Dino Babers has only had one full recruiting cycle as Syracuse’s head coach and he is already making a change. Babers is adding a position to his staff and hiring Dave Boller as the Director of Player Personnel. In this position, Boller will work during the recruitment process. He will essentially serve as a scout, evaluating potential recruiting targets. A press release from Syracuse Athletics said that he will work closely with Asil Mulbah, the director of recruiting operations.
Boller has plenty of experience evaluating talent. He comes to Syracuse from Louisville, a big time program that has had no trouble bringing in some talented players in recent years. At UL, he was the “director of high school relations”. Fortunately, he worked for their football program and not their basketball program.
This hire makes sense. For several reasons. It makes sense that Syracuse would want to add a person to help evaluate talent, to find a “hidden gem” or two. It also makes sense that Boller was seen as the right man for the job. He and Babers worked together way back in 1985 at Arizona State University. Boller was the Director of Football Operations and Dino was a young graduate assistant. 32 years later, the two are reunited on the Hill.
Boller’s resume is also quite extensive. After leaving ASU, he served as a scout for five different NFL teams, including the New York Jets and Philadelphia Eagles. Syracuse’s 2016 class ranked 64th nationally and 14th in the ACC. The Orange are desperately trying to get back to relevance and that all starts with bringing in the the necessary talent. Whether the problem has been misjudging talent, or just not being able to convince the necessary players to come to Syracuse, hiring someone with so much experience in scouting talent cannot hurt in the slightest.
