Alex Boone says Jim Harbaugh 'kind of wore out his welcome'

Jim Harbaugh's so-called mutual departure from the San Francisco 49ers is back in the news this week. HBO's Real Sports is doing a feature Sunday Tuesday evening about Harbaugh, and in it we get to hear from Jim Harbaugh and others about his departure. I'm getting a copy of it tomorrow, but set your DVR if you have HBO (or check out HBO Go after the fact).

Pro Football Talk pulled out some notable quotations from the show, and they are at least a little bit interesting. Jim Harbaugh said he does sometimes wear out his welcome. Initially he said people say that, but then said it must be true.

That is followed later by some comments by right guard Alex Boone. Among things, he said:

"He does a great job of giving you that spark, that initial boom," 49ers guard Alex Boone tells Kremer.  "But after a while, you just want to kick his ass. . . .  He just keeps pushing you, and you're like, ‘Dude, we got over the mountain.  Stop.  Let go.'  He kind of wore out his welcome."

"What does that mean?" Kremer asks.

"I think he just pushed guys too far.  He wanted too much, demanded too much, expected too much.  You know, ‘We gotta go out and do this.  We gotta go out and do this.  We gotta go out and do this.'  And you'd be like, ‘This guy might be clinically insane.  He's crazy.' . . .  I think that if you're stuck in your ways enough, eventually people are just going to say, ‘Listen, we just can't work with this.'"

He did say the players had nothing to do with Harbaugh getting fired, but the PFT article does not include any more comments around that to provide context to Boone's comments. Once I get a chance to watch the episode, I'll let you know if there anything else of interest from it.

I'm not exactly stunned by Boone's comments. And the fact that Harbaugh acknowledges he can wear out his welcome at least further confirms that it is not always a bed of roses working with him. I could see how he could quickly turn the program around but then have his style wear people down to some extent. It does not give us complete insight into the dynamic between Harbaugh, Jed York and Trent Baalke, but it is potentially one more clue on the Harbaugh side at least. I don't think we'll ever know everything, but each clue adds a small piece to the puzzle.