UNDER RATED: Under John Harbaugh, the Ravens are in the playoffs for the fifth straight season. (Getty Images)
When the Ravens’ recent run as Super Bowl contenders is referenced and the list of reasons for their sustained success is mentioned, there is almost always a glaring omission: head coach John Harbaugh.
This is wrong on too many levels to list. The Ravens always have been most identified by linebacker Ray Lewis, his paroxysmal dances and his sideline-to-sideline patrolling of the field as a ball-carrier-seeking missile. They, too, have been identified by safety Ed Reed and his uncanny takeaway skills that change games in a single play, the pass-rushing prowess of Terrell “T-Sizzle’’ Suggs and the havoc defensive tackle Haloti Ngata wreaks in the trenches.
More recently, the Ravens have become known for their all-everything running back from Rutgers, Ray Rice, the little engine that runs the Baltimore offense, and for their big-armed quarterback, Joe Flacco, who throws as good a deep ball as anyone in the NFL.
Harbaugh?
An afterthought. Taken for granted, like the sun coming up tomorrow morning. All the man, who toiled for nine years as a special-teams coach before being given a chance to run his own shop in 2008, has done is lead the Ravens to a 54-26 regular-season record.
All he has done is lead the Ravens to the playoffs in all five of his seasons, winning at least one game in each postseason. Sunday night’s AFC Championship Game rematch of last year’s tussle against the Patriots in Foxborough will be the third conference title game the Ravens have played in the five years under Harbaugh.
What head coach in the NFL — other than New England’s Bill Belichick and Mike McCarthy in Green Bay — has had the kind of sustained success Harbaugh has had? And, with due respect to Flacco, who is a very good quarterback who happens to possess a clutch gene, Harbaugh has not had Tom Brady or Aaron Rodgers at quarterback.
Yet when the CBS cameras are fixed on the respective sidelines Sunday, you can bet there will be more shots of Belichick and his cut-off hoodie than there will be of Harbaugh. He seems to quietly blend into his surroundings, not standing out as either a bombastic leader or hailed as some sort of brilliant tactician.
At Baltimore headquarters Wednesday, nine different Ravens were paraded into an interview room and 74 questions were posed by reporters. Not one was about Harbaugh.
Despite having a longer period of head-coaching success than his brother, Jim, the former NFL quarterback and current coach of the 49ers, John Harbaugh inexplicably takes a back seat amongst the two brothers. John is the good Harbaugh brother — the guy you would much rather share dinner and a drink with than Jim, who has an arrogant edge and can be caustic and condescending.
While Jim belittles questioners with passive aggressiveness, John humbly thanks reporters for coming to his press conferences and seems genuinely appreciative for what he’s fortunate enough to be doing for a living. John gives you the impression he’s the luckiest guy in the room. Jim tries to make you believe he’s the smartest dude in the room.
Unlike with his brother, with whom John is close (the two shared a bedroom for nearly 18 years), there does not appear to be a mean or disingenuous bone in John Harbaugh’s body.
The one place where Jim Harbaugh, who is 15 months younger than John and has the 49ers in Sunday’s NFC Championship Game in Atlanta, got something right, is when he said of his brother on several occasions: “I’m probably half the coach he is.’’
“I don’t think there’s any coach coaching in the game today that really has the full grasp of offense, defense, and special teams like my brother has,” Jim Harbaugh recently told CSNBayArea.com.
Why then, is John Harbaugh not universally recognized as one of the best head coaches in the NFL?
Perhaps it will take beating the Patriots Sunday and winning the Super Bowl before he gets credit for being as much the reason for his team’s success as any of its high-profile star players.
Only then will the wrong be righted.