What is Marrone's ceiling as a coach? | Syracusefan.com

What is Marrone's ceiling as a coach?

OrangeFoo

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I don't think that there is a real Syracuse fan out there who thinks that Marrone should be fired today, this year or even next year. However I think there is enough evidence in year three of Marrone's regime to worry about what his ceiling as a coach is. Is he a 7 win coach who every grinds out enough wins to barely qualify for a bowl game or is he a coach who 8 or 9 wins is a minimum and in a good year 11 or 12 wins and a BCS game is in play?

Positives of Marrone-ball:
- He has brought Syracuse football back to respectability
- His teams never ever give up
- His Defenses are fun to watch and play like they were shot out of a cannon (how much of this is Schafer?)
- He has shown the ability to identify good talent on defense

Negatives of Marrone-ball
- Pretty piss poor game day management at critical points of the game, Marrone doesn't seem to have great feel for it yet
- A terrible offensive line for three years running from a guy who is supposed to be a great line coach
- A very stubborn streak where we will no change what we are doing - see our starting center or the pound the ball efforts
- A terrible and pretty unimaginative offense overall. See the struggle against RI, Wake or any BE team
- A tendency to play not to lose rather than playing to win
- No discipline on either of the ball or special teams
- Terrible special teams
- Zero playmakers on offense

I don't know what the answer is and I'm sure that there are more positives and negatives but to me I smell a 7 win grind out a bowl game each year coach.
 
10 win in the Big East, probably a shade below in the ACC.

He's a guy that should have us in bowl contention every year and generally have us in any game come the 4th quarter.
 
the million dollar question. This is the mendoza line for all the bickering. Some of us are worried after what we have seen from recruiting and recent (very recent) game management, that doug isn't the guy to get us back to the teams we had in the 90's. Others say, hey, he had a mess when he came in and it's going to take a lot more then three years to fix this program. we won't know the right answer for a few years. I don't know how anyone can be sure he is the guy today. Hope he is. sure. Like enough of what you have seen to believe he can do it, sure. But be positive? I don't know how.
 
There is no such thing as a "ceiling" for a coach. There is however, a basement as GRob proved.
 
The real question is what is the university's ceiling? They need at least 4-5 million to invest in football facilities... Marrones ceiling will look a lot better at that point becasuse he won't be recruiting with one hand tied behind his back.. Marrone is as good as Syracuse can do Right now because the job isn't all that attractive currently, the acc can help but until the university steps up and improves facilities we won't be winning a lot.

That said, I like Marrone and feel he will be here a long long time
 
The real question is what is the university's ceiling? They need at least 4-5 million to invest in football facilities... Marrones ceiling will look a lot better at that point becasuse he won't be recruiting with one hand tied behind his back.. Marrone is as good as Syracuse can do Right now because the job isn't all that attractive currently, the acc can help but until the university steps up and improves facilities we won't be winning a lot.

That said, I like Marrone and feel he will be here a long long time

Tend to agree with that. We either get an alum that will work for a little less on the dollar, an up and comer who takes this gig waiting for Paterno to die, etc, or a guy like Robinson who wanted his one shot at being a HC. Finding a ten year kind of guy is tough.
 
The real question is what is the university's ceiling? They need at least 4-5 million to invest in football facilities... Marrones ceiling will look a lot better at that point becasuse he won't be recruiting with one hand tied behind his back.. Marrone is as good as Syracuse can do Right now because the job isn't all that attractive currently, the acc can help but until the university steps up and improves facilities we won't be winning a lot.

That said, I like Marrone and feel he will be here a long long time

Well said IB. One thing that some of the anti-Marrone movement haven't taken into account has been the facilities issue. How high can the upside be if he is recruiting with with inferior facilities? That certainly has to be a factor on how high the ceiling can be. And facilities are certainly an issue so I don't want to hear about how that's just an excuse. We just hired a new account manager at work and he happens to be a Grob-era Syracuse player. He confirmed what I figured regarding our facilities and their comparisons to others he was recruited by. They're AWFUL.
 
Walk through the Melo stuff then see football and the gap is shocking.
 
Well of course. But that was true for P. As it was for g-rob.
 
Well of course. But that was true for P. As it was for g-rob.

Different eras. Other schools have ramped up, we haven't done a thing but build a bare bones weight room about 6 years back. Apples to Oranges
 
What did fans think Coach Mac's ceiling was in 1986? How about by 1990?

How was Frank Beamer looking in year 3 at Virginia Tech?

Agree that the only thing we know right now is his basement is a lot higher than GRob's... And that a lot of how high Marrone's ceiling is will be dictated by how much facilities improvement he sees in the next few years. But right now it's too early to say much other than he's shown potential but has areas he'll need to personally improve on to get Syracuse to be a top 25 program annually.
 
Negatives of Marrone-ball
- Pretty piss poor game day management at critical points of the game, Marrone doesn't seem to have great feel for it yet
And this is a statement only based on the Rutgers game, because this wasn't raised in any other game this year.
- A terrible offensive line for three years running from a guy who is supposed to be a great line coach
A terrible offensive line is the 2007 version of this team. Ours is good to average, depending on the game. Not many sacks this year, Ryan has had time to throw. Run blocking looked better against Rutgers.
- A very stubborn streak where we will no change what we are doing - see our starting center or the pound the ball efforts
Bitching about Macky loses points for you here, it's been the Guard play more than the Center.
- A terrible and pretty unimaginative offense overall. See the struggle against RI, Wake or any BE team
I feel that if we don't run the spread it's an "unimaginative offense". I guess WR passes aren't imaginative for you.
- A tendency to play not to lose rather than playing to win
I guess? Is this only because they didn't go for it on 4th and 1 in OT? Because taking the points there is a pretty good idea.
- No discipline on either of the ball or special teams
6 penalties a game is not "no discipline". Sure, Phil Thomas and Sharpe have both made stupid plays but how is that Marrone's fault.
- Terrible special teams
Once again, only based on the Rutgers game.

Quit your bitching, we aren't Alabama yet. It's year 3 of Marrone, and everyone knew before the season we might take a step back this year.
 
it's hard to know what his ceiling is, until we see what his ceiling as a recruiter is. i'm not a football expert, so for me it is tough to distunguish between problems with scheme and problems with personnel, although i suppose there are both right now. i do think that the deep down he wants a dual threat qb that can make something on broken plays. i just don't see how we can't give the guy 6-8 years to realize his vision, upgrade facilities, make a run at the acc, all that and see what happens. it's not like we are hiring urban meyer tomorrow.
 
Well said IB. One thing that some of the anti-Marrone movement haven't taken into account has been the facilities issue. How high can the upside be if he is recruiting with with inferior facilities? That certainly has to be a factor on how high the ceiling can be. And facilities are certainly an issue so I don't want to hear about how that's just an excuse. We just hired a new account manager at work and he happens to be a Grob-era Syracuse player. He confirmed what I figured regarding our facilities and their comparisons to others he was recruited by. They're AWFUL.

Agreed, and the thing is the facilities are Mac quality and that makes the job less desirable, we are lucky to have Doug, and hey I get it he sucked yesterday but we should have still won, the kids left some plays out there. Yes, I am pissed off but we are 5 games in.. Ton of football to be played, we need a st coach who can recruit

Get the facilities improved and recruiting will improve and Marrone will also not have to take as many flyers on a kid like Cater which I have no issue with giving kids a chance but people need to remember that a lot of kids won't be buying what Doug is selling, they just wont. The accountability doesn't appeal to a lot of kids. You npwant better recruits donate

In addition, we miss Sales a lot
 
Whiiiiine...we played badly and lost an important game...cryyyyy...we'll never be any good ever again.

Stop it now. Marrone's ceiling is 12 regular season wins plus one bowl game.
 
it's hard to know what his ceiling is, until we see what his ceiling as a recruiter is. i'm not a football expert, so for me it is tough to distunguish between problems with scheme and problems with personnel, although i suppose there are both right now. i do think that the deep down he wants a dual threat qb that can make something on broken plays. i just don't see how we can't give the guy 6-8 years to realize his vision, upgrade facilities, make a run at the acc, all that and see what happens. it's not like we are hiring urban meyer tomorrow.

Doug isn't going anywhere anytime soon.. People need to chill
 
The real question is what is the university's ceiling? They need at least 4-5 million to invest in football facilities... Marrones ceiling will look a lot better at that point becasuse he won't be recruiting with one hand tied behind his back.. Marrone is as good as Syracuse can do Right now because the job isn't all that attractive currently, the acc can help but until the university steps up and improves facilities we won't be winning a lot.

That said, I like Marrone and feel he will be here a long long time

What's this, about year 10 for that being the reason for recruiting results?
 
What's this, about year 10 for that being the reason for recruiting results?

yes it is, people should get out more and tour facilities of other programs, tough to sell a bag of for facilities
 
My God, it's year 3, no one can possibly say what his ceiling is?

Stupid crap like this is why I avoid the hoops board.

If we lose a couple more games Scooch, this place will be Hoops Board Jr.

Agree with you. I can't even fathom that question being asked right now
 
The real question is what is the university's ceiling? They need at least 4-5 million to invest in football facilities... Marrones ceiling will look a lot better at that point becasuse he won't be recruiting with one hand tied behind his back.. Marrone is as good as Syracuse can do Right now because the job isn't all that attractive currently, the acc can help but until the university steps up and improves facilities we won't be winning a lot.

That said, I like Marrone and feel he will be here a long long time

Exactly, his ceiling is only as high as the university is willing to spend on football. There is no doubt in my mind that UCONN for example who spent a great deal of money on resources were affected in a positive way by the money they spent. Look at our basketball team, spend some dough, and look how positively your program is viewed.
 
What's this, about year 10 for that being the reason for recruiting results?

What's been done to address the gap between Syracuse's facilities and everybody else we recruit against? It's not just an excuse, it's a real issue that hasn't been adequately addressed for over a decade. We seem to be beyond the Commitment To Mediocrity approach, but still have a long way to go to overcome the ten plus years of neglect.
 
The real question is what is the university's ceiling? They need at least 4-5 million to invest in football facilities... Marrones ceiling will look a lot better at that point becasuse he won't be recruiting with one hand tied behind his back.. Marrone is as good as Syracuse can do Right now because the job isn't all that attractive currently, the acc can help but until the university steps up and improves facilities we won't be winning a lot.

That said, I like Marrone and feel he will be here a long long time

Good thing for us the ACC is BBall conference. Besides FSU, I don't see a school that can consistently be a Top 15 team. And who else is truly dedicated to FB beside FSU, Clemson, and VT? I think it is fair to expect a bad year to be 6-6, a good year to be 10-2, and the typical year to be 8-4. No reason why we cannot do what BC did from 2005-2010 in the ACC.

2005 5-3 final rank 17/18
2006 5-3 final rank 20
2007 6-2 went to ACC CG final rank 10/11
2008 5-3 went to ACC CG
2009 5-3
2010 4-4

If BC can do it, we certainly can as well. If we go to 9 conf games, I expect SU to schedule OOC: one cupcake, one 1AA, and one BCS team. So we would be playing 10 BCS games a year. Even if we go 4-6 against those teams we should get to 6-6 overall and a Bowl. No reason to have a season worse than that.

I think Marrone can certainly pull off those expectations. And I think asking more of any HC is asking too much in today's environment. Remember McNabb had ZERO Top 15 finishes. Graves had two. McPherson had two. 1987-1992 were awesome times at SU but back then SU did not have the deck stacked against us.
 
Good thing for us the ACC is BBall conference. Besides FSU, I don't see a school that can consistently be a Top 15 team. And who else is truly dedicated to FB beside FSU, Clemson, and VT? I think it is fair to expect a bad year to be 6-6, a good year to be 10-2, and the typical year to be 8-4. No reason why we cannot do what BC did from 2005-2010 in the ACC.

2005 5-3 final rank 17/18
2006 5-3 final rank 20
2007 6-2 went to ACC CG final rank 10/11
2008 5-3 went to ACC CG
2009 5-3
2010 4-4

If BC can do it, we certainly can as well. If we go to 9 conf games, I expect SU to schedule OOC: one cupcake, one 1AA, and one BCS team. So we would be playing 10 BCS games a year. Even if we go 4-6 against those teams we should get to 6-6 overall and a Bowl. No reason to have a season worse than that.

I think Marrone can certainly pull off those expectations. And I think asking more of any HC is asking too much in today's environment. Remember McNabb had ZERO Top 15 finishes. Graves had two. McPherson had two. 1987-1992 were awesome times at SU but back then SU did not have the deck stacked against us.

What does "dedicated to football" mean? UVa has really nice facilities, UNC just dumped a bunch into theirs, TOB left BC because NCSU has a far superior infrastructure...
 

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