OWINGS MILLS — The Baltimore Ravens never had any intentions of allowing coach John Harbaugh to enter the final year of his contract without securing him for the future, and they followed through on that desire Monday morning by signing him to a three-year, $12 million extension.
Having led the Ravens to the playoffs in each of his first three seasons, Harbaugh is now under contract through the 2014 season with an average annual salary of roughly $4 million.
The deal closely mirrors the contract of Pittsburgh Steelers coach Mike Tomlin with slightly lower annual compensation than Tomlin following an increase of $1 million to $1.5 million over his original deal.
"This is much appreciated and I am thankful to Steve [Bisciotti]," said Harbaugh, who signed the deal Monday at the Ravens’ training complex after returning from the organization’s annual retreat. "I want to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with him, Ozzie [Newsome], Dick [Cass], our players and everyone else in the organization as we work to bring championships to Baltimore.
"We have a lot of great people who are Ravens. I’m proud to be part of this. We all push each other and pull together. I said it when I came here: ‘It’s about the team.’ And we plan to be a championship team."
Team president Dick Cass told Ravens24x7.com in January that talks had been launched with Harbaugh and that a deal would be completed soon. Nearly a month later, they finalized the deal.
Harbaugh, 48, is only the fourth coach in NFL history in the past two decades to lead his team to the postseason in all three of his first three seasons, joining Bill Cowher, Barry Switzer and Dennis Green.
No coach in franchise history had previously made it to the playoffs for three consecutive years.
Harbaugh owns a 32-16 regular-season record, a .666 winning percentage. He has won four of seven career playoff games, and the Ravens are the lone team in the NFL to win at least one playoff game in the past three seasons.
"It’s great for him," fullback Le’Ron McClain said in a telephone interview. "It shows how much hard work he’s been putting in. He got us to the playoffs three straight years. He’s building a great foundation and a great team. Congrats to him on that deal."
The Ravens hired Harbaugh after initially offering the job to Dallas Cowboys offensive coordinator Jason Garrett, who later went on to replace Wade Phillips in Dallas as head coach.
The Ravens also interviewed Rex Ryan, Tony Sparano, Jim Caldwell and Brian Schottenheimer and held preliminary discussions with Marty Schottenheimer before hiring Harbaugh, a former Philadelphia Eagles special teams and defensive backs coach who hadn’t previously been a head coach at any level.
Since being hired by Bisciotti, Harbaugh has placed slogans all over team headquarters advocating a team-first mentality.
"There are three important things in putting together a football team: No. 1 is the team, the second-most important thing is the team and third-most important thing is the team," Harbaugh said during his introductory press conference. "We’re going to stick with that through and through, beginning to end, and that’s what it is all about."
Since arriving in Baltimore, Harbaugh has followed through on those statements by instilling longer, more physical practices than his predecessor, Brian Billick, who won a Super Bowl.
Harbaugh led the Ravens to the AFC championship during his rookie season as a head coach, losing in the AFC divisional round to the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Indianapolis Colts over the past two postseasons.
The Ravens went 11-5 in his first season after going 5-11 in Billick’s final season in Baltimore.
"Steve said that we want to make sure John remains as our head coach and we reached a new agreement late last week and Coach signed it this morning," Ravens team president Dick Cass said. "Having John increases our opportunity to compete for the NFL championship every year, which is our goal."
Although the Ravens endured season-ending injuries to offensive tackle Jared Gaither, cornerback Domonique Foxworth and rookie outside linebacker Sergio Kindle, the Ravens went 12-4 last season.
Harbaugh has often said he wants the Ravens to embrace a rough, tough, disciplined approach to football.
“You’ve got to have a guy at the throne that has that mean, tough, bully attitude that goes along with his players," McClain said. "Coach Harbaugh has that. He’s a very tough guy and a great coach."
