim Harbaugh will have if the FBI/NCAA investigation into the Michigan “Spygate” investigation got thinner throughout Sunday. Earlier in the day, NFL.com’s Ian Rappaport and Tom Pelissero reported that if Harbaugh jumped from Michigan back to the NFL, he would not avoid punishment from the league and would have to serve some sort of penalty.
Most of this stems from when Pete Carroll left Southern California for the Seattle Seahawks. Many felt Carroll left due to incoming sanctions, something he vehemently denied. When Jim Tressel resigned from Ohio State in 2011, he had already been given a two-game suspension by the university, and the NCAA issued a five-year show-cause penalty to any institution that looked to hire Tressel to explain why it shouldn’t be sanctioned. When Tressel became an analyst for the Indianapolis Colts, he was not available to perform his duties until Week 7.
Tressel’s quarterback at Ohio State, Terrelle Pryor, also faced a five-game suspension when he attempted to circumvent the penalty and make himself eligible for the NFL Supplemental Draft. NFL commissioner Roger Goodell upheld the suspension ruling, saying, “This smacks of a calculated effort to manipulate our eligibility rules.”
My take is the NFL has set a precedent it doesn’t want to be used as leverage to circumvent penalties from any other league or level in football. It also doesn’t want one of its franchises to take on any unnecessary distractions that would question the integrity of the game, something that engulfed the League with the New England Patriots “Spygate” issues.
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On Sunday evening, the bigger news dropped from the Wall Street Journal’s Andrew Beaton and Rachel Bachman that the University of Michigan rescinded a contract offer to Harbaugh, according to a person familiar with the situation. The extent of illegally obtaining information by the Michigan program with in-person scouting has ruffled a lot of feathers amongst other Big Ten institutions that feel Michigan has violated the conference’s sportsmanship policy.
The move by the Wolverines may be seen twofold as a potential mea culpa to the rest of the Big Ten, as they aren’t going to extend a coach with questionable ethics and for the school themselves as a form of protection. They are beginning to distance themselves from Harbaugh if, indeed, the allegations of espionage are deemed legitimate.
For Harbaugh, the news shouldn’t come across as shocking. For him to plead ignorance about the extent of Connor Stallions’ intelligence-gathering methods won’t be bought by any investigator or even Michigan’s internal staff. The news that Michigan was recently with a Division III coach to film and document the Penn State sidelines against UMass has cast major doubt about the legitimacy of this team that is undefeated and near the top of the polls.
While I wrote about the NCAA’s ineptitude to properly convict major problems of Level I violations and questioned if Michigan’s current scandal matters, that question is soon going to be answered based on the NCAA and Big Ten’s response because as evidence mounts against Harbaugh and his staff, it is going to hard to justify their existence as major games of consequence will soon be played.
Harbaugh’s next move is going to be a limited one, and as doors begin to close around him, it will be to what extent his program violated the rules as to whether Michigan would want to keep him. It doesn’t sound like Michigan will be a viable option for Harbaugh if the disgrace brought to the program is that severe. His options will be limited in football, and his next move might not be in football.
