Watching Syracuse QB Eric Dungey is so exciting and so stressful

When Syracuse quarterback Eric Dungey is on the run, he isn’t afraid to lower his shoulder to get that extra yard, and he meets defenders head on a lot. It’s unorthodox and makes routine plays unpredictable, but a lot of times it makes you cover your eyes, to be honest.

Sliding is pretty essential when you’re a QB, but Dungey doesn’t do that a whole lot.

It’s a safe, effective way to get the yardage on a play that takes the signal caller outside of the pocket. But the 202-pound Dungey just keeps running.

Some examples! Against Central Michigan in 2017:

More from that game later.

At NC State last season, he attempted a stiff arm instead of going to the ground, knocking a big guy’s helmet off:

During Syracuse’s upset of then-No. 2 Clemson last season, complete with a hard bounce off the turf:

On the road against UConn in 2016:

Even when he does slide, he still takes a hit ... from the turf:

Dungey seems to know his style often isn’t the wisest for a QB.

He’s been talking for years about trying to take fewer hits.

“Coach [Dino Babers] always makes it clear that you got to protect yourself and have the family in mind,” Dungey said in August 2017. “If I’m not doing that, I’m not being smart and protecting myself. If I’m not on the field, it’s hurting the team.”

Still, he’s even been known to try and hurdle defenders. Again, despite being a QB not named Lamar Jackson.

It’s fun and frightening to watch at the same time.

Was that touchdown worth the following?

Dungey’s score put Syracuse up on UVA by a touchdown, but Hunt worried about Dungey because he seemed “woozy.” In the Virginia visitor’s locker room at halftime, Hunt remembered Dungey approaching him and their following exchange like this.

“Hey T,” Dungey said, “what’s the score?”

“We’re up 21 to 14,” Hunt said.

“Really? Who scored?” Dungey asked.

“What do you mean,” Hunt said, taken aback. “You scored. You jumped over a guy!”

“Really?” Dungey replied. “I did that?”

Anyway, he once kicked a defender in the head.

In the same game, he did this later:

Dungey is pretty fearless off the field, too.

In this profile on him from last summer, he’s described as a backflipping adrenaline junkie:

Dungey learned how to do a backflip off a diving board in sixth grade before seeking to up the ante. Backflip off a boathouse? Check. Backflip off a 20-foot ledge? Check. Then one day he decided to backflip off the barrels.

The barrels are fat, metal cylinders that stand 30-40 feet high on the shores of the Willamette River. Nobody is supposed to jump off them, but kids being kids, they became a jumper’s paradise in the summer, when Dungey and his friends biked there and spent all day tossing their bodies over the railing.

“When you’re on the field and you’re having 6-foot-5, 310 pounds coming at you, what are you going to do?” Dungey said via the newspaper. “You’re just going to be calm back there? It’s easy to say something, but once you’re on the field in the arena, it’s a whole different world.”

Unfortunately, there have been some other scary moments.

This hit against Clemson in 2016 was particularly tough — he was hit by two Tiger defenders, and it took him out of the game.

“It was kind of a weird hit that at the point where like I felt my body was tingling,” Dungey said. “So, I was a little nervous.”

This one against Central Connecticut State from last September sent him somersaulting:

And later in that game:

He’s missed a good bit of playing time due to the hard hits he’s taken. In fact, he’s missed the final three games of each of his last three seasons.

In 2018, Dungey had to leave in the second quarter against Florida State.

Per Babers, the injury was to his eye after a defender poked him in the second quarter. But he’d taken a couple big hits, including this one, after which he was visibly favoring his right arm:

And this hit looked especially painful:

Syracuse fans love his creativity on the field, but have had about enough of seeing him get blasted.

Here’s Nunes Magician on “the love-cringe affair” that Cuse fans have watching Dungey play ball:

Their quarterback has been the starter since 2015, yet has never finished out an entire season. Dungey claps back at being called injury prone, as we found out over the summer. Still, out of 39 potential games to play in during his career, Dungey has only participated in 29, and that doesn’t take into account the times he played but left early, like this past Saturday.

This isn’t to bury Dungey or to be an indictment on his ability to stay healthy. It’s just, really, he might be one hell of an example as to why football is so cringe-worthy.

On the one hand, the senior from Oregon is as exciting as just about anyone to ever suit up for Syracuse, certainly he’s in the top five during the last decade. He’s likely to make something out of nothing the way Donovan McNabb used to do during his days in the Dome. Dungey might just knee a dude in the face during a quarterback scramble, or he could score three TDs and rack up over 330 total yards against the No. 2 team in the country.

Babers doesn’t seem to think it’s feasible to make Dungey change his personality.

“Obviously he’s very difficult to change when it comes to that stuff, but it makes his game,” Babers said in 2017. “A lot of quarterbacks do that stuff and then it affects their accuracy and their numbers and percentages drop. He does that stuff and he throws for high percentages. It’s kind of who he is, I guess.”

Dungey’s teammates suggest him taking hits gains respect in the locker room.

“Most definitely,” former Syracuse receiver Steve Ishmael said via the newspaper. “Especially for a quarterback to put his body on the line as much as Dungey does. All of us respect him. We have a huge amount of respect for him. We know that he cares about the game a lot and that pushes us as well.”

If Dungey pursued his career at the next level, his injuries and playing style would be part of the conversation.

He wouldn’t be able to get away with this in the NFL, obviously, but if he can majorly cut down on how many hits he takes, he could find a place somewhere in the league.

It’s a tricky balance, when it comes to protecting your body and wanting to lay it all on the line. But if Dungey can stay as healthy as he can, he can hopefully finish a season without missing games for once.

I, for one, look forward to watching Dungey’s fearless style of play a few last times at the college level. As long as he stays in one piece.