As the sun rose over TCO Performance Center in Eagan on Wednesday morning, the winds of change whipped through the frigid February air.
The Minnesota Vikings had spent weeks interviewing candidates and mulling a replacement for coach Mike Zimmer, fired in January after missing the playoffs for the second straight season and suffocating the organization with a hardass approach to leading. After newly hired general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah joined the organization two weeks ago, the coaching search had shifted into overdrive. The last candidate slated to be interviewed was the most high profile, and polarizing, of the finalists.
Advertisement
Jim Harbaugh arrived at Vikings headquarters early in the morning brimming with his trademark confidence. He hoped to complete his journey back to the NFL where he’d again chase his dream of a Super Bowl after seven years at his alma mater, the University of Michigan.
An electricity rippled through the building upon his arrival. For all of his eccentricities and concerns about people skills or leadership style, the 58-year-old Harbaugh has an undeniable presence about him, one that fills any room he enters, be it a conference room where the Vikings set up shop for the NFL Draft or the sprawling indoor practice field. It is a different kind of energy from the other three finalists, 36-year-old Los Angeles Rams offensive coordinator Kevin O’Connell, 43-year-old New York Giants defensive coordinator Patrick Graham and 45-year-old Rams defensive coordinator Raheem Morris, all younger up-and-comers, though Morris did have previous head coaching experience in Tampa Bay and Atlanta.
Harbaugh was batting cleanup in the interview order, which, coupled with coaching the San Francisco 49ers to three NFC title games and a Super Bowl appearance in four seasons and fresh off leading his Wolverines to a long-sought conquering of rival Ohio State, put so much more attention on his turn than the previous three relatively anonymous candidates.
But while many Vikings fans salivated over the possible addition of a big name with a big resume and a bigger personality, and with some media reports painting Harbaugh’s interview on national signing day as nothing more than a formality, the Vikings made it abundantly clear to Harbaugh that he was coming in to compete with the other three men for the job, sources told The Athletic. There were some in the organization who wondered if his hard-driving ways, which had been known to grind on those around him in San Francisco and Ann Arbor, would fit in Minnesota after the Vikings had just extricated themselves from the tension-filled end of the Zimmer-Rick Spielman regime.
Advertisement
Harbaugh knew there would be questions. He knew of the perception that he was a coach who was difficult to work with, and he spent the days leading up to the interview preparing to address all of their concerns. In the end, he is one of the winningest football coaches of the last decade and the owner of a 44-19-1 record in the NFL. He believed that after some time with the Vikings’ decision-makers, his resume and gumption would win over Vikings owners Zygi and Mark Wilf, CEO Andrew Miller and Adofo-Mensah (with whom he worked in San Francisco) and inspire them to bring forth a lucrative contract.
But that offer never came, sources said. On a whirlwind day, the Vikings opted against offering Harbaugh a contract and instead turned to O’Connell. A deal with the Sean McVay disciple can’t become official until after the Super Bowl, but O’Connell is expected to become the franchise’s 10th head coach.
For outsiders intoxicated by Harbaugh’s accomplishments and pedigree, it was a stunning result. For many Vikings insiders, however, it was the logical conclusion to a deliberate process aimed at reshaping how things are done in a franchise that has straddled the line between mediocre and contender for too long. It was an exhaustive process that included marathon interviews, Harbaugh professing his desire to return to the NFL and conversations that didn’t go as planned. The Athletic spoke with multiple sources to understand how the Vikings arrived at hiring O’Connell when everything seemed pointed toward Harbaugh.
When the Vikings interviewed candidates for their vacant general manager job, they asked each contender to name three coaches they’d potentially want to work with. Because they did not want to fall too far behind in the coaching carousel, while they were interviewing candidates to replace Spielman after 16 years of leading the front office, a committee of Vikings executives set about interviewing a group of coaches that intrigued them.
When the 40-year-old Adofo-Mensah was hired two weeks ago, he was known to be a fan of Packers offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett, who was among that group of eight coaches to have interviewed with Vikings brass. But Hackett was hired by the Broncos on the day Adofo-Mensah was introduced, so Adofo-Mensah provided the Vikings with three coaches he liked: O’Connell, Graham and Harbaugh.
Advertisement
The Athletic reported earlier in the winter that Harbaugh, who led the Wolverines to the Big Ten championship and a berth in the College Football Playoff, was itching to get back into the NFL. His connection to Adofo-Mensah from their days together with the 49ers made it easy to connect the dots.
Shortly after he became the team’s GM, Adofo-Mensah led virtual interviews with Graham and Harbaugh. Graham impressed the search committee with his smarts and Ivy League background. He became a finalist, along with O’Connell, Morris and 49ers defensive coordinator DeMeco Ryans. Then Adofo-Mensah called Harbaugh. Adofo-Mensah and Harbaugh share a circle of friends and Adofo-Mensah was curious if one of the most recognizable coaches in America was truly interested in returning to the NFL. Harbaugh insisted he was.
So Harbaugh became the Vikings’ fourth finalist. When Ryans withdrew his name from the running, speculation swirled that he knew something, perhaps that the job was being steered toward another candidate. The Vikings’ search committee flew to Los Angeles and interviewed O’Connell and Morris on Monday. Both conversations went well, but O’Connell “blew them away,” according to a source. He had studied the team’s roster from the previous season. He came prepared with ideas on how to improve the team and was able to offer a nuanced review of quarterback Kirk Cousins, whom he coached for one season in Washington.
O’Connell quickly became the favorite of the search committee, which was looking to overhaul the working environment at team headquarters, prioritizing leadership, inclusivity and collaboration after the front office, coaching staff and roster fractured under the pressure on Spielman and Zimmer’s watch. O’Connell seemed to fit that style and mesh well with Adofo-Mensah’s measured approach. Leadership also believed O’Connell’s offensive background was more in line with where the game is going.
But the Vikings knew the search was not over.
They returned home on Tuesday and spent nine hours with Graham. He had only been a defensive coordinator for three years, but the Vikings weren’t deterred throughout the process by a lack of coordinator experience as long as the candidate impressed with his leadership and willingness to work with others. After all, in the early days of the Wilf family ownership, they watched a young coach named Mike Tomlin join Brad Childress’s staff, spend a year in Minnesota as the defensive coordinator and then leave to become a championship-winning head coach for the Steelers.
For those who believed this was all a show with a scripted ending that had Harbaugh in purple, the length and thoroughness of the interview with Graham seemed to indicate that they were taking their due diligence seriously. While Harbaugh had the most impressive resume and certainly would’ve qualified as the biggest swing for the team, it was also a signal that this process was far from a done deal.
Advertisement
In words and actions, the Vikings made it clear that Wednesday was not going to be merely a coronation and a celebration of Harbaugh’s return to the NFL. The Vikings also knew that Harbaugh was notoriously unpredictable. There was no way they could assume anything when it came to a coach so … unconventional.
Harbaugh was going to have to interview like anyone else. He was going to have to earn it.
But it is not clear Harbaugh saw it that way. When he left Ann Arbor for the Twin Cities, reports out of Michigan were that it felt like goodbye. The parents of recruits were quoted as saying Harbaugh had warned them that he was “definitely looking” for an NFL job.
Besides, the Vikings’ search committee wasn’t 100 percent sold on Harbaugh. The coach had clashed with leadership in San Francisco, and even though many place more of the blame at former GM Trent Baalke’s feet, the way an incredibly successful run came to such a quick and flammable end was cause for concern. Some in the Vikings organization wondered about his leadership style and how that would align with their new goals in the post-Spielman/Zimmer era. They had just endured and been weighed down by a volatile head coach’s moody nature and a GM’s inability to find a way to make it work.
Mark Wilf and linebacker/team leader Eric Kendricks spoke about the need to reconnect players and franchise leadership, to feel supported. And now they were looking at Jim Harbaugh to do that?
Others liked the idea of pairing a proven, veteran coach with an inexperienced general manager and thought Harbaugh, with his track record for winning, was the perfect candidate for a team that doesn’t want to rebuild. With Cousins under contract next year and an aging defense, the ability to make big roster changes quickly will be challenging. Mark Wilf said in January that he didn’t think the team was far away from contending and did not want to tear it down and start over. Harbaugh has proven time and again that he can take rosters that accomplished less under previous head coaches and get them to perform better. He has done it at the University of San Diego, at Stanford, with the 49ers and at Michigan. Why couldn’t he do it here?
Adofo-Mensah’s interest in Harbaugh was considered a statement as well. Adofo-Mensah was in San Francisco in those last, ugly days of Harbaugh’s tenure. So if anyone knew enough to stay away from the coach, one figured it would be Adofo-Mensah.
Advertisement
At first, the interview seemed like it was going well. Harbaugh saw the Vikings’ gleaming new practice facility and the team started to see some of the coach’s most redeeming qualities.
A buzz reverberated through the building. Is this really happening? Are we really going to hire Jim Harbaugh?
Harbaugh started to feel it, too. He left Ann Arbor believing he was not coming back, and as the process got rolling, it started to look like he would be in Minnesota to stay.
But the Vikings had some hard questions to ask. They wanted to know more about his style and ability to work with others. They wanted to know more about how things ended with the 49ers. They wanted to hear his vision for leading this team back to the Super Bowl for the first time since 1977.
Sometime around 3 p.m., for reasons that are not exactly clear, things started to take a left turn. The tenor started to change, and if there was any momentum at Harbaugh’s back as he tried to secure the job, it disappeared.
Shortly before 6:30 p.m. CT, ESPN first reported that Harbaugh called Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel to tell him he was coming back to the Wolverines for the 2022 season and beyond.
The reason had nothing to do with money or a contract because the Vikings did not offer Harbaugh the job, sources said. There do not appear to be any hard feelings on either side — just a realization that this was not the right fit.
After that, the Vikings turned their attention to O’Connell. In reality, their attention never left him. Harbaugh would have been the headline-grabbing hire, but the Vikings kept coming back to a guy who was drafted by the New England Patriots in the third round in 2008, backed up Tom Brady for one season and also had short stints with the Jets, Dolphins and Chargers. He had left a positive impression on the entire search committee in a way that Harbaugh hadn’t. He had the makeup and the coaching connections to make the Vikings believe that he would be the perfect partner for Adofo-Mensah.
Advertisement
In the grand view, they thought, what better way to usher in a new era of collaborative, innovative Vikings football than with a 40-year-old general manager willing to delegate and a 36-year-old coach ready to run a modern offense.
The success of past McVay assistants Matt LaFleur in Green Bay, Zac Taylor in Cincinnati and Brandon Staley with the Chargers was a positive for O’Connell as well.
The Rams leaned heavily on 11 personnel this season with wide receiver Cooper Kupp posting a record-setting season. It was easy for the Vikings to envision O’Connell deploying something similar with Vikings star receiver Justin Jefferson. Plus, as questions swirl at quarterback, who better to make a judgment on Cousins than O’Connell, his coach for a year in Washington and a former quarterback himself?
O’Connell only attempted six passes in an uneventful four-year playing career. He entered the coaching ranks in 2015 as the quarterbacks coach in Cleveland, and his rise has been swift. After a year working for the 49ers together with Adofo-Mensah in 2016, O’Connell spent three seasons with Washington, then joined McVay as the Rams’ offensive coordinator in 2020.
Success has followed and brought O’Connell and the Rams to the Super Bowl, prepping for a matchup against the Bengals. That, of course, is the end goal for the Vikings as they undergo this transition from Spielman and Zimmer to Adofo-Mensah and O’Connell.
O’Connell will not be officially announced as the new head coach until after the Super Bowl.
If Harbaugh would have been considered a risk, O’Connell certainly constitutes one as well. He has never been a head coach and did not call plays for the Rams. But the NFL is trending younger with its head coaches, and the Vikings are the latest team to go in that direction after saying goodbye to the 65-year-old Zimmer.
Advertisement
What this means for the direction of the team is not immediately clear. Was Harbaugh the “win-now” coach? Does the younger O’Connell represent an openness to rebuilding? Not necessarily. The 42-year-old LaFleur has won the NFC North in each of his three seasons and taken the Packers to two NFC title games. The 36-year-old McVay has won three NFC West titles and is coaching in his second Super Bowl in five years.
Zimmer, on the other hand, won two playoff games and two division titles in eight seasons in Minnesota.
What we do know is it will most certainly be different with Adofo-Mensah and O’Connell in charge.
Because on Wednesday evening, change came to TCO Performance Center. It just wasn’t the change many expected.
(Top photo: Justin Casterline / Getty Images)