Syracuse Orange Football: Player Development Should Come First

By: Rick

Not since the days of Paul Pasqualoni has the Syracuse Orange had a coach with a winning record. From Greg Robinson (.213) to Doug Marrone (.500), to Scott Schaffer (.378), to Dino Babers (.476) no coach has proved they can turn Syracuse into a consistent competitor. The Orange have found it tough to find a coach whose tenure lasts more than ~3.5 years and this season they’ll be starting over with new head coach Fran Brown.

Undoubtedly, Coach Brown likely has a whiteboard filled with checklists, goals, and strategies for the new season. The program has been average at best and was left with some holes to fill. Luckily for the new staff, those holes aren’t as big as the ones surrounding Destiny USA so they’re probably much easier to fix.

From the start, Fran Brown and company have made an much needed effort into recruiting and pushed a sense of community to refresh interest in the program. While that is a good place to start, the new regime has one area of focus that needs to be at the forefront of the new program, development.

Syracuse made it through the entire 2024 NFL Draft without a single former player being selected. On top of that, not since they days of Justin Pugh in 2013 has the Orange had a player drafted in the first round. The year before was Chandler Jones. Then you have to go all the way back to 2002 and Dwight Freeney to find another first round pick.

A program that has turned out former NFL greats like Jim Brown, Ernie Davis, Larry Czonka, and Marvin Harrison needs to right the ship and that’s where the Syracuse Orange have struggled since the turn of the millennium. The program is no better off than when a new coach has started and the players are just as good as the day they walk through the doors. Great athletes never reach elite potential. Good players stay good. Average players stay average. Bad players stay bad. There might be a few players who break that mold but it is few and far between.

No matter how much they recruit or they can get the community behind them, unless Coach Brown can get these young men to the best version of themselves on gameday then the program will continue to struggle. Player development needs to be at the forefront of this regime in order to start churning out winning seasons.