Here are the five reasons you can't blame Coach Marrone if he fails here:
1. He is an outstanding football coach having had major success at New Orleans and New York.
2. He was hired late - in mid December - leaving little time to put together a recruiting class.
3. He was never the top choice of the administration or AD and was only given the job after there were failed attempts at other candidates.
4. His ability to recruit from the outset was hindered by the fact that he had spent most of his previous time in the NFL
5. Nobody realized the extent to which the Football Infrastructure had deteriorated by the time took over - certainly Marrone had no idea and really had no idea what he was getting himself into or where the program had been headed during the previous ten years.
Filled it in for Marrone above.
In the end, Robinson failed. To say anything otherwise or to say why he shouldn't be looked at as failing is to ignore facts.[/quote]
Actually the analogy is factually incorrect for a number of reasons.
In no particular order.
Pasqualoni was fired one week following a late December bowl game - after having been promised another season at the helm.
For that reason, the process of securing coaches was significantly delayed.
With Robinson it was announced that he would not return before the ND game - with two games remaining in the season. For that reason there was a great deal of time to secure coaches.
So, in that respect your post is inaccurate.
Second, Marrone actually had enough time to recruit a very decent class in 2009. That classs included Shamarko Thomas, Philip Thomas, E. J. Carter, Brandon Sharpe, Andrew Tiller, Torrey Ball and I think R'Shard Anderson amongst others. He also brought in a guy named Greg Paulus. It was a relatively strong effort.
So, in that respect your post is inaccurate.
Third, Marrone was a Syracuse guy with close HS contacts in the NYS area and down south where he had been a very strong recruiter. Also, he brought on board John Anselmo and Bob Casullo who had strong local recruiting contacts. As opposed to Robinson who had few if any NE contacts, Marrone had many strong ones.
So, in that respect, your post is inaccurate.
With respect to infrastructure, Dr. Gross determined early in Robinson's tenure that the football infrastructure was lacking. He added field turf to the Dome and to the practice facilities and improved fund raising. By 2009 - as opposed to 2004 - the problems had been identified and the process of fixing it had begun.
So, in that respect, your post is inaccurate.
Marrone was well aware of where SU Football stood when he took over, having applied for the job when P was fired, having continued his close relationship with Coach Mac and of course having gone to SU and having retained his close NYS coaching contacts.
So, in that respect, your post is inaccurate.
You're correct - Marrone had a solid NFL coaching career, though nowhere near as long or as successful as that of Robinson.
So, in that respect, your post is accurate in a strict sense, but probably misses the true measure of Robinson's pro successes.
Other than what is noted above, your post is a nice attempt at irony, though it is pretty much way, way off target.
But thank you for playing!!