DCOrange

My guess would be Syracuse will never return to the days of being a perennial top 25 team like they once were. From 1972-2018, Syracuse was in the top 25 at some point during the season in all but 2 years. But in reality, they probably haven't been deserving of those rankings beyond the 2013-14 season or maybe the 2015-16 season with Gbinije, Malachi, and Lydon. The other years in recent memory where Syracuse found themselves ranked were just starting the season ranked in the pre-season poll and falling out once the schedule turned. We'll see how it goes with Autry; I suspect that things will improve at least to some degree. How much it'll improve is to be determined. My guess would be that we settle in as one of those teams that pops up in the top 25 here and there and makes the tournament more often than not, but is no longer a lock to be in the NCAA Tournament every year/in the top 25 every year. I certainly hope we can get back to being a powerhouse again, but especially in the NIL era we now find ourselves in, it feels unlikely.

Syracuse has no chance at making the NIT anyways. They won't make the CBI either. The season is over; Syracuse is just focusing on trying to get their players to return/reaching out to people in the transfer portal.

I’ll believe it when I see it because we’ve heard Boeheim would play man this year, Hopkins would play man at Washington, etc., but I’ve been told Autry will primarily play man.

I think he’s said in the past that he’d prefer to do it the way Roy Williams did (no farewell tour) but we’ll see.

Now been some pushback that he’ll announce one more year instead but we’ll see. Everyone I’ve spoken to agrees he’s going to announce the plan in the next couple weeks.

Hearing some buzz that Jim will announce his retirement in the next couple weeks.

I think it’s possible, but it’s definitely not possible with this group of players and I think man to man is simply a better option at this point for almost any team makeup. I get why you’d think this, but going back and watching teams like the MCW team or the title team, there’s a night and day difference between the intensity they brought compared to the teams we’ve had the past 5+ years. With the more recent teams, there’s 10+ times a game that a hard working defense would trap and force an easy turnover. Our teams don’t even try anymore and frankly aren’t built for it even if they did try.

He’s better than Watson and also doesn’t embarrass fans with his presence. It makes sense that he’d be asking for more. Whether or not Baltimore is willing to pay a QB as much as Cleveland was remains to be seen.

I admittedly haven't watched much film on the draft guys this year outside of some highlights and whatever games I watched live. My understanding of Quentin Johnson from reading a decent amount and seeing some is that he's a lot like Chase Claypool from the sense that he's a mammoth human being that plays like he's 5'9". A lot of catches with his body/really struggles to high-point the ball but once you get the ball in his hands, he's really difficult to bring down. I put together a small table of some basic stats and metrics on the WR class and Quentin is near the top in both ADoT and YAC which is a pretty impressive combo.

I went with Addison; just think he's the best of all those WRs. Was tempted by the OLine guys as well.

Evans is great and I'd gladly take him here if Tampa looks to shop him. Everything I've heard out of Tampa is that he's a Buc for life though. Feels like Chris Godwin might be more attainable if Tampa decides to sell off their roster.

The NFL literally made the extra point more difficult because of this.

It really wasn’t ticky tack though. Juju would have been wide open if Bradberry didn’t grab him. He had completely faked Bradberry out. And everyone keeps saying they were letting all the defensive holding go but I have yet to see an instance of it. They definitely missed an even more blatant pass interference earlier in the game but nobody was really pointing out missed holding calls the rest of the way. Bradberry just got fooled again at the worst time and did what he had to to prevent a touchdown and the refs rightly called him for it.

I don’t think anyone is perfectly fine with having missed calls, but I think it’s pretty fair and logical to say that the goal should be to limit missed calls as much as possible. Not calling holding against Philly at the end because you missed another holding against Philly earlier would be pretty stupid IMO.

There isn't much point in having a short yardage back anymore. Handing the ball off is far less effective than just pushing the QB forwards.

Literally everyone is good at it lol. Any time the play is stopped it’s a fluke or defying the laws of physics.

The problem is that it’s almost literally impossible to stop unless the QB fumbles the snap or slips and falls. 4th and 1s or 3rd and shorts used to be stressful situations where either team could come out on top. Now success is essentially just determined by which coach is smart enough to run a QB sneak instead of trying to get cute.

They were converted nearly 85% of the time this year and that’s including traditional QB sneaks like where the QB wasn’t being pushed from behind. I’d be shocked if it were less than 90% on the push plays.

I guess maybe I’m just naively optimistic that they’re seeing how many former players, coaches, media people, etc. think it needs to be changed.

This is obviously a massive exaggeration but I’m sure you realize that too. It was objectively a penalty that some are arguing the refs just shouldn’t call in that situation vs plays like the Saints-Rams pass interference where literally everyone can agree it was a blatant penalty. I would argue every game in every sport likely has multiple calls worse than the one from last night.

I think the league has realized it was a mistake to change it but we’ll see. There’s already so many people calling for it in the media and among former players. The push plays ruined what used to be a tense situation. 4th and 1 and even 2 are now just gimme plays because it’s physically impossible for 1 or 2 defensive linemen to stand up against 7+ players pushing directly on them. It’s just stupid.

I suspect it will be outlawed this off-season anyways (not qb sneaks in general but specifically the ones where everyone just pushes him from behind).

I’m honestly asking here…I’m guessing the answer is yes but I didn’t see it myself. Were there a lot of defensive holding penalties going uncalled in this game? I think the one that was called at the end was pretty blatant personally and likely saved a TD so I personally think it had to be called, but I’m open to the idea that there were other blatant ones that were not. Ultimately I thought this was maybe the best officiated game of the playoffs which isn’t saying a lot but kinda is. The playing surface and QB sneak abuse were the two most annoying parts of the game to me.

This is how the Eagles defense looked pretty much every time they faced a good QB this year.

Feels like he’s more likely to return to Europe than the NBA but you never really know. Either way it doesn’t sound like he’ll be back. I think expectations for next season should be pretty low but it seems like we’re finally starting to recruit again thanks to Weitsman.