Marrone

[Millhouse]

Have you ever liked a football coach of one of your teams?

Levy

 

[Millhouse]

For Millhouse to like a coach he has to be as smart as Millhouse

Nobody is as smart as Millhouse

Therefore Millhouse can never like a coach.

you talk about how unsuccessful the bills have been then you criticize me for not liking those coaches.

pardon me for being indifferent to a 15-17 coach (or 40-42 coach) moving on

 

[baggerbob]

Hey Anomander Scott Shafer won more games for Doug than Doug did for Doug while he was here. The SU defense was far superior to the offense except for Marrones last year. Shafer may get turnout to be a better coach. No one knows the future.

People still don't acknowledge the fact that Doug had a losing Big East record 11-17, in OOC games against P-5 tams 3-8, a good 2-0 in bowls for a record of 16-25. He got 9 wins against Teams like Akron (2), Maine (2), Colgate, Rhode Island, Toledo, Tulane, and Stony Brook. The wins in 2011, against Rhode Island, Toledo, Tulane were not dominating performances. Doug helped bring the program back from the abyss, but in reality our record in his 4 years was below average. That 16-25 winning percentage is .390, that is where we were after 4 years.

 

[Crusty]

To be fair, and despite your enthusiasm, there is little evidence to date that SS will be a good college HC. At the very best, the jury is still out. Fact: he is 10-15 as a HC, with 6 of those 10 wins over the likes of Wagner, Tulane, Nova, CMU, and Wake (2x).

Marrone was under .400 in Big East play so he didn't set the world on fire either. Shafer did very well last year under the circumstances.

Most fans have no earthly idea what they are watching and they condemn coaches who forgot more that they will ever know. Shafer is an excellent defensive mind and I think he will get the HC thing right next next year. He is under severe budget constraints and our program is still on life support. Marrone got us out of intensive care but we are still in therapy. Give the guy a chance.

 

[OrangePA]

Marrone is a great football coach.

I like Shafer a lot, but Marrone towers over him as a HC.

 

[OrangeDW]

People still don't acknowledge the fact that Doug had a losing Big East record 11-17, in OOC games against P-5 tams 3-8, a good 2-0 in bowls for a record of 16-25. He got 9 wins against Teams like Akron (2), Maine (2), Colgate, Rhode Island, Toledo, Tulane, and Stony Brook. The wins in 2011, against Rhode Island, Toledo, Tulane were not dominating performances. Doug helped bring the program back from the abyss, but in reality our record in his 4 years was below average. That 16-25 winning percentage is .390, that is where we were after 4 years.

Have to look at it in context though. We LOST AT HOME TO AKRON the season before he took over. That's where we were at.

By year 4(2012) we had a legitimately solid team with some good wins, that competed well against good teams in it's losses.

 

[OrangeDW]

Marrone was under .400 in Big East play so he didn't set the world on fire either. Shafer did very well last year under the circumstances.

Most fans have no earthly idea what they are watching and they condemn coaches who forgot more that they will ever know. Shafer is an excellent defensive mind and I think he will get the HC thing right next next year. He is under severe budget constraints and our program is still on life support. Marrone got us out of intensive care but we are still in therapy. Give the guy a chance.

Marrone took over a team with a bunch of small, fat kids that got rolled at home by Akron too. A team where a scrubby ACC PG who hadn't played football in 5 years came right in and won the starting QB job. We were BAD. So yeah, it took some time. He pretty much worked a miracle here.

 

[Crusty]

Marrone is a great football coach.

I like Shafer a lot, but Marrone towers over him as a HC.

I think it is a little too early to call Marrone a "great" coach. So far he has demonstrated an ability to improve horrible programs, but he has not done anything more than that - at least not yet. While he is a good planner he is average at best as a game manager. It will be interesting to see what they both do in the couple of years.

 

[RF2044]

Good college coach, just doesn't stack up to Belichick. That's my entire point. I'm kinda peacocking a bit and I apologize since i'm enjoying the hell out of the last 14 years after dealing with years of ineptitude in New England. I don't see Marrone as the guy who will take the Bills to that perpetual 10-12 win state. I'm just stating what I think. Who knows he may surprise and become Chuck Noll.

I wish he never left Syracuse because my expectations of that program are 8 wins year in and year out with the occasional 11 win What season (see 88, 92, etc). He was en route to that. I am a Marrone guy and wish he was still in Syracuse but like i said my expectations for my college team (alma mader) and the Pats are in two different galaxies.

That's not a very good benchmark, because Belichick is arguably the greatest coach in NFL history. No exaggeration. And if he's not, he certainly is in the conversation with the top handful in league history.

So if the line of demarcation for comparison is "best ever," then very few if any coaches will ever measure up to that standard.

 

[Millhouse]

If you take into account strength of schedule and average Shafer's SRS (simple rating system) and Marrone's, then compare them to 2014 SRS standings, it can give you a sense of where each falls on average

Shafer's avg rating = -.715 would be 73rd this year

Marrone's avg rating = .0025 would be 67th this year.

Shafers avg strength of schedule is 3.235 which would be 39th in the country this year

Marrone's avg strength of schedule would've been 63rd this year.

There isn't much difference between 73 and 67. One side can believe that Marrone built them from the ashes, the other side can believe that Marrone left Shafer with nothing at QB.

Both guys are totally average. They're both knuckleheads that are good at teaching college kids to hit hard and they both hurt their teams chances by being stubbornly against math.

http://www.sports-reference.com/cfb/schools/syracuse/

http://www.sports-reference.com/cfb/years/2014-standings.html

 

[007]

Marrone was under .400 in Big East play so he didn't set the world on fire either. Shafer did very well last year under the circumstances.

Most fans have no earthly idea what they are watching and they condemn coaches who forgot more that they will ever know. Shafer is an excellent defensive mind and I think he will get the HC thing right next next year. He is under severe budget constraints and our program is still on life support. Marrone got us out of intensive care but we are still in therapy. Give the guy a chance.

You have responded as if I am bashing Shafer. I am not. You made a statement that Marrone and Shafer are BOTH very good coaches. There is evidence to support the statement about Marrone (despite Milhouse's use of "stats"). Marrone is a HC in the freakin NFL and he reportedly had multiple teams pursuing him. And SS is 5 games below .500 in 2 years as a HC. There is very little to support the "good head coach" moniker other than your desire for it to be true. That doesn't mean he will not prove to be a good HC some day. It does mean that he has done nothing yet to inspire that confidence.

It doesn't get too much more basic than that, Crusty.

 

[Millhouse]

You have responded as if I am bashing Shafer. I am not. You made a statement that Marrone and Shafer are BOTH very good coaches. There is evidence to support the statement about Marrone (despite Milhouse's use of "stats"). Marrone is a HC in the freakin NFL and he reportedly had multiple teams pursuing him. And SS is 5 games below .500 in 2 years as a HC. There is very little to support the "good head coach" moniker other than your desire for it to be true. That doesn't mean he will not prove to be a good HC some day. It does mean that he has done nothing yet to inspire that confidence.

It doesn't get too much more basic than that, Crusty.

5 games below .500 isn't a "stat"?

 

[007]

5 games below .500 isn't a "stat"?

Who said it wasn't?

 

[Millhouse]

Who said it wasn't?

i guess you use stats acceptably and i don't.

 

[anomander]

People still don't acknowledge the fact that Doug had a losing Big East record 11-17, in OOC games against P-5 tams 3-8, a good 2-0 in bowls for a record of 16-25. He got 9 wins against Teams like Akron (2), Maine (2), Colgate, Rhode Island, Toledo, Tulane, and Stony Brook. The wins in 2011, against Rhode Island, Toledo, Tulane were not dominating performances. Doug helped bring the program back from the abyss, but in reality our record in his 4 years was below average. That 16-25 winning percentage is .390, that is where we were after 4 years.

But hey if Marrone's 2011 season wasn't marred by injuries who knows what would have happened? We were 5-2 with a huge win over WVU before injuries mounted up and decimated an already thin team that was just in the process of being rebuilt. I mean if Shafer is getting a pass for this year, then it's only fair to credit Marrone for a season that was actually looking good before injuries took over. If anything Marrone had a far better excuse for the season spiraling out of control then Shafer did, but i'm not even trying to get into the injury thing again.

 

[Millhouse]

But hey if Marrone's 2011 season wasn't marred by injuries who knows what would have happened? We were 5-2 with a huge win over WVU before injuries mounted up and decimated an already thin team that was just in the process of being rebuilt. I mean if Shafer is getting a pass for this year, then it's only fair to credit Marrone for a season that was actually looking good before injuries took over. If anything Marrone had a far better excuse for the season spiraling out of control then Shafer did, but i'm not even trying to get into the injury thing again.

marrone still had his QB though

 

[anomander]

marrone still had his QB though

I thought people don't like Hunt? I keep getting confused?

 

[007]

i guess you use stats acceptably and i don't.

that's probably not true the majority of the time

 

[Rocco]

Levy

The guy who couldn't win a Super Bowl? That Levy? Appearances don't matter.

 

[Crusty]

A very interesting question is whether it is easier to take a really terrible program to average or to take an average program to say, the top 25. Personally, I think it is the former. It seems to me it gets harder and harder to improve the better you get. When you are at the bottom it doesn't take much to improve the talent because the pool of players better than yours is so large. There is a lot of low hanging fruit. As you near the top the talent thins out a lot and the competition for it gets much more intense.

A great number of formerly top programs face this challenge. For some, it used to be easy as they had a great deal of talent in their 600 mile recruiting radius and now that talent is thinned out and the competition for it has increased as well. For some schools the increase in cost has also reduced the huge number of walk-ons to a trickle.

One of the objectives of the P5 is to monopolize the talent pool so as to create an insurmountable product quality gap, which in turn will create pricing power.

But hey if Marrone's 2011 season wasn't marred by injuries who knows what would have happened? We were 5-2 with a huge win over WVU before injuries mounted up and decimated an already thin team that was just in the process of being rebuilt. I mean if Shafer is getting a pass for this year, then it's only fair to credit Marrone for a season that was actually looking good before injuries took over. If anything Marrone had a far better excuse for the season spiraling out of control then Shafer did, but i'm not even trying to get into the injury thing again.

Why is it that Marrone has a far better reason? He had a far better QB who was not injured. I just don't get it why injuries explain one coach's season but not another, especially when the injuries were more widespread for one.

Personally, I gave Marrone a pass not only for that season but for the first four games of 2012 as well.

 

[Millhouse]

I thought people don't like Hunt? I keep getting confused?

hopefully those people have learned. i'm just talking about the coaches' #1 qbs

 

[Crusty]

You have responded as if I am bashing Shafer. I am not. You made a statement that Marrone and Shafer are BOTH very good coaches. There is evidence to support the statement about Marrone (despite Milhouse's use of "stats"). Marrone is a HC in the freakin NFL and he reportedly had multiple teams pursuing him. And SS is 5 games below .500 in 2 years as a HC. There is very little to support the "good head coach" moniker other than your desire for it to be true. That doesn't mean he will not prove to be a good HC some day. It does mean that he has done nothing yet to inspire that confidence.

It doesn't get too much more basic than that, Crusty.

I don't want to be bashing Marrone because I think he is a very good coach. However, that is just my opinion and I can't defend it on the record. The fact he is an NFL coach means nothing for if that were the standard I guess Mark Tressman, Chan Gailey, Rich Kotite and all the others would be considered great coaches.

You have an opinion that I happen to share with respect to Marrone but it is only an opinion that cannot be supported by facts. Time will tell for both Marrone and Shafer.

 

[Millhouse]

The guy who couldn't win a Super Bowl? That Levy? Appearances don't matter.

yes that levy. very dumb post

 

[anomander]

A very interesting question is whether it is easier to take a really terrible program to average or to take an average program to say, the top 25. Personally, I think it is the former. It seems to me it gets harder and harder to improve the better you get. When you are at the bottom it doesn't take much to improve the talent because the pool of players better than yours is so large. There is a lot of low hanging fruit. As you near the top the talent thins out a lot and the competition for it gets much more intense.

A great number of formerly top programs face this challenge. For some, it used to be easy as they had a great deal of talent in their 600 mile recruiting radius and now that talent is thinned out and the competition for it has increased as well. For some schools the increase in cost has also reduced the huge number of walk-ons to a trickle.

One of the objectives of the P5 is to monopolize the talent pool so as to create an insurmountable product quality gap, which in turn will create pricing power.


Why is it that Marrone has a far better reason? He had a far better QB who was not injured. I just don't get it why injuries explain one coach's season but not another, especially when the injuries were more widespread for one.

Personally, I gave Marrone a pass not only for that season but for the first four games of 2012 as well.

I don't really give either a pass. Injuries are part of football. But just for discussion sake I would be more willing to give Marrone a pass with the injuries because I still don't believe he was working with a full roster at the time. The year before he had just cut people, and were still very young, and inexperienced in several of the positions that were injured. We really had no depth in year 2 of the massive rebuild project. And yes he did have Sophomore Ryan Nassib, who many people were ready to run out of town that year. Was he that much better then Hunt, or Long? People were ready to run Hunt out of town this year, but now all a sudden he's back to the savior? I've always been a big fan of Hunt and feel he has been treated unfairly, especially after the AJ love affair following the FSU game where FSU played the most basic defensive game plan I have seen. People keep on wanting to say AJ was the 4th string qb, but in reality he was the 2nd string qb. He was listed deeper on the depth chart because the plans were for him to redshirt. As soon as Hunt went down for the year the plan all along was for AJ to finish out the season.

Anyways I was basically just arguing the point that Marrone had an average career at Syracuse even though he dealt with the same exact issues everyone was so willing to give Shafer a pass on this year. One thing Marrone did have going for him in 2011 was a successful season. He showed that he could field a competitive team on the field before the injury bug got him. 5-2 with a big win vs WVU in year 2 of that rebuild was practically a miracle. I am still waiting on Shafer's signature win. Hopefully we can get one next season.




I also agree with you that I think it is easier bringing a program from the abyss to respectability, then it is from average to great. As you said there are too many factors that can put a cap on a programs success. We're a program fighting many built-in disadvantages, be it recruiting territory, inability/unwillingness to invest in coaching staff, facilities/poor fanbase, etc etc you get my point. I said it yesterday, but i'll say it again...at least Duke should give us hope.

 

[007]

I don't want to be bashing Marrone because I think he is a very good coach. However, that is just my opinion and I can't defend it on the record. The fact he is an NFL coach means nothing for if that were the standard I guess Mark Tressman, Chan Gailey, Rich Kotite and all the others would be considered great coaches.

You have an opinion that I happen to share with respect to Marrone but it is only an opinion that cannot be supported by facts. Time will tell for both Marrone and Shafer.

Ok, so we can both agree that Marrone is a "very good" coach. The issue under debate, and this has been my point throughout this thread, was whether or not Shafer is a also "very good" HC. There is very little evidence that he is at this time; you believe he is despite the lack of success. We can respectfully disagree on that one.

As for the your belief that being hired as an NFL coach "means nothing" relative to a coach's ability...that's just doesn't make any sense to me at all.