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CEO Jed York plans to sit down with 49ers coach Jim Harbaugh after the season to hammer out what he believes will be a long-term contract extension.
Harbaugh is in the third year of a five-year, $25 million contract, which makes him third-highest paid coach in the NFC West behind Seattle’s Pete Carroll and St. Louis’ Jeff Fisher.
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"You can't really ask for a much better job than what he's done over the last two and a half seasons," York said Wednesday on KNBR. "Now's not the right time to get into a deep contract discussion. But he knows we want him here long term, and we'll sit down at the end of the season, we'll assess like we always do. And I definitely anticipate Jim being here for a long period of time."
York acknowledged that Harbaugh and general manager Trent Baalke have their disagreements on personnel decisions from time to time, but he said Harbaugh has never asked for more control in determining the team’s 53-man roster.
“He's never asked for that, he's never intimated any of that," York said. "And it's easy to say, it's easy to speculate, 'Well, he was in college and he had full control and he wants full control here.' That sounds great until you actually get to reality. And Jim's never really ever asked for that.
“Now do we butt heads on players from time to time? Of course. That's what GMs and coaches do. But Jim knows that being a coach is a full-time job, and he has a lot of respect for the job that Trent has done. I mean you look at the folks we've added through the draft, free agency and trade - we're in a pretty good spot from a talent standpoint."
Baalke has contractual final say over the 49ers’ roster. But Baalke has said in the past that he would never force a player onto his coach that the coach does not want. York described the give-and-take relationship between Harbaugh and Baalke as healthy.
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"And I've always said, you can have control in your contract, but if you can't sit down and actually talk something through, it really doesn't matter what your contract says,” York said. “And I think that's where Jim and Trent are. They sit down and argue things out. And then they figure out, what's the best thing for the 49ers and let's move forward. And that's how I really see this team operating in the future and in perpetuity."
In line image of Jim Harbaugh provided by The Associated Press
