what awaits Giants players<\/a> as they get together in the spring and learn what their new head coach is all about.<\/p>\n\u201cI would say you\u2019re gonna hit the ground running,\u2019\u2019 Jay Harbaugh said Wednesday during the Seahawks media session in advance of Super Bowl 2026. \u201cThere\u2019s gonna be a focus on real substance, football and all the things that help you win and none of the things that don\u2019t.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s really ruthless in terms of making sure that the main thing stays the main thing. And it\u2019s gonna be tough but intelligent, you\u2019re gonna work hard but not to a point where you\u2019re put in unnecessarily risky positions or wearing the guys out too much. You\u2019re going to be coached and challenged but not unfairly and not without compassion. He really is in the sweet spot on a lot of things \u2026 being honest but not cold-hearted. He\u2019s really a masterful leader, teacher. I couldn\u2019t say enough great things about him.<\/p>\n
Seattle special teams coordinator Jay Harbaugh talks to the media a couple of days before the Seahawks\u2019 win over the Rams in the NFC Championship. AP<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really biased, I think my dad and him are as good as it gets.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
Yeah, Jay Harbaugh is really biased. John is his uncle and Jim Harbaugh, the head coach of the Chargers, is his father. Jay thought about becoming an FBI agent but his family DNA was not having that. <\/p>\n
Jim\u2019s Ravens were eliminated from the playoffs on the final day of the regular season and John\u2019s Chargers were one and done in the postseason, losing to the Patriots in an AFC wild-card game. Jay is the Seahawks special teams coordinator and he is the last remaining Harbaugh preparing for a game, looking to win it all by beating the Patriots on Sunday in Super Bowl LX at Levi\u2019s Stadium.<\/p>\n
Tracking Jay Harbaugh\u2019s coaching path is akin to flipping through pages in a family album. He spent four years as an undergraduate assistant at Oregon State, working for Mike Riley \u2014 the head coach of the San Diego Chargers when Jim Harbaugh was the quarterback. Jay\u2019s first NFL job came in 2012, hired by uncle John. In 2015, Jay moved on to Michigan, to work for his father. <\/p>\n
After nine years, Jay returned to the NFL, hired in 2024 by Mike Macdonald to lead special teams in Seattle. Macdonald is not a Harbaugh but he might as well be, having worked for John in Baltimore and Jay in Ann Arbor before the Seahawks came calling.<\/p>\n
Lest we forget, the Harbaugh who got this coaching thing rolling is Jack, the longtime head coach at Western Michigan and Western Kentucky \u2014 John and Jim\u2019s father and Jay\u2019s grandfather.<\/p>\n
Seattle special teams coordinator Jay Harbaugh talks with placekicker Mike Myers a couple of days before the Seahawks\u2019 win over the Rams in the NFC Championship. AP<\/p>\n
When he needed advice on anything to do with coaching, Jay Harbaugh never had to leave the living room.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really grateful for having those relationships and those resources as I grew up,\u2019\u2019 Jay said, \u201cIt\u2019s like water to a fish, you\u2019re just in it and that\u2019s what you know, so being a part of those conversations about tough decisions and building a team and strategy, I\u2019ve been exposed to that for a really long time and I\u2019m really thankful.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
This leads the conversation at holidays toward predictable subject matter.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re not immune to the family gathering, hot-button politics, that type of stuff,\u2019\u2019 Jay said. \u201cThose things find a way to rear their head at any time of family gathering. The football if it does go away it doesn\u2019t stay away for very long.\u201d<\/p>\n
John Harbaugh, talking during his introductory press conference, will bring a winning culture to the Giants, says his nephew, Jay Harbaugh, who is the Seahawks\u2019 special team coordinator. Charles Wenzelberg \/ New York Post<\/p>\n
These discussions are not reserved for the actual coaches in the room.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot really, because grandma Jackie, all the women they know ball, they love ball,\u2019\u2019 Jay said.<\/p>\n
Jay is not a bystander in all this. The Seahawks are still playing and that their special teams unit graded out as the seventh best in the league by Pro Football Focus is one of the reasons why.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe is always dialing up and scheming,\u2019\u2019 kick returner George Holani said during the season. \u201cHe is making sure we have the right plays and the right players in the right spots. He is super locked in.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jay Harbaugh made the Super Bowl with John after the 2012 season. The nephew made it back. It is on to the Giants for the uncle.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom the outside it looks like they have a lot of talent there or at least some players that really stand out,\u2019\u2019 Jay Harbaugh said. \u201cI would imagine there\u2019s going to be a feeling of togetherness and taking that talent and really turning it into a team. That\u2019s really one of his super powers and I\u2019m just super excited for him.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s gonna do great. He\u2019s just the type of person that\u2019s gonna take whatever the situation is and make it something really good for himself and for the team. He\u2019s gonna crush it. He just seems really excited and energized, and that\u2019s not to say he was lacking any of that. He just loves a challenge. He loves when people don\u2019t maybe believe in things being possible, that\u2019s kind of an energizing thing to hear in our family in general.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN JOSE, Calif. \u2014 Be forewarned. Uncle John will not be playing around. So says the nephew about…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":730483,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2067],"tags":[7,519,1012,2909,1917,56,2321,2469,6,261,9,505,41484],"class_list":{"0":"post-730482","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-giants","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-giants","10":"tag-jim-harbaugh","11":"tag-john-harbaugh","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-giants","14":"tag-newyork","15":"tag-newyorkgiants","16":"tag-nfl","17":"tag-seattle-seahawks","18":"tag-sports","19":"tag-super-bowl","20":"tag-super-bowl-2026"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116016254128133673","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/730482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=730482"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/730482\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/730483"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=730482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=730482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=730482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}