John Harbaugh contract delay: Giants still don't have a finalized deal in place as anxious fans wait

At some point, it appears that John Harbaugh is going to become the next head coach of the New York Giants, but that hasn't quite happened yet. After visiting with the team on Wednesday, reports came out later that night that he had decided to take the job in New York.

Giants fans celebrated the hire, but the celebration has suddenly turned into concern, because two days later, there's still no deal in place. The team had all day Thursday to finalize a contract with Harbaugh, but a deal didn't get done, and as of Friday morning, there was still no contract in place. 

This most likely means nothing, but this is the part where we're going to point out there have been at least two occasions since 2000 where a coach verbally accepted a job, only to change his mind at the last second. The most famous instance came in January 2000 when Bill Belichick accepted a job to become head coach of the Jets, but then he decided to not to show up for the press conference. And the best part might be the fact that he turned in his resignation on a napkin. 

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It's not just Belichick, though. Less than 10 years ago, there was a similar situation with Patriots offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels. On Feb. 6, 2018, the Colts announced that they were going to hire McDaniels as their new head coach, but he never took the job, because later that night, McDaniels had a change of heart and decided to stay in New England. 

It was a shocking turn of events that proves one big thing: No deal is done until the contract is signed, and right now, Harbaugh's contract isn't signed. According to Tom Pelissero of NFL Media, a deal could come on Friday, but there's also a small chance that it might not come at all. 

"Harbaugh has been very methodical about doing his due diligence on all the interested teams," Pelissero said. "This is leaning toward John Harbaugh becoming the next Giants' head coach, but it was not and is not a foregone conclusion. Those talks continue and could very well come to a conclusion in the next few hours. Then and only then are the Giants hopeful that they'll be able to celebrate their biggest win in years."

That being said, Giants fans probably don't need to panic just yet. For one, the Giants somewhat acknowledged the fact that Harbaugh will likely be their next coach with a simple tweet on Thursday. 

CBS Sports senior NFL reporter Matt Zenitz reported on Friday morning that the two sides "are still in the process of trying to finalize a deal, the full expectation remains that this will get done and that he'll be hired as the Giants' next head coach."

Giants beat writer Art Stapleton also reported on Friday that it was just a matter of time before a deal got done, "This isn't about John Harbaugh still making demands," Stapleton wrote. "He's the head coach of the Giants, spirit of the law. Letter of the law, they've got to go through the contract and make sure language works for lawyers on both sides. Again, the deal is agreed upon. It's legal language now."

Since Harbaugh hasn't signed a deal with the Giants yet, other teams are free to contact the former Ravens coach, and it's certainly possible that's happening, but he might not be listening. Harbaugh was scheduled to interview with the Titans on Thursday, but he called that off and the presumption was that he called it off because he was going to take the Giants' job. 

At this point, it seems like they just need to iron out the contract details, but no one in New York should be celebrating Harbaugh's hiring until there's a contract in place, and right now, there's no contract in place.