sutomcat
2024 Iggy Award (ACC Tournament Record)
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- Aug 15, 2011
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Parked at a West lot. Easy and the price was right (free). Got to the quad around 1:05 pm.
They had a bunch of tents up and two rows of tables with chairs for the player autographs. There were 3 or 4 food trucks and Meiers Creek had a tent up near the dome, so there were a bunch of food options. It was 44 out, overcast and the rained off and on. Never hard. Kind of a refreshing mist or, if a pessimist, a depressing drizzle.
There were a ton of former players milling about. And even more recruits, accompanied by their families. Coach Fran was in the middle of everything, going through the autograph line, trying to shake the hand and have a short talk with everyone who bothered to show up.
The gates to the dome were supposed to open at 2 pm so a bunch of people started to head over around 1:50 pm. The powers that be unfortunately decided not to open Gate N or the gate one level down from ground level in the middle of the north side of the building. Or the next exit over by the old law school building. Looked like they wanted people to enter through the new Micron Victory gates. Though I am sure they waned to save some money by not staffing many of the gates.
I headed to the middle rows of section 116, the traditional place my crew hangs out for the spring game. It was good to see many old friends. ESM forever!
The special teams players were the only ones practicing early. Stonehouse appeared to be amusing himself attempting to hit the scoreboard with high mega-bomb punts. He appeared to just miss several times. In any event, he consistently got great hang time on his punts and really pounding the ball. It was the best I have seen him look so far.
There were a bunch of place kickers out there kicking FGs. Jackson Kennedy and Jadyn Oh were out there and I had my first chance to see Tripp Woody kick. And there were two other walk-ons kicking. One (#46) wasn’t even listed on the Cuse.com SU football roster. Woody mostly practiced shorter kicks and was not impressive. He might have been goofing off. 46 really looked raw. He has to get more flexible. 48 was okay. His leg was strong and he got good height on his kicks. Oh was a level up on 48 though. Stronger leg. More consistent. But the guy who was the best in the pregame stuff was Jackson. He took longer kicks. Consistently had the distance, even on kicks from 55. Sprayed them a bit but I think he made over 80%.
Stonehouse retains his 1975 porn star mustache. He is well positioned to at least be all conference and could contend for All American honors at punter. I also have him as the SU football player most likely to show up as a villain on a soap opera.
We found out shortly before the scrimmage started that Collins, who was warming up with the other players, was going to sit the practice out. He just had a piece of that black tape on his thumb. A jaded person might think the staff held him out to keep what he can do on the down low.
The staff divided the teams into a blue and an orange team. The QBs wore white and were not supposed to get hit. The orange team appeared to have the first team offense (lssollins).) The starting OL was as reported in the PS: LT Mack LG Miller C Petry RG J Cruz RT Spoon started for the orange team. It should be noted that for some series (most series?), Hornsby played center, Petry played OG and Miller sat down. For a few series late in the scrimmage, true frosh Bryon Washington worked with the first unit at RG. I have been following SU football since 1973 or so. Over this time period, I have seen many big OL at Syracuse. But no one has ever been remotely close to the size of Byron Washington. As Media Mark remarked to me, he made Enrique Cruz, who is about 6’6 and 320, look like a junior high school player. His chest size must be something like 75 inches. Good lord.
Besides having the starting OL and starting WRs and TE, the orange team had the only 2 scholarship available RBs. Willis and Hart.. The blue team had to make due with two walk-on RBs. Montanez was impressive and did some damage.
The blue offense was pretty much the second team offense. The OL was mostly LT Bertrand LG Brown-Miller C Hornsby RG Big Byron Washington RT E Cruz. As mentioned, Hornsby played center for both teams. Olson worked a couple of series at center as well.
Johnson Jr had a nice run and a couple good throws but he doesn’t have the arm tength or touch to be a QB at this level. iMHO.
Williams looked comfortable and threw it better but he missed some easy throws. Also showed he is a fine athlete on a scramble for 10-15 yards. He has a strong arm and likes to throw long balls high in the air. The team move the ball pretty consistently when he was QB in the first half. I would say he is the second team QB by a large margin right now.
The third QB to play was Rich Belin. Kind of a surprise. He’s not the biggest guy you’ve seen play quarterback. He’s listed a 6 foot tall and I’m not sure he’s even that height. But he’s a very good athlete, and is very dangerous when he starts to freelance and make things happen with his legs. Very good throwing on the run. Throwing from the pocket is going to be more of a issue for him.
Joe Filardi and Luke Carney both played quite a bit in the second half.
Filardi was said to be one of the biggest surprises of spring ball. He looked pretty skinny but moved around well and made some good throws. Showed some poise in the pocket and accuracy throwing. Another dual threat guy.
Carney was mostly asked to hand the ball off but showed a strong air and good mechanics when he did throw it. He is already pretty filled out (205 pound so) and my guess would be the third QB on a real depth chart.
Clement and Tremble both played a lot. Not sure either made a catch or were even targeted. Villari did not play, presumably because of his upper body injury.
Peña didn’t play a lot but made one nice catch. E Ross had a big game and won an award as the most improved player on offense this spring. He has size and toughness and won some 50-50 balls. Gill was off running in a track meet (with James and Coleman). Justus Ross-Simmons was running without a limp and looked very good. Size, toughness and speed are a good combination for a WR. Jaylen Hornsby got a lot of targets and delivered. Made two or three tough catches in traffic. And the little,guys (Thomas and Johnson) both has nice catches late. Hatcher was fully dressed and was walking around without a limp but I don’t believe he played a snap. I believe he is another player recovering from a surgery from last season. Samuel got quite a bit of PT on offense and was targeted long a couple of times. I believe he drew one of the PI calls. My guess is he’s our fastest wide receiver (he had a sub 10.6 100 m in high school).
Stangle did all the long snapping I saw. Stonehouse was good punting in the scrimmage as well. I think Oh made 2 of 3 FG attempts, all from over 40 yards. I believe Woody made 1 of 2. Thought it was weird Kennedy did not get a chance to show what he could do. From the warmups, it looked like he us our best option.
Woody and Oh both kicked off and neither was really impressive. Woody in particular lacked leg strength and struggled to get the ball inside the 5. It appears we have a problem kicking off. This is a place Denaberg will be missed. Place kicking may also remain an issue.
I think Peña was the first team returner on punts. Pretty sure Thomas was for the other team. Peña had the white no contact jersey on like the QBs. But he moved well when he was out there.
Samuel worked with the first team defense at CB, along with Davien Kerr. Both played very physical and came close to committing pass interference almost every time the ball went their way. Personally, I think the ACC allows this and we have to play that way until/unless that changes. The kids were called for a couple PI penalties and I think we can expect to see them happen some during the regular season.
I thought Chestnut looked improved and was one of the most impressive players we had on defense. Had some big hits and provided help in coverage a number of times. It appears he understands his role as a safety a lot better this season than last year. Long did some good things. Broke up at least one long pass. Martin made a bunch of good plays including an interception that iced the game.
I believe Long was the starting FS. Martin was the star safety. Chestnut was the strong safety. It was weird seeing Chestnut wearing number 2. That is gonna confuse the fan base but Duces gotta deuce. I believe the backup free safety was mostly Cornell Perrr. Perry won an award for stellar play this spring. I think he was the most improved player on defense. I think Emmanuel Ross was the most improved player on offense. Anyway, Perry looked good today. Seemed to be in the right place at the right time consistently. Made a couple nice hits.
One of the backup safeties was number 11. I think he was playing strong safety. Haile is still listed as a WR on the roster but I assume it was him. Whoever it was, he can run and cover a lot of ground.
The backup at star was Ibn McDaniels. He has nice size and can run but he seems a bit uncomfortable there right now. Looks to have a very high ceiling.
The top backups at CB were Kaylib Singleton (another true frosh who enrolled in the spring) and Davion Kerr (Kerr the Later). Both looked like really nice athletes who need to get stronger.. As an aside, Rayshon Andrews also got some snaps at CB and looked really good. Long, fast and smooth.
Delaine didn’t play much. Almost got a sack on a blind side blitz that helped lead to an interception. I think the staff knows what they have here and wanted to focus on what the kids could do.
Washington, Grant and Buxton did not play. I assume all are still hurt. Believe Grant and Buxton had surgery during the off season.
The starting linebackers were Sparrow and McDonald. They looked good but not great. Was surprised to see Diggs the Younger get a lot of PT as a linebacker today. He was okay but did not wow me. Heard played a lot on the second team and looked reasonably good. ZMG also played a lot of snaps and did quite well. Brown played some snaps late and looked okay as well. Antoine Deslauriers was dressed but I don’t think he played a snap. Maybe on special teams. Bummer. Looked like he was played a lot in all the clips I saw from spring practice. David Omopariola also did not play, which was a disappointment. A jaded man might think SU not playing its two best young LB prospects in the spring game might be related to keeping them under wraps from poachers. Things that make you go hmmmm.
At DL, first I will say this unit appears to have a lot of depth and I am not sure there is much distinction between the starters and the backups. Though Watson got penetration a lot and was impressive. Thomas and Wilson are going to play a lot inside. Jobity played a lot and was very active at DE. King Joseph-Edwards had a sack and looked very athletic. Still too skinny but he has a thicker body that last fall. Nathan Nyandoro didn’t get a ton of snaps but he got a sack and was good pressuring the QB at DE when he was in. Lesaine got a few snaps late and looked athletic but needs to add at least 25 more pounds to get real PT.
The crowd was about 10K. Maybe 12K. It was a young crowd with lots of families with young kids. Before the scrimmage started, the sidelines were literally filled with recruits and their families. There were a ton of them there. A bunch of the recruits were huge. The staff did a good job talking them up and making them feel appreciated.
SUMB was there in a watered down form but they played a bunch of songs and contributed to the excellent atmosphere at the event.
It is always dangerous to draw much from a spring game. I think it is fair, however, to say that we are bigger on the offensive and defensive lines, and we clearly have more depth across the entire roster than we have in a very long time. These are very good things.
I’m worried right now about our linebacker unit, our place kicking and kicking off in general. But I’m feeling pretty good about everything else.
They had a bunch of tents up and two rows of tables with chairs for the player autographs. There were 3 or 4 food trucks and Meiers Creek had a tent up near the dome, so there were a bunch of food options. It was 44 out, overcast and the rained off and on. Never hard. Kind of a refreshing mist or, if a pessimist, a depressing drizzle.
There were a ton of former players milling about. And even more recruits, accompanied by their families. Coach Fran was in the middle of everything, going through the autograph line, trying to shake the hand and have a short talk with everyone who bothered to show up.
The gates to the dome were supposed to open at 2 pm so a bunch of people started to head over around 1:50 pm. The powers that be unfortunately decided not to open Gate N or the gate one level down from ground level in the middle of the north side of the building. Or the next exit over by the old law school building. Looked like they wanted people to enter through the new Micron Victory gates. Though I am sure they waned to save some money by not staffing many of the gates.
I headed to the middle rows of section 116, the traditional place my crew hangs out for the spring game. It was good to see many old friends. ESM forever!
The special teams players were the only ones practicing early. Stonehouse appeared to be amusing himself attempting to hit the scoreboard with high mega-bomb punts. He appeared to just miss several times. In any event, he consistently got great hang time on his punts and really pounding the ball. It was the best I have seen him look so far.
There were a bunch of place kickers out there kicking FGs. Jackson Kennedy and Jadyn Oh were out there and I had my first chance to see Tripp Woody kick. And there were two other walk-ons kicking. One (#46) wasn’t even listed on the Cuse.com SU football roster. Woody mostly practiced shorter kicks and was not impressive. He might have been goofing off. 46 really looked raw. He has to get more flexible. 48 was okay. His leg was strong and he got good height on his kicks. Oh was a level up on 48 though. Stronger leg. More consistent. But the guy who was the best in the pregame stuff was Jackson. He took longer kicks. Consistently had the distance, even on kicks from 55. Sprayed them a bit but I think he made over 80%.
Stonehouse retains his 1975 porn star mustache. He is well positioned to at least be all conference and could contend for All American honors at punter. I also have him as the SU football player most likely to show up as a villain on a soap opera.
We found out shortly before the scrimmage started that Collins, who was warming up with the other players, was going to sit the practice out. He just had a piece of that black tape on his thumb. A jaded person might think the staff held him out to keep what he can do on the down low.
The staff divided the teams into a blue and an orange team. The QBs wore white and were not supposed to get hit. The orange team appeared to have the first team offense (lssollins).) The starting OL was as reported in the PS: LT Mack LG Miller C Petry RG J Cruz RT Spoon started for the orange team. It should be noted that for some series (most series?), Hornsby played center, Petry played OG and Miller sat down. For a few series late in the scrimmage, true frosh Bryon Washington worked with the first unit at RG. I have been following SU football since 1973 or so. Over this time period, I have seen many big OL at Syracuse. But no one has ever been remotely close to the size of Byron Washington. As Media Mark remarked to me, he made Enrique Cruz, who is about 6’6 and 320, look like a junior high school player. His chest size must be something like 75 inches. Good lord.
Besides having the starting OL and starting WRs and TE, the orange team had the only 2 scholarship available RBs. Willis and Hart.. The blue team had to make due with two walk-on RBs. Montanez was impressive and did some damage.
The blue offense was pretty much the second team offense. The OL was mostly LT Bertrand LG Brown-Miller C Hornsby RG Big Byron Washington RT E Cruz. As mentioned, Hornsby played center for both teams. Olson worked a couple of series at center as well.
Johnson Jr had a nice run and a couple good throws but he doesn’t have the arm tength or touch to be a QB at this level. iMHO.
Williams looked comfortable and threw it better but he missed some easy throws. Also showed he is a fine athlete on a scramble for 10-15 yards. He has a strong arm and likes to throw long balls high in the air. The team move the ball pretty consistently when he was QB in the first half. I would say he is the second team QB by a large margin right now.
The third QB to play was Rich Belin. Kind of a surprise. He’s not the biggest guy you’ve seen play quarterback. He’s listed a 6 foot tall and I’m not sure he’s even that height. But he’s a very good athlete, and is very dangerous when he starts to freelance and make things happen with his legs. Very good throwing on the run. Throwing from the pocket is going to be more of a issue for him.
Joe Filardi and Luke Carney both played quite a bit in the second half.
Filardi was said to be one of the biggest surprises of spring ball. He looked pretty skinny but moved around well and made some good throws. Showed some poise in the pocket and accuracy throwing. Another dual threat guy.
Carney was mostly asked to hand the ball off but showed a strong air and good mechanics when he did throw it. He is already pretty filled out (205 pound so) and my guess would be the third QB on a real depth chart.
Clement and Tremble both played a lot. Not sure either made a catch or were even targeted. Villari did not play, presumably because of his upper body injury.
Peña didn’t play a lot but made one nice catch. E Ross had a big game and won an award as the most improved player on offense this spring. He has size and toughness and won some 50-50 balls. Gill was off running in a track meet (with James and Coleman). Justus Ross-Simmons was running without a limp and looked very good. Size, toughness and speed are a good combination for a WR. Jaylen Hornsby got a lot of targets and delivered. Made two or three tough catches in traffic. And the little,guys (Thomas and Johnson) both has nice catches late. Hatcher was fully dressed and was walking around without a limp but I don’t believe he played a snap. I believe he is another player recovering from a surgery from last season. Samuel got quite a bit of PT on offense and was targeted long a couple of times. I believe he drew one of the PI calls. My guess is he’s our fastest wide receiver (he had a sub 10.6 100 m in high school).
Stangle did all the long snapping I saw. Stonehouse was good punting in the scrimmage as well. I think Oh made 2 of 3 FG attempts, all from over 40 yards. I believe Woody made 1 of 2. Thought it was weird Kennedy did not get a chance to show what he could do. From the warmups, it looked like he us our best option.
Woody and Oh both kicked off and neither was really impressive. Woody in particular lacked leg strength and struggled to get the ball inside the 5. It appears we have a problem kicking off. This is a place Denaberg will be missed. Place kicking may also remain an issue.
I think Peña was the first team returner on punts. Pretty sure Thomas was for the other team. Peña had the white no contact jersey on like the QBs. But he moved well when he was out there.
Samuel worked with the first team defense at CB, along with Davien Kerr. Both played very physical and came close to committing pass interference almost every time the ball went their way. Personally, I think the ACC allows this and we have to play that way until/unless that changes. The kids were called for a couple PI penalties and I think we can expect to see them happen some during the regular season.
I thought Chestnut looked improved and was one of the most impressive players we had on defense. Had some big hits and provided help in coverage a number of times. It appears he understands his role as a safety a lot better this season than last year. Long did some good things. Broke up at least one long pass. Martin made a bunch of good plays including an interception that iced the game.
I believe Long was the starting FS. Martin was the star safety. Chestnut was the strong safety. It was weird seeing Chestnut wearing number 2. That is gonna confuse the fan base but Duces gotta deuce. I believe the backup free safety was mostly Cornell Perrr. Perry won an award for stellar play this spring. I think he was the most improved player on defense. I think Emmanuel Ross was the most improved player on offense. Anyway, Perry looked good today. Seemed to be in the right place at the right time consistently. Made a couple nice hits.
One of the backup safeties was number 11. I think he was playing strong safety. Haile is still listed as a WR on the roster but I assume it was him. Whoever it was, he can run and cover a lot of ground.
The backup at star was Ibn McDaniels. He has nice size and can run but he seems a bit uncomfortable there right now. Looks to have a very high ceiling.
The top backups at CB were Kaylib Singleton (another true frosh who enrolled in the spring) and Davion Kerr (Kerr the Later). Both looked like really nice athletes who need to get stronger.. As an aside, Rayshon Andrews also got some snaps at CB and looked really good. Long, fast and smooth.
Delaine didn’t play much. Almost got a sack on a blind side blitz that helped lead to an interception. I think the staff knows what they have here and wanted to focus on what the kids could do.
Washington, Grant and Buxton did not play. I assume all are still hurt. Believe Grant and Buxton had surgery during the off season.
The starting linebackers were Sparrow and McDonald. They looked good but not great. Was surprised to see Diggs the Younger get a lot of PT as a linebacker today. He was okay but did not wow me. Heard played a lot on the second team and looked reasonably good. ZMG also played a lot of snaps and did quite well. Brown played some snaps late and looked okay as well. Antoine Deslauriers was dressed but I don’t think he played a snap. Maybe on special teams. Bummer. Looked like he was played a lot in all the clips I saw from spring practice. David Omopariola also did not play, which was a disappointment. A jaded man might think SU not playing its two best young LB prospects in the spring game might be related to keeping them under wraps from poachers. Things that make you go hmmmm.
At DL, first I will say this unit appears to have a lot of depth and I am not sure there is much distinction between the starters and the backups. Though Watson got penetration a lot and was impressive. Thomas and Wilson are going to play a lot inside. Jobity played a lot and was very active at DE. King Joseph-Edwards had a sack and looked very athletic. Still too skinny but he has a thicker body that last fall. Nathan Nyandoro didn’t get a ton of snaps but he got a sack and was good pressuring the QB at DE when he was in. Lesaine got a few snaps late and looked athletic but needs to add at least 25 more pounds to get real PT.
The crowd was about 10K. Maybe 12K. It was a young crowd with lots of families with young kids. Before the scrimmage started, the sidelines were literally filled with recruits and their families. There were a ton of them there. A bunch of the recruits were huge. The staff did a good job talking them up and making them feel appreciated.
SUMB was there in a watered down form but they played a bunch of songs and contributed to the excellent atmosphere at the event.
It is always dangerous to draw much from a spring game. I think it is fair, however, to say that we are bigger on the offensive and defensive lines, and we clearly have more depth across the entire roster than we have in a very long time. These are very good things.
I’m worried right now about our linebacker unit, our place kicking and kicking off in general. But I’m feeling pretty good about everything else.
