Harbaugh's recruiting has been lackluster throughout his tenure at Michigan. Coaching at the winningest program in college football history, Harbaugh has brought in recruiting classes ranked 7th, 5th, 22nd, 10th, 12th, 13th, and 12th. Before Harbaugh, Michigan was top 12 (his median) in recruiting in 2001, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2012, 2013. Nothing is monocausal and the ascendance of the SEC and Ohio State's reign of dominance don't help, but I think the evidence is clear that Michigan doesn't recruit under Harbaugh anything like its historical birthright.
Couple that evidence with how much better Shaw has recruited throughout his tenure compared to Harbaugh (on paper, at least....evaluation is another matter) and I think one needs to question how good of a recruiter Harbaugh is. After getting Stanford back on the scene with an 8 win season and Gerhart's Voldemort campaign, Harbaugh brought in the #24 class. And then after the 12 win season/Luck's Voldemort campaign/Stanford being one of the darlings of college football, Harbaugh brought in the #22 class. Meh. He was, rightfully, one of the hottest names in the sport but wasn't turning the recruiting into anything better than squeaking into the top 25. One way to think about it is that a Harbaugh selling a program on the upswing and back-to-back Voldemort household names recruited basically at the level Shaw has while selling a program on the downswing and no relevance at all in the national college football landscape for half a decade.
I don't think Harbaugh is nearly as good of a recruiter as he is a coach and I think the reason is pretty simple: he's untrustworthy and weird. Having watched and admired him (will always think he's one of the best coaches in the sport) for years, I don't think recruiting (in the sense of actually succeeding in executing the plan he wants to execute) is a strength of his.
P.S. Didn't bother to change the H-E-I-S-M-A-N references above. This board's software automatic correct of certain words is childish and embarrassing.
Couple that evidence with how much better Shaw has recruited throughout his tenure compared to Harbaugh (on paper, at least....evaluation is another matter) and I think one needs to question how good of a recruiter Harbaugh is. After getting Stanford back on the scene with an 8 win season and Gerhart's Voldemort campaign, Harbaugh brought in the #24 class. And then after the 12 win season/Luck's Voldemort campaign/Stanford being one of the darlings of college football, Harbaugh brought in the #22 class. Meh. He was, rightfully, one of the hottest names in the sport but wasn't turning the recruiting into anything better than squeaking into the top 25. One way to think about it is that a Harbaugh selling a program on the upswing and back-to-back Voldemort household names recruited basically at the level Shaw has while selling a program on the downswing and no relevance at all in the national college football landscape for half a decade.
I don't think Harbaugh is nearly as good of a recruiter as he is a coach and I think the reason is pretty simple: he's untrustworthy and weird. Having watched and admired him (will always think he's one of the best coaches in the sport) for years, I don't think recruiting (in the sense of actually succeeding in executing the plan he wants to execute) is a strength of his.
P.S. Didn't bother to change the H-E-I-S-M-A-N references above. This board's software automatic correct of certain words is childish and embarrassing.