Chargers' Jim Harbaugh returns to North Carolina, his omega and alpha

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Chargers coach Jim Harbaugh returns Sunday to where it all ended for him, and also where it all began.

He was a 38-year-old quarterback hoping to play a few more years in the NFL when he joined the Carolina Panthers for the 2001 season. He didn’t think his career was over. After all, he was throwing passes to star rookie Steve Smith, but the football gods had other ideas, as he recalls.

Although he never played for the Panthers, the franchise left an indelible mark on Harbaugh and, ultimately, led him down a different career path. That’s when he began to realize he could turn to coaching, following in the footsteps of his father, Jack.

So Harbaugh started going to the film room long after practice was over and his teammates had gone home. He sat on the floor and watched and listened as coaches broke down the footage and discussed schemes and ways they could exploit their opponents while covering their own shortcomings.

Harbaugh also met with Greg Roman, a Panthers assistant coach who has joined him several times over the years, including this season with the Chargers. Earlier this week, Roman remembered Harbaugh as a careful student, a man who could become a great coach someday.

“I met Greg at Carolina, yeah, that’s as deep as anything,” Harbaugh said recently. “Nothing deeper than meeting Greg Roman at Carolina. He was an offensive line assistant. I was at the point where I was new. I was in the office late, watching the coaches.”

Said Roman, recalling his first impressions of Harbaugh: “He was always in the film room, always. He was sitting on the floor in our special teams coach’s office, watching film with him at night. What do you think? A quarterback doing that? He was getting ready to be a coach.”

It wasn’t long before Harbaugh returned his helmet and pads.

“I didn’t play a game, it was time to coach,” Harbaugh said, laughing at the memory. “It was time to coach. It was the football gods telling me we weren’t going to play anymore. We were going to need you to coach. In my mind, I could still do it. I’ve got at least two years left.”

No.

Jack Harbaugh’s idea that when you think you’re done, when you can’t imagine going out on the field to practice or play or prepare for a football game, then you can go on for two years. Jim Harbaugh remembers his father’s words, but he was done. There wouldn’t be two more years.

Jim Harbaugh spent his final days throwing passes to Smith, a budding superstar, and running the Panthers’ scout team. When the end came, he was prepared for it. The then-Oakland Raiders offered him a job as their quarterbacks coach, and he jumped at the chance for the 2002 season.

After two seasons, he became head coach at the University of San Diego, a return to his roots after playing in 1999-2000 with the Chargers. After stints at Stanford and the San Francisco 49ers, he landed at the University of Michigan.

The Chargers hired him in January. Roman joined him in Los Angeles, accepting the defensive coordinator position.

“He’s a go-to guy,” Harbaugh said of Roman. “He’s excited to teach. Football advice. It was a joy to be around him and listen to him talk and explain and teach. He could take a complex football play, a scheme, and explain it in 15, 20, 30 minutes, max, and I felt like I knew it inside and out. He just has that ability to teach. This guy was a chess player, he probably would have thought seven or eight moves ahead. That’s the way he is as a football coach.”