John Harbaugh on Michigan vs. Rutgers, Urban Meyer, fighting an opposing coach
Baltimore Ravens head coach John Harbaugh laughs during a news conference at the team's practice facility in Owings Mills, Md. on Jan. 7, 2016. Credit: AP / Matt Hazlett
John Harbaugh’s conference call with Giants reporters on Wednesday took some bizarre but entertaining turns that zig-zagged from laughing at Rutgers to Urban Meyer’s chances in a fight to whether Harbaugh himself could take Giants head coach Ben McAdoo if they came to blows.
It all started by noting that the last time a Harbaugh-coached team came to New Jersey it won, 78-0.
That was when Michigan trounced Rutgers on Saturday. The question: Did Jim Harbaugh, Michigan’s coach, have any tips for scoring in the Garden State for his brother John, head coach of the Ravens?
“That’s a great question,” John Harbaugh said. “We’re over here struggling on scoring points and everybody just wants to talk to me about the point total (by Michigan). You know, it’s funny. It’s fun to watch it all, it’s fun to read it all, and I was really proud of him. I thought they played a really good game.”
Harbaugh then took an unsolicited segue to a comment made by Houston coach Tom Herman last week in a radio interview in which he was asked whether Urban Meyer or Jim Harbaugh would win a fight if they ever squared off.
“It cracks me up about how the talk sometimes is about who’s going to beat him up in college football. You guys see that one?” John Harbaugh asked. “I’m talking about the quote the Houston coach made about Urban Meyer would whoop Jim Harbaugh in a fight.”
Harbaugh laughed and said he wouldn’t comment on what he had just commented on.
Naturally, since the topic of coaches fighting each other came up, he was asked whether he thinks he could take Ben McAdoo. Harbaugh laughed.
“Man, I tell you, (Steve) Spagnuolo is a guy that I would probably be more inclined (to stay away from),” he said of the Giants defensive coordinator who worked with Harbaugh in Philadelphia and Baltimore. “We’ve had a lot of battles at basketball and working out. They’ve got a great bunch of guys there. That’s probably where I’d leave it.”
Good thinking.
Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.
