Michigan Coach Jim Harbaugh is being persecuted for meeting with prospects and having too many coaches on the field during COVID.
Per a cursory review of infractions they appear related to COVID. Harbaugh’s most serious infractions surround him meeting with prospects during COVID.
Level II violations reportedly included:
- Practices with too many coaches on the field.
- Contacting prospects during the COVID-19 dead period.
- Unauthorized video observation of practices.
The pertinent violation, however, is the deliberate misleading of NCAA officials and refusing to cooperate with an investigation. That Level I violation was the most serious.
Jim Harbaugh cheeseburger receipt
One of the reasons this situation blew up is because of a receipt from Ann Arbor watering hole “The Brown Jug.” On3’s Chris Balas reported Harbaugh took two recruits to lunch at The Brown Jug and, when confronted about the literal receipts, Harbaugh “wasn’t completely honest” about them.
That dishonesty remains the most serious allegation against Harbaugh.
Harbaugh, for his part, denies any wrongdoing but cannot speak on the investigation due to the nature of it.
“I’m not allowed to talk about any aspect of that,” Harbaugh told media at Big Ten Media Day, per Bruce Feldman. “I’d love to lay it all out there. Nothing to be ashamed of. But now is not that time. And that’s about all there is to say about that.”
In August of 2020, the Big Ten announced that it would postpone football games due to COVID.
The Big Ten and Pacific-12 Conferences, boasting some of America’s most elite schools and storied college football programs, postponed 2020 gridiron action on Tuesday because of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
The 14-team Big Ten and dozen-member Pac-12 both said they hope to play now-postponed fall sports in the spring, if the nation’s struggle against the coronavirus is in a better place.
“I’ve said it from the first day that I started at the Big Ten, that the health, the safety, the wellness — both physical and mental — for our student-athletes was going to be at the top of my list,” Big Ten Commissioner Kevin Warren told the Big Ten Network minutes after the announcement.
We’ve learned since that people of college age and younger were virtually immune to COVID. The elderly and sick were the most at risk from COVID which had a mortality rate similar to that of the flu. By promoting no solution to those we got really sick with the disease, deaths were up. Also, contributing to this were treatments that were dangerous to those who were sick.
With hindsight, the Big Ten never should have shut down its school operations and football games. The NCAA looks like fools pushing these violations on Harbaugh.