">
ZHK comes out of hibernation
Marrone gets settled in
The Zero Hand has decided to break its winter slumber and touch base on all things Cuse Football. In typical ZHK fashion, I have eschewed actual personal thought and decided to throw out some updates on where things stand and question my partner in crime Reyes39 to get his take on football program.
As we all know, the upcoming schedule is not complete. Donnie Webb reported that Maine could be that elusive 12th opponent. Maine!? Yes Maine. And they may have to come in midseason to boot. Brian Bennett reports just how hard Big East teams have in finding opponents. Long story short is that we still don’t have a schedule and may not see one until late February or even March. Yikes!
Once we have a schedule in place I will make my annual foray into breaking down the matchups and see what we may expect from the schedule and how many times we can hope Marrone to ring the register in that all important win column. As it stands now, we will be moonlighting as a part time member of the Big 10 with 3 games. It is a start that will surely shed light on how much work was done and how much work will still need to be done.
I do want to make comment on the recruiting class. As most of us know, we signed a small class and as such got demolished by the recruiting services for our final ranking. Scout, to pick one, has us ranked at 101 so we know that we certainly must have fallen behind the likes of WV, USF, Pitt and Rutgers, all whom hang around the top 30. Correct? Well we all know how shady the services are and in my mind they are nothing more than stone age tools used to somehow define how good a class you have. Maybe its better to evaluate possible raw material, but in the end coaching will determine how good a class ends up being. Since the services are good at pumping the people they service and hey why not. No one’s life is at stake at Rivals for failing to properly evaluate or heck even evaluate player X. Especially when he doesn’t chose USC, Ohio St, Florida or any other SEC or selector program. It’s impossible for us fans to comb through the myriad highlight reels of players and figure out whose got the goods vs those that should be bagging those goods so why should we expect Joe Lazy Analyst to do the same at Rivals or Scout? This time of year has everyone looking at stars, but while it’s nice to see a guy “flash” (ok I knew I wouldn’t go a whole post without using that word), the best we can do as fans is trust that coaches have done the best they can at evaluating talent and can then coach that talent to get the most out of them. Of course David Oku is still undecided so maybe if he picks Orange we will get some recruiting love. Or not. LVO now steps off the soap box.
Now here is my back and forth with Reyes39, better known as the signature wiz and man who brings you those pre-game football breakdowns. So without further adieu…
LVO: From what you’ve seen so far, did Gross make the right call in hiring Doug Marrone?
Reyes39: At first I wasn’t really sure. I didn’t know if I wanted to take a chance with another NFL coordinator even if he had ties to the University. But soon Marrone grew on me and now I’m very happy with the hire. He’s definitely motivated and has a love for ‘Cuse Grob didn’t have coming in. I can’t really say how good of a coach he’ll be since the season has yet to start – but so far he’s doing A.O.K. in my book. I believe he really has the “want-to” to bring Syracuse out from the depths of the Big East and all of College Football.
LVO: What kind of grade do you give Marrone’s first recruiting class?
Reyes39: With the time he had I’d have to give him a B+. He was able to coax a few guys out of their verbals to other Big East schools and even dip into Florida with just over a months work. I expected him to just take what he could get – but he showed that wasn’t his plan after he said no thanks to Moore and Barnas and offered Loeb. I was going to give him a freebie with this recruiting class but he busted his butt and made the best out of what he could.
LVO: With 5 DBs recruited, do you think Marrone was addressing a need or was he really just grabbing the best available athlete?
Reyes39: There is no doubt in my mind he was addressing a need. Although we weren’t much better at LB – the secondary was easily our weakest unit on defense. Not to mention Brown, Chiara, and Williams were all lost to graduation. Holmes, Scott, and Suter gives us a decent core to start with but we’ll need solid contribution from Peterman and Anderson early and throughout. I was glad to see GRob didn’t completely kill Grahams confidence after throwing him out there premature against Penn St and hopefully he continues to play solid like he did down the stretch last year. It also wouldn’t hurt to have Chestnut solidify a spot on the roster again. Sure he was very streaky but he’d give us more depth and in game experience.
LVO: Who do you think will make the biggest immediate impact from this class? Who will have the biggest impact when their career is done?
Reyes39: Immediate is definitely Tiller. I hate to say it but Chavers really didn’t pan out like we all thought he would…he was more of a liability at times. I’m sure his position will now be manned by Tiller who as a JUCO will be expected to contribute immediately.
As for long term – probably Loeb. Marrone spoke extremely highly of Loeb and spurred two other good QB’s to get him. I’m going to trust Marrones’s judgment for now and hope Moore and Barnas don’t amount to more than he does. With the mess at QB this year and down the road (Is Legree on the team? Is Cody even a QB anymore? It sounds like Loeb is going to have to be the face of the Orange’s resurgence.
LVO: What do you put the odds on the Cuse landing David Oku?
Reyes39: Not to break anyone’s bubble – but I think if he really wanted to come to ‘Cuse he would have already. I’d love for us to land him…but we’re just fine at RB so I won’t be heartbroken if he heads to Auburn. It’d help charge up some of the still sleeping fan base though.
LVO: What do you think will be the biggest surprise(s) to come out of spring practice?
Reyes39: When I first heard Marrone was hired I listened to an audio clip of Marrone in an off-season coaches workshop. He spoke about how he thinks its a privelege to play the game of football, to play for him, and for him to teach you. I think we’re going to see his mindset rub off on the players. No more “want-to” or “little engines that could,” just balls to the wall football and dedication. I think we’re going to have a tougher team that finishes plays…no more thud drills.
LVO: Big thanks to Reyes39 for sharing his thoughts. And stay tuned for more coverage.
