Is P.J. Fleck The Next Generation's Jim Harbaugh?

BleedGopher

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per Alex Kirshner:

FLECK’S PATH TO THIS POINT CALLS ANOTHER BIG TEN COACH TO MIND.

It’s not only that Fleck and Jim Harbaugh are super-intense Midwesterners in a reserved Midwestern league.

Both are just right for college, after somewhat different stints as NFL coaches (Fleck didn’t exactly win the NFC, instead following Greg Schiano from Rutgers to the Buccaneers).

Both recruit ruthlessly. Fleck’s last three-year run at WMU led MAC recruiting. He then stirred controversy by bringing nine of WMU’s best commits to Minnesota. In under a month, his new staff went from only a handful of commits to nearly topping Wisconsin for the highest-rated class in the Big Ten West. It was the Gophers’ first in the Big Ten’s upper half since 2008.

Both are proven offensive coaches. Harbaugh’s won with everyone from backups and transfers to Andrew Luck, while Fleck signed and coached WMU’s first-ever top-10 pick, WR Corey Davis. WMU improved from No. 121 in yards per play in 2013 to No. 11 in 2015.

Both have won where they weren’t supposed to. WMU had never appeared in the AP Poll until 2016’s run to a No. 15 finish, and Harbaugh’s turned four straight slumping teams into double-digit winners, with Michigan the only team either’s coached that was anywhere near a sure thing.

Both started young, and it’s hard to imagine either ever acting old. Fleck was 32 when WMU hired him, FBS’ youngest head coach at the time. Harbaugh is 53 and one of the sport’s powers, but was only 41 when he first became a head coach, after years of volunteering as a consultant and recruiter for his father at Western Kentucky.

Both are unapologetically unique in a rigid business, and there’s the irony.

"I think comparisons steal your joy," Fleck tells me. "Just in society in general, when we’re always comparing ourselves to somebody else, we want a better car, we want a bigger house, we want more money, we want this. Comparisons, you’ll never outdo the one that’s always at the top. You know, you’re never gonna outdo that one. So for me, I don’t compare myself to anybody else."

As Fleck rose in Kalamazoo, Harbaugh was about 100 miles east. The two sometimes crossed paths at clinics.

"Mainly just watched him win games," Harbaugh says.

https://www.sbnation.com/a/cfb-preview-2017/pj-fleck

Go Gophers!!
 


I agree; he is the next Harbaugh. I have been thinking about this for a while now and so have the Badger fans.
 




I hope Fleck doesn't have sleepovers with recruits. Also Fleck doesn't have the Patrick Bateman vibe
 


I hope he's better than Harbaugh. I want to win national championships - and conference championships. Harbaugh gets a lot of praise for a guy who has never done either at the FBS level.

Also, on what planet did we almost catch wisconsin in recruiting? First of all, wisconsin didn't win the Big Ten West in any of 247, Rivals, or Scout, and the Gophers finished 6th out of 7 in the division in all 3.
 







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