Syracuse Football Living on the Edge: Why Defensive Depth Could Hurt the Orange

  The Syracuse defense is officially walking the tightrope without a net. As is normal with any regime change in college football, a number of players have left the Syracuse football program since the firing of Greg Robinson and the subsequent hiring of Doug Marrone. Thus far the total of scholarship players who have left the program has reached 17. On paper at least, the majority of the defections don’t jump out at you as season changing losses individually. The real problem for the Orange is how concentrated the losses have been to key positions. The areas hit the hardest have been the defensive line and the linebackers, with four players leaving from each squad. The losses at linebacker so far have been Mike Mele, Parker Cantey, Dan Sheeran (who was converted from wide receiver), and JUCO transfer Derek Hines. The loss of Hines was particularly alarming for this group because he had been penciled in as the starting weak side linebacker heading into fall practice and le...