Syracuse Pro Day: Eyebrows, Roofs Have Been Raised

Syracuse Pro Day in Manley Field House was all about raising things. Expectations. Heights. Levels of Games.

But there's two thing in particular that got raised Wednesday that made NFL scouts take notice.

1. Roofs.

Literally, Rob Long needed to raise the roof. His punts were hitting the ceiling so much at Manley that his workout needed to be moved to the Carrier Dome, a place Rob's a little more comfortable.

"It felt great to be back in the Dome again," said the 22-year-old whose senior season ended early last December after doctors discovered that a brain tumor had been causing him months of severe headaches and nausea.

"There’s always room for improvement, but I think it was good enough to hopefully warrant a second look by some teams," said Long, who kept working out through six weeks of radiation treatments and chemotherapy in the hope of getting a shot with an NFL team.

Impressive isn't the word to sum up Rob and his journey. Delone Carter says it better...

"It's like you can't tell nothing was wrong with him," Carter said. "He's like Superman."

Commence your photoshops...

2. Eyebrows.

Da’Mon Merkerson made sure that many of the NFL scout's eyebrows left Syracuse Pro Day slightly higher than when they arrived.

"Da’Mon Merkerson kind of raised a lot of eyebrows today," Hicks said.

"I hope I raised some eyebrows, because I’d like to keep playing football," Merkerson said.

As for the rest of the players on hand, everyone did what they could to stay top-of-mind for the NFL Draft April 28th.

Ryan Bartholomew continued his ascent up draft boards everywhere, improving his broad jump and vertical jump numbers from the combine.

Doug Hogue shaved a tenth of a second off of his 40 time (4.5 seconds), which is nice.

Derrell Smith felt good about his abilities as he had to make up for not being able to showcase his talents at the combine thanks to a knee injury.

Delone Carter ran the 40-yard dash in 4.43 and 4.46 seconds, according to sources.

Of course, with the lockout going on, there's uncertainty in the air for many of the Orange players. Only a couple are expected to be drafted. The rest will have to wait a while as no teams can sign free agents They'll have to wait until a new agreement is in place before any team can even begin the process of signing them.

SB Nation New York has more on Pro Day and check out the Syracuse Orange All-Access video here at SUAthletics.com