If a “BELIEVE” sign happens to materialize in the Chargers’ dressing room in the next few weeks, we’ll know why.
“I tried to emulate Ted Lasso in a lot of ways,” Jim Harbaugh said Thursday afternoon, in his official introduction as the Chargers’ head coach, referencing the title character of one of his favorite shows. “I think there’s a life lesson in every one of those episodes.”
And yeah, I know: Where else but the shadow of Hollywood would life and art mesh together just so?
Maybe there’s a correlation of sorts, if ever so slight. In the fictional world that the Apple TV+ show inhabited, Richmond AFC was a forlorn club, one taken for granted by the rest of English soccer. In real life, the Chargers are known primarily for … well, for Chargering, which is sort of how we got here.
But give owner Dean Spanos and his son John, president of football operations, credit in this case. They didn’t go the safe, economical route by giving an assistant his first head coaching job. Harbaugh, fresh off a national championship celebration at the University of Michigan, is returning to the NFL largely because he sees a chance to make history as just the fourth coach to win a college national championship and a Super Bowl.
And, as he made clear during Thursday’s introduction at the YouTube Theater in Inglewood, on the SoFi Stadium grounds, he’s not afraid to recite his goals publicly.
“We stated the goal,” he said. “I’m not going to be shy about stating that, you know, that’s what we want to do. We want to be known as as world champions. And we’re going to work at that; we’re going to do it or die trying.”
What’s the bigger hurdle: The fictional coach with no previous soccer experience getting his team (spoiler alert, for those who haven’t yet watched) promoted to the Premier League? Or overcoming 60 real-life seasons of often frustrating history and bringing the Chargers their first Lombardi Trophy?
Or is it maybe…
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