San Francisco 49ers meet with Jim Harbaugh for head coaching job
Stanford Cardinals coach Jim Harbaugh met with the San Francisco 49ers for five hours on Wednesday.
A source said that team president and CEO Jed York and newly promoted general manager Trent Baalke had the meeting with Harbaugh.
The winning head coach of the Cardinals flew out to the Bay Area on Tuesday after winning the Discover Orange Bowl over Virginia Tech in Miami, Florida. The Cardinals ended their season 12-1 and it is now time for Harbaugh to weigh his many options.
The 49ers made their promotion of Baalke to general manager public on Tuesday, even though he had already been the top candidate for a week now. He is now looking for a new head coach to replace Mike Singletary, who was fired after a loss to the St. Louis
Rams on December 27, putting them out of the playoff run for the eighth straight year.
York said that after Singletary’s departure, the decision on who to hire as the new head coach was completely up to the general manager, in this case, Baalke. The five-hour meeting on Wednesday seems to be Baalke’s first attempt in landing Harbaugh, although
it will take a lot more work from the entire team to acquire the head coach who has many options.
Harbaugh has a career coaching record of 58-27 with a 29-21 record with Stanford. It is hard to believe that the team that won on Monday night is the same team that was 1-11 when Harbaugh joined back in December 2006.
In his first season, the team was 4-8. In the second season, they improved to 5-7. In 2009 they became even better at 8-5 and were in their first bowl appearance since 2001.
Aside from the Niners, the Miami Dolphins and Denver Broncos are also trying to convince Harbaugh to join their teams as head coach.
"When you have a bunch of billionaires chasing you around to be a part of an NFL program ... If Jim feels like he's ready for that, who would blame him?" University of Michigan athletic director Dave Brandon said.
The 49ers were also given permission to speak with Oakland Raiders offensive coordinator Hue Jackson about the head coaching job. A source said that two other teams had met with Jackson on Wednesday.
Another source said that the Niners have also asked to interview New York Giants defensive coordinator Perry Fewell. Both Jackson and Fewell will fulfil the obligation to interview a minority candidate in accordance to the league’s Rooney Rule.
Jackson is also a candidate for the head coaching job with the Raiders after Tom Cable was not optioned for an extra season.
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