Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh, who in the last eight days has led the Wolverines to a national championship and interviewed for an NFL head-coaching job, continues to have his representatives negotiate with Michigan for a contract extension that would make him the nation’s highest-paid college coach. The latest draft of the six-year extension that would pay Harbaugh $11.5 million annually plus incentives was received by Michigan last Friday and includes unique language regarding termination and delaying the starting date of the contract to accommodate the NFL hiring window.
The details of the contract were first reported by Dan Wetzel of Yahoo Sports on Tuesday and confirmed by two sources to The Detroit News. Harbaugh, 60, just completed a ninth season coaching his alma mater and led Michigan to a 15-0 record and a national championship victory on Jan. 8 against Washington. On Monday, Harbaugh, who last month hired high-powered agent Don Yee, interviewed with the Los Angeles Chargers, making it the third-straight year he has had serious interest from an NFL team. Harbaugh also has two NCAA investigations into the football program lingering. Over the years, Harbaugh has said he’s not motivated by money when it comes to his contracts.
“You want to be somewhere where you’re wanted,” Harbaugh said last October when asked about his desire for a revised contract at Michigan. “If they like what you do and how you do it, your bosses tell you that and then that gets reflected in a contract. Bottom line, any of us, we want to be somewhere they like how you do it and what you do.” While the financials of his contract have seemingly hit the right note, Harbaugh’s contract is seeking other assurances, specifically a matrix of specific fines laid out for any future NCAA violations, and also having a three-member arbitration panel that would handle a for-cause firing, rather than having the athletic director, in this case, Warde Manuel, making that decision.
As one source pointed out, this is not Harbaugh seeking immunity per se from NCAA violations or termination, but he wants the decision about his future made by a panel of three, not one individual. Arbitration panels are common in the NFL, but not in college football. “It’s typical in normal-services contracts to have some type of arbitration clause,” sports lawyer Dan Lust, a law professor at New York Law School and host of @ConDetrimental podcast, told The Detroit News on Tuesday. “It’s all about what you ask for. There’s no set uniform contract for coaches and executives. “If Harbaugh Is worried about what’s fair and not fair, there’s a process for how the arbitrators are picked.
If you have an arbitration and Michigan gets to pick all three arbitrators, it’s basically the same as sole and absolute discretion (the athletic director). Sometimes, it’s one side picks one, the other side picks one and there’s a process to pick a neutral. You don’t want to vest in one person. Harbaugh does have the leverage to enact a fair proposal, and a panel is fair, but the neutral is hard to pick.” These are important contract clauses for Harbaugh because the Michigan football program is involved in two NCAA investigations, the first including impermissible recruiting visits in 2021 during the COVID-19 recruiting dead period in 2021, resulted in a Notice of Allegations delivered last month. Harbaugh faces a Level I violation – the NCAA’s harshest – for allegedly lying to and misleading investigators.
Michigan is expected to face a Committee on Infractions hearing likely this spring, and Harbaugh could receive an additional suspension. There remains an outstanding investigation into an alleged illegal scouting/sign-stealing scheme. For the first, Harbaugh served a three-game school-imposed suspension at the start of the 2023 season, and for the second, the Big Ten suspended him the final three regular-season games. Rick Karcher, a lawyer and professor in sports management at Eastern Michigan University, said it’s insignificant to the NCAA what kind of wording is included in any coach’s contract. “Basically, the NCAA doesn’t care what a coach’s contract says,” Karcher said, “and the arbitration panel wouldn’t impact or have any say over what the NCAA infractions committee does or doesn’t do.” The other interesting wrinkle in Harbaugh’s contract draft is that he wants to push the start date of the new contract to Feb. 15, which would allow him to considering NFL jobs. According to his current contract, on Jan. 11, his buyout dropped to $1.5 million from 2.25 million. Michigan wants to significantly increase the buyout in the extension.
