Syracuse Asst. John Anselmo Candidly Discusses Why MetLife Works
D.A. | Sep 11, 2012 | Comments 33
Debbie Wong - US Presswire
In a candid interview with The Fizz’s Andrew Kanell that aired on Fizz Radio Saturday, assistant coach John Anselmo gave some very important insight into how the MetLife game is absolutely vital for SU to continue to grow. Unfortunately Syracuse couldn’t pull off the monumental upset of USC, and the debate of whether the Orange should continue to shortchange its CNY fans by playing these huge games at the Meadowlands is shelved for another year. But if you listen to Anselmo, the ends justify the means.
“It’s a heck of a lot easier to recruit players out of New York City and Long Island, when I can tell them we’re going to play in MetLife Stadium against the teams that we’re going to play… and use that to help us in a recruiting situation, where the other teams down there might not be in that same situation.”
This will continue to be enormous for the Orange as it heads to the ACC.
The step up in conference should pay big dividends against Rutgers and UConn. But how about BC, Pitt and Maryland as SU recruits the northeast and mid-atlantic?
“I think it’s very important. Because when we recruited them, we recruited them telling them, ‘Hey, we’re going to be playing at MetLife Stadium, we’re going to play Southern Cal, we got Penn State, we have Notre Dame.’ Young players in the city, on Long Island, they want to play great competition. You tell them you’re playing in a pro venue, the type of teams you’re going to be playing against, it only helps you in the recruiting process.”
“Those kids when they walk into (MetLife) Stadium, they got their parents there, they got their family and friends there, they got their high school coaches there. Most of the (high school) games in the city are played on Saturdays, so it’s hard for those people to get up to see games in the afternoon in Syracuse.”
He understands the concern from upstaters about playing the best games away from the Dome. But he sees it as a huge advantage as they build the brand around NYC.
“Everybody has their own opinion of the game, but from a big picture standpoint, I would understand that the fans would want to see that game in the Carrier Dome. But on the other hand you’re trying to get into the national spotlight, and you’re trying to secure your recruiting base, you have to go against some other schools downstate that are closer to the city. So this is a good footprint for us to solidify that fact that we are New York’s college team.”
Anselmo also gave a surprisingly honest peek into the message SU is selling the in-state players.
“I tell the kids all the time, ‘You want to go to a place out of state, well there’s going to be 20 kids from that state on that roster, in your recruiting class. So what benefit do you have?’”
The experience of this coaching staff in the five boroughs and New York metropolitan area is obviously paying big dividends? Why? Because of trust.
“The one thing that we always say to the players down there and to the coaches: ‘First of all, Doug’s from the Bronx. So he has a city connection. I recruited the city for 30 years at Nassau. Most of those coaches to me have sent players to me when I was at Nassau. Or coaches on their staff have played for me. So you’re not going to have to go introduce yourself when you get into the coach’s office.
“If a high school coach knows that you have people you can trust on a staff and he can call you up and say, ‘Hey listen I sent you a guy and he’s got a problem, can you look into it?’ And if it takes you 2 weeks to call him back, you’ve got a problem. But that’s never going to happen up here. I’ve had the relationships for 30 years with those people, and we like to think that that pays dividends.”
Syracuse may have lost the battle, but it’s winning the war. The Orange is light years ahead of where it was in recruiting when Marrone took over. And these are the reasons why.
Posted: D.A.
Filed Under: FB Recruiting • Featured
I’m all for playing games down state but at the same time you cant forget about the boosters that are donating to the school and the students that pay to go to school at SU as well. `Cuse needs to nut up and put 2 big time games on the shedule have 1 of them in the dome and all the crying would go away.
SU offered free tickets to student ticket holders and 5 free buses down there. That is plenty. Students don’t show up to football games most of the time anyway. And I would like to know the percentage of boosters that are downstate as opposed to in CNY that actually go to the games to see if that point has any merit too. Good idea with two big time games though, that might work or the fans might still complain about that one other game.
There will be plenty of big name opponents in the Dome once the ACC schedule starts next year. I think the NYC strategy is pretty clever. If Syracuse can sign the best prospects in the state the team will be competitive on the field.
I understand the frustration with having these games at Met Life, but if it helps recruiting, then people should be happy. And as Aaron mentioned, starting in 2013 the home conference schedule will be significantly upgraded. I may be wrong, but I didn’t hear Clemson or Auburn fans complaining about playing in the Georgia Dome
i couldn’t agree more with reading this article. i understand the big picture and feel its a great idea that will enhance this program. i beleive in this idea, i beleive in our coaches and i beleive in the players. i to am a season ticket holder, and i also understand what the syracuse fans are saying as well. heres how you correct the problem on the billing for a season ticket holder you give the fan the option for the nyc game if they don’t go you lower the price for that fan. if he wants to go then unfortunately the price will increase. i took a bus tour down to the nyc game with j & j tours and had an absolute blast. we tailgated had some beers and soda. more food and beverages than you could possibly dream of having. they did all the cooking etc. let me tell you for the price of that was very resonable. didn’t have to worry about driving, parking, food, etc it was all included with the package deal. su should hire these kind of people to get the season ticket fans down to these games. i’m more than pleased that this opportunity came my way. oh and thanks again to j&j tours.
@Sackster- So the athletic department didnt offer u a free tickets to the game?
@stringer- I wanna start by saying I dont know the size of the SU student section but a bus holds what 100ppl? Thats 500 students. I know FSU gives out 16,000 student tickets so if the SU section is near that then I would say SU did the bare minimum.
The route of the problem is the BE as a conf. Lets face it as a whole it sucks, an maybe offers u on a lucky yr to play a mid 20′s ranked team at home. The bball team has gotten away /w scheduling lesser competition b/c the BE conf. in bball is equivalent to what the SEC is in football where every week seems to have a big game or two. Although like it was mentioned above once `Cuse moves to the ACC the big games will come /w va-tech, g-tech, the u, clemson and fsu.
An to ur question about the percentage of boosters that are downstate as opposed to in CNY that actually go to the games is kinda irrelevant b/c at the end of the day the school should want them to be happy by offering A. games they wanna go to or B. games that they can sell to make back some of the $$ they are shelling out to support ur athletic department.
@ carlton, you’re comparing a private institution in Syracuse to a public institution in Florida State. You’re comparing a perennial Top 25 program in Florida State to a D1 cellar dweller in Syracuse. Florida State has a least double if not triple the amount of undergrads at Syracuse, that’s why they allot 16,000 (although I challenge that number) tickets to students. Where as Syracuse offers somewhere in the vicinity of 3-4,000 tickets, albeit not free. Foolish to compare the two. I think Syracuse and BC or GT would be a better comparison in relation to pedigree and student body size.
I think thats a good point. With the ACC schedule, the home games will be way better. FSU, Clemson, Miami, VT… way better than the dregs of the Big East. I think if this (MetLife games) is the way to build recruiting a better program, you have to do it.
Listen gentlemen..does student travels matter? Or total fan support? There will always be orange in the stands, the magic of the fanbase. Traveling to Florida twice, plus S. Carolina, or Virginia twice, or
N. Carolina three times….pisses me off, rather than going to Connecticut or NJ? But “bigboy” ball is played in the south, and ALL the future Dome games will matter vs. quality opponents! Then add a ranked ND or PSU, we’ll be a perrenial top25 toughest schedule. Two more QUALITY opponents could mean NO BOWL…who cares about losing at home or Metlife, we’re ultimately sacrificing the bowl season, for a game to please boosters, and for recruits’ attention, I dont CARE about one less game in the Dome? I care about turning a home advantage into an embarrassing away loss….HBBC JB would never sacrifice a packed Dome to risk a bad neutral site loss?
And since fball games are a larger % of the schedule, compared to bball games(12 to 30+), its a risky disadvantage moving games away
from home….i dont care about taking two games out of the Dome, but the opponent should MATTER! SU had more fans for the bowl game vs KSU….and we won? Games vs powerhouses is just too dumb. The USC game was a game for THEIR ALUMNI! Thats messed up!
Bigdip I would agree with you if the SU fans got loud and actually cheered but honestly it was embarrassing the lack of cheering and noise coming from the section I was in. And I was in a section with mostly fans from another fan board. So yeah it would be great t get that home crowd advantage but the home fans have to cheer and SU’s don’t. You can’t argue that.
PSU game’s will not help anyone’s SOS for at least 7/8 yrs due to their misfortune w/Sandusky,but they’ll have 4 fan’s to 1 in NJ against us!Are any of these game’s gonna count against their home schedule?..or just us?Same situation w/ND,except they will help SOS!Thought we were outnumbered by USC? Wait for ND and PSU!
And Carlton are you kindling me have you ever seen how many SU students actually go to home games? The school did plenty with 5 buses. And actually anyone that pays attention was proud of the students for even filling 5 buses. They actually showed up and were cheering loud, they were not the issue.
Carlton,I believe a PACKED Greyhound bus carries 65/68 ppl!!ps and 1 tiny cubicle lol!!
I should know,I commuted from Albany to NYC for 12yrs 8 times a month!!
@44, I think I stated that I didn’t know the number of tickets SU allots for students. Wasn’t trying to compare the 2 schools. FSU does a lottery and SU does a sale of student season tickets. FSU tickets aren’t really “free” they have a built in “athletic fee” when you pay your tuition. Anyways I was just using a # of allotted tickets for students that I knew off the top of my head.
Also you seem to have missed the point that I was trying to make in that SU was alienating its boosters and student body by having the perceived “big games” away from the dome. You are right though there are 3,000 student season ticket holders this season. They still only offered five buses that could maybe hold 50-100 students on each. A lot less than the # of students that are season ticket holders.
I don’t see how FSU being ranked in the top 25 has anything to do /w the issues of SU playing games in NJ.
So you think my # is off regarding FSU student tickets? ok. I’ve provided you a link at the bottom to check out. Don’t worry you don’t have to search. It’s at the top of the page. Convenient huh?
http://www.seminoles.com/tickets/fsu-football-student-info-faq.html
@Carlton,I knew u’d be ready for that one lol!!!
@Dip – HBBC JB has said on record that his biggest regret aboutthe ACC move is losing his time in the Garden. Between pre-season touneys, and the BE tourney, I think he would sacrifice a packed Dome for a packed Garden loss, although I’m sure he’d rather a win.
@Carlton – The alumni, the boosters, and in some cases even the current students are in NYC. a majority of them are from LI or NJ or NYC too. As for boosters, S.I. Newhouse is a NYC family. John Archibold was a NYC man. Melo plays in NYC. So many current and former players are in or from the area, including Jim Brown, Floyd Little, Rob Moore, Joe Morris, David Tyree, Tom Coughlin…
As for FSU, most of it’s been said correctly by 4orty4our, but 16,000 is SU’s total enrollment. Combo that with the bad turnout from students I keep hearing about anyway and who cares if there were enough buses for all of them, they didn’t go. If they don’t go for free, they aren’t paying to go either… until they get jobs, move to NYC and go to this game in a few years, when they’re boosters.
Even the Carrier Corp, the name on the building, was founded in NJ. and they are slowly moving back to the area relocating a large portion of management to Connecticut. There is a plan to improve the team in action, don’t be sour about it. Embrace the effort.
I guess it’s not acceptable to have a differing view point on a subject without getting chastised for it on the fizz these days haha.
@malone, Like I already stated I threw FSU out there because I knew the # of allotted student tickets. I knew if I threw out a wrong # or a guess I would probably get ripped apart for it. An hell mr.44 showed that assumption to be true by going after my correct #. I’m not comparing FSU and SU and # of kids that go to said schools or the # of allotted tickets for students at said schools, my point was they didn’t do a lot to accommodate the students at SU. Five buses at 65 students per bus is not close to the # of student season ticket holders for this season.
So you condemn students for not turning out for games but ignore the three major problems.
1. student season tickets are about $100.
2. They haven’t had a winning product on the field.
3. They ripped away the one nationally televised game away vs a big time opponent an put it in NJ.
Sure sign me up for season tickets! Seems like a great investment! I said before that if you schedule two big name teams have one in the dome and one in NYC/NJ then you appease both factions of your fan base and also accomplish your goal of growing your brand state wide.
The bottom line is SU is always going to play 99% of their home games in the dome and it seems unwise financially to put the screws to the what is the life blood of your university.
I’m not gonna get into the booster stuff b/c in 1 yr none of these will even matter when the `Cuse is in the acc and can make up for scheduling 1 big name in NJ and a bunch of nobody’s at the dome in non-conf by offering a good conf. slate of games that the BE currently just cant offer in football.
Oh last thing, I’m not “sour”(you must have overlooked my 1st post) . I said before I loved the idea. Building the brand downstate is huge for both SU’s big $$ making sports. It helps both in recruiting and keeps the vultures away! It also helps SU build relationships /w alumni which in turn helps generate money when you go and ask for donations. I simply was offering the other side of this issue.
At first ,I didn’t like the thought of playing USC at the MetLife Staduium. I didn’t want to travel knowing it was going to be an awful long day. However I will say that I totally enjoyed the game,the fans,and I thought the stadium was beautiful.
I think that Syracuse needs to restructure the ND contract. We play them in NJ twice and at their place twice. I feel that two of those games should be a home and away game. I’m guessing that the reason ND doesn’t want to play at the dome is because the last time they were here we kicked their a$$es.
Already starting to make plans for next years game.
Hey Russell, it looks to me that I’m not the only one who’s writing a book here.
What say you bud?
Carlton! Season tickets are $100 dollars and you are arguing that as a point?! You know how much a single book for any class costs or how much an average student will spend in a week or two at Chucks?! That is a terrible point to argue. Yeah $400 for the typical 4 year students entire stay at SU for football season tickets is really gonna throw their HUGE student loan balance all sorts of out of whack. And SU has plenty of games on ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, bad arguments all around Carlton. Keep grasping for reasons to argue this point though.
@Ron the entire experience at MetLife was great wasn’t it?! I know I had a blast. Wish more folks would have gone instead of just whining about it. But then again that is your typical SU fan. Thankfully there are still some good ones who will support the team.
@Ron,it seem’s Carlton who make’s plenty of sense to me alway’s attract’s commenter’s who don’t get the points he’s trying to make!His suggestion’s seem to come across as some kinda affront to a few!!And he even goes futher to clarify himself which is more than most would do,hell ur not ever gonna appease some people.Look’s like ur happy with ur Metlife experience outside of the 3rd tier lol..
I don’t mean Malone who’s alway’s reasonable!!
Hey guy’s I’ve read Carltons comments and find nothing wrong with any of them. He made his point and wasn’t nasty in doing so. It’s awful hard to please everyone. Like I said before Russell,I welcome a good debate.
@Stringer/Russell Mac Eachern;growing up I had a friend whose father always took him to Yankee Stadium for the games. I told myself if I had a son that would take him to places that I never had a chance to go.
My son’s and I have gone to a few of the NFL stadiums and enjoyed them all. last Saturday we had a blast,we were in good company which made it all the better. Looking forward to doing it all over again.
In an earlier post I made a statement that you have to crawl before you start to walk. Well guys I watched and saw Syracuse go from taking baby steps to immediately started in running and realized that we were watching the beginning of a new era for the university.
To all of the people who complain about moving important games to MetLife Stadium. I know that you’ll end up changing you mind once you’ve experience it live.
As far as I’m concerned it was time well spent.
Future games at MetLife include ND and Penn State. As I’m writing this I can visualize a full stadium for all three of the games against Penn State. Home,at MetLife and at Happy Valley.
I would like to see Syracuse schedule games against Penn State again forever. It would be good for both institutions and it wood be good for college football. RENEW THE RIVALRY Dr. Gross.
The reason I bring up the other side of this is b/c I work in athletics and had to deal /w angry boosters/students over the fact that the good games where all away games for that particular yr. An just this yr had the issue come up again b/c of the fact the non-conf. home games ended up being Murray State an Savannah State. Even though it wasn’t our fault b/c WVU kneecapped us and backed out of the deal at the last sec. Trust me even a valid reason isn’t enough to pliz haha.
I’m not saying one side or the other is right. The right answer is probably somewhere in the middle and even if you get there I’m sure someone would still be upset haha.
@ Carlton-Your pointis taken, butI think its a little off point in that season ticket sales, especially student ticket sales are not the life blood of the SU sports machine. The fact that SU doesn’t give free tickets to the students is evidence to the fact that SU is less concerned about student fans than local fans. I can’t imagine the uproar if students got better seats and free tickets to the games. There was a point in the 90′s and early 2000′s where the local fans were lobbying to get the students thrown out because they were too loud and crass. It got so bad that the Dome management threw a bunch of students out of a BB game including band members(there wasn’t a defined student section due to the ticket lottery) and JB refused to put the team out for the second half until they were all allowed back in. I beleive the “hooperville” section was created only two seasons later. If you look at the ND news, and really read into it, one of the reasons ND wants in, and the ACC wants SU is the NY presence. That is not Syracuse NY they are talking about, it’s the major media market and alumni base that is NYC. We would be fools not to strengthen that if the opportunity is there, even if we breakeven or lose some money. That is what is bringing in the quality opponents and in turn the better recruits.
And keep in mind that most of the MetLife games were scheduled before we joined the ACC. We needed a way to get better quality opponents and recruits. We were never consistently better in recruiting than when we played Va Tech and Miami.
History note, one of the reasons we stopped playing Penn St., a 100 year rival, was because when we became an OOC scheduled game, they saw no value in coming to the Dome, and only offered a 2:1 home and home ratio. SU couldn’t stomach that imbalance, and PSU wouldn’t budge. Big time opponents don’t see any value to themselves playing at the Dome.
@Ron good story about taking in games with your sons. Great memories I am sure.
@Stringer;all of my son’s played high school football. My youngest son is 38 and when he gets going, just about everyone around us does the same. They know the game and see things happening that I don’t see and tells everyone around us what had just happened. We always try to get other people involved with good discussions during the game.
The MetLife experience was exceptional. Your right in saying the games build memories,I truly love the time spent with my family at the games or home watching with them on tv.
Your comments are really appreciated. Thank you. Hop to see you at a game sometime.
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