Jim Harbaugh Will Be Honorary Captain for Michigan's 2024 CFB Opener vs. Fresno State

While he won’t be strapping the pads on and playing for Michigan in the year 2024, Jim Harbaugh will definitely grace the Big House at least once in the year.

According to the MLive’s Aaron McMann, Harbaugh will act as an honorary team captain for the Wolverines-Fresno State game on the 31st of August.

In early January Harbaugh led Michigan to win a national championship; shortly after the season ended he became the head coach of the Los Angeles Chargers and switched back from the college to the NFL ranks after nine years.

McMann also added that preparations to have Harbaugh back in Ann Arbor have been in the making for several months, as suggested by Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel in January this year. The date suited the Chargers well since Harbaugh and Wolverines’ teams would have a bye-weekend before the start of the NFL season a week later.

As for the college football coaching experience, Harbaugh will get a taste of that again much later in the summer but it will be some time maybe seasons before he gets to be on the side line for any collegiate team.

The NCAA handed Harbaugh a four-year, show-cause order due to recruiting violations during the COVID-19 crisis. The terms of that order state that Harbaugh “may not engage in any coaching activities as an employee of an NCAA member institution, such activities to include, but not limited to team travel, video study, recruiting and team meetings” and in essence prohibits him from being a coach in the NCAA until August six of the year, 2028.

The same recruiting violations were actually good enough to merit his suspension for the entire 2023 campaign three games into it.

However, some of the violations committed will be key in the findings, but Harbaugh will strive to look forward and new challenges as an NFL head coach. He takes over the Chargers who were 5-12 in the previous season, dismissing Brandon Staley halfway through the season.

He had been the head coach of the San Francisco 49ers earliest in the period of 2011 to 2014 in which case he took the team to the NFC Championship Game three times, and to the Super Bowl in 2012. With that new experience back in the NFL ranks, he will seek the same fortune in the city of Angels.