Michigan football rumors: Jim Harbaugh's replacement is painfully obvious

Win a national championship at your alma mater, then try to make football history. That seems to be the internal compass guiding Jim Harbaugh as, just weeks after bringing his alma mater in the Michigan Wolverines their first title in more than 25 years, he's now agreed to take over as the head coach of the Los Angeles Chargers.

The potential of a move to the NFL has been looming large in Ann Arbor well before Michigan won the natty. However, the popular belief was that winning a national championship -- especially with looming NCAA sanctions -- might make it more likely that the former San Francisco 49ers head coach would return to the NFL coaching ranks.

Now, Harbaugh will be looking to add a Super Bowl to his illustrious resumé, something he was just one win shy of while with the 49ers. But what about Michigan?

Well, don't expect the search for Harbaugh's replacement to take all that long -- or for it to be any surprise at all, really.

Michigan football rumors: Sherrone Moore the favorite to replace Jim Harbaugh

According to The Athletic college football insider Nicole Auerbach, Michigan offensive coordinator Sherrone Moore is the favorite to replace Harbaugh with the Wolverines. Auerbach also noted the possibility that the university doesn't even consider an outside hire before promoting Moore.

Furthering that belief is the fact that, per Jonathan Jones of CBS Sports, Moore has already been making calls trying to fill out the rest of his staff at Michigan for the 2024 season as Harbaugh was interviewing for NFL jobs.

As Michigan fans surely remember, Moore served as the acting head coach in four of the six games for which Harbaugh was suspended in the 2023 regular season. He obviously went undefeated, but notched an impressive group of wins at the helm of the Wolverines, beating Bowling Green, Penn State, Maryland and Ohio State.

Moore has been an assistant on the Michigan staff since 2018 after playing at Oklahoma and previously serving as an assistant at both Louisville and Central Michigan. After learning under Harbaugh for the past several years, though, Moore would represent an attempt to continue what Harbaugh built in Ann Arbor.