Taking one final look at the grade book and handing out some position group accolades.
Over the course of the 2024 season for the Syracuse Orange, grades were handed out to each position group for all 12 regular season games over the course of the year.
Recently, one TNIAAM reader requested that we compile all the positional grades from the season and put them in one place to get the full picture and evaluate how the final grade book turned out by the end of the year.
Mark Konezny-Imagn Images
Before getting to the results from 2024, a few notes on how the grades done this year for some added context:
- Grade scale went as high as A+ and as low as F-.
- My personal philosophy: any position performance that felt pretty average overall for a game was in C- to C+ range. B-range meant it wasn’t perfect and likely some mistakes, but a) enough key plays were made (particularly on defense) that bumps the game grade up just a bit or b) the totality of the performance wasn’t flawless but was in solid to good range.
- A+ were rarely handed out just in general, not necessarily because some position groups didn’t deserve it but A+ is always a super high bar. For context, only 10 A+ grades were given at one point to a position group all regular season.
- Grades only include Syracuse’s regular season and therefore do not include any performances from the 2024 Holiday Bowl.
- Obvious note should still be mentioned: wins likely yielded high grades and vice versa.
- Also by request from some readers, we originally broke out the “receiver” category into “WR and “TE” rather than putting them all under the same umbrella. We also added a “coaching” category. You can see in the chart below when those changes took effect.
As an added bonus, we’ll also have some superlatives down below to further look at the grades and highlight the different position groups.
Without further ado, here is the final grade book for each position group for Syracuse’s 2024 season:
Now onto the categories:
Position MVP: QB
Probably the obvious choice both with the grades and how the 2024 season ended up playing out for the Orange. With Kyle McCord as the starter from start to finish, he concluded the year with an A- or better in two-thirds of Syracuse’s games including at least seven As and three A+ grades (most of any single position group). There was only one game (Pitt, D) were McCord had worse than a C. The spearhead of Syracuse’s successful passing attack was rightfully rewarded well in the grade book.
Offensive Position MVP (non-QB): WR
Tight call between RB and WR, but the depth of Syracuse’s receiving group this year was too much to overlook. A comeback year from Trebor Pena, valuable contribution from transfer Jackson Meeks and flashy performances from the likes of Darrell Gill Jr. and Justus Ross-Simmons sneak by LeQuint Allen, Yasin Willis and the running backs. WRs ended with eight games with at least an A- and just one game (Pitt, D+) below a C.
Defensive Position MVP: LB
A tight race between all three of LB, DL and DB, but the LBs had the most combined As and Bs between the three and really played well down the end of the year with a C+ or higher in six of the Orange’s last seven games. Considering Marlowe Wax missed the first half of the year with injury, that might partly explain the improvement in the grades down the stretch compared to the start of the year.
Mark Konezny-Imagn Images
Most Chaotic Position Group(s): O-line and Special Teams
These were the only position groups during the year who had a performance as high as A-range who also collected multiple F or worse performances.
Offensive line, always a concern in any college football year, had the most rollercoaster-like season among all the position groups. In half the games, the O-line played at a B- or better. In four of the remaining six games, either a D or F was handed out (including two F- which was the only position group to get at least two in 2024).
And then, there was the special teams which were… umm… all over the place. In the first five games of 2024, three saw the unit finish in F range thanks to a mix of blocked punts, really poor field goal kicking and a handful of costly special teams penalties. Fast forward to the middle of the year and it was a completely different unit, finishing above C- the final seven games including five straight games to end the season with B or higher. Although, part of that trend might have been handing out a B for a “thank god absolutely nothing bad happened tonight” performance.
Most “Right Down the Middle” Position Group: D-line
Part of this was due to injuries thinning out the depth just a bit, but the defensive line easily averaged closer to C which isn’t the worst. The Orange’s D-line only had three D grades and no Fs all year, but capped out with two B grades and five in C range with no As. That’s about as middle of the road as you can get. Positives included actually holding its own against some pretty elite running backs and occasionally getting to the opposing QB, but the negatives mainly centered on the pressure in the pocket being very hot or cold.
Most Polarizing Grade/Hardest Group to Grade: DBs
Rich Barnes-Imagn Images
A category to both acknowledge how difficult it is to grade defensive backs as a collective on a per game basis and how up-and-down a year it was for Syracuse’s DBs. Half the games saw the unit finish in C-range and there were some notably really bad games (namely, NC State and Boston College). The passing offense largely just outscored opponents at times as well.
On the flip side, when the unit needed to make big plays, it did which helped to bump the grades up a bit (example: Miami).
Biggest Asterisk: Coaching
Of all the categories, probably the one in which the grades truly don’t reflect what actually happened this year.
We started the coaching category at the worst possible time, when Syracuse was trounced by 28 points to Pittsburgh. The final grades do miss out on one questionable job by Fran Brown and the staff (Stanford), but it also leaves out some pretty notable wins over Georgia Tech, UNLV and NC State.
Getting a bowl win and 10 wins in year one, regardless of how you slice it, is absolutely a phenomenal result for where this program was not too long ago.
Now it’s your turn: what are your thoughts on the final position grades for the year? What stands out the most?