Big Blue View
If things go according to plan, the New York Giants will be introducing John Harbaugh as their newest head coach by the end of next week. That is the belief of one prominent New York sports columnist.
“I think both parties really want each other, and I don’t see a reason why it wouldn’t work out,” Ian O’Connor, columnist for The Athletic, said on the ‘Valentine’s Views’ podcast. “If you said I have to put down 20 bucks on a candidate today, absolutely, John Harbaugh will be the head coach of the Giants by the end of next week. That’s what I believe.“
Nothing, of course, is guaranteed. Every team with an opening for a head coach would like to talk to Harbaugh. A couple of teams ousted this weekend in the Wild-Card round of the playoffs could also enter the mix.
“I’ve been doing this for 40 years. I’ve seen a lot of crazy things happen,” O’Connor said. “It’s certainly possible that it will go sideways at some point. But I believe today that John Harbaugh is the best candidate for the job and the most likely candidate to get hired.”
Harbaugh is expected to begin taking interviews next week. There are other suitors, such as the Miami Dolphins, and more could emerge after Wild-Card weekend. O’Connor believes, though, that Harbaugh is “very interested in the Giants’ job.”
When Harbaugh does come to East Rutherford, N.J., will he actually be interviewing the Giants?
“I think there’s a little bit of that dynamic that will likely be in play during that meeting,” O’Connor said. “But John is more or less a collaborative guy. I think he’s just not the kind of guy who’s going to go in there and demand that Joe Schoen be fired. I think he is going to want personnel say to some degree.”
The Giants have always been GM-driven in terms of their decision-making structure, with the general manager having personnel authority rather than the coach. To land Harbaugh, the Giants might need to be willing to bend that structure somewhat.
“You hire John Harbaugh for a reason, and that is to bring his winning expertise to your organization. You don’t limit him to just coaching. I think Joe Schoen knows that,” O’Connor said. “For one, Joe realizes he’s probably lucky he’s still employed, and there are a lot of franchises around the NFL where he wouldn’t be anymore after his record of 13 and 38 the last three years. So, there’s that. Also, he knows that his bosses want to hire John Harbaugh. It’s very likely they want to do that. So, I think they’ll work it out where Harbaugh will have a good amount of say in personnel, but so will Joe.”
Mara, of course, is battling cancer. Does his health impact how candidates for the coaching job might feel about the Giants’ job?
“I think you’d have to ask each individual candidate because...
