With the return of EA Sports’ college football video games set to return about a year from now, Rivals.com’s national recruiting director Adam Gorney has been ranking the ten most valuable players in each conference. One Syracuse player made the cut, one guess and you’ll probably get it.
So with that in mind, what was Tucker’s rating? Gorney had him as the 10th best player in the ACC with a rating of 82.
Simply put, that is disrespectful. Tucker broke the school record for rushing yards in a single season with plenty of time to spare. His total was good for 6th in the country. For reference, the 6th best running back in Madden ’23 has a 93 rating. Of course, it’s unfair to compare professional players to collegiate players, but at the same time, really? An 82?
Tucker was also 10th out of 10 on Gorney’s list of ACC players. The guys ranked in front of him include Clemson D-Linemen Myles Murphy and Bryan Bresee, Wake Forest QB Sam Hartman (now hurt) and WR A.T. Perry, Virginia QB Brennan Armstrong and WR Dontayvion Wicks, North Carolina WR Josh Downs, and QBs Malik Cunningham from Louisville and Devin Leary from NC State. At first glance, that’s pretty good company to be in. But, the ninth-highest rated player was given an 86. Four points feel like a steep drop from 9 to 10.
Finally, Tucker’s importance to Syracuse makes an 82 rating feel like a joke. Where would this team have been without their star player a season ago? There’s a case to be made the only game SU wins without Tucker is the UAlbany rout. Without Tucker, would the Orange really have been in contention against Virginia Tech, Liberty, or even Ohio and Boston College? It’s not far-fetched to say no.
Tucker has the stats to back it up, has plenty of business being among the best of the best in the ACC, and is extremely important to his team. Surely that would lead to a rating higher than an 82, right? Not according to Gorney. But, if Tucker can dominate and lead SU to a few victories against this gauntlet of a schedule, safe to say he’ll be plenty higher come next year’s ratings.
