As a junior at Bryant University, Logan Paul knew she wanted to go to graduate school. She had an extra year of NCAA eligibility because she missed most of her sophomore season after needing hip surgery. Paul wanted to play one more season of softball.

Syracuse wasn’t on Paul’s radar, until October of 2017, when her brother committed to SU as a preferred walk-on shooting guard on the men’s basketball team.

“You’ve got to come to Syracuse,” Paul recalled her brother, Brendan, joked over the phone.

What started as a joke soon turned into reality when Paul received admission into the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications for advertising and learned she could transition from the Northeast Conference to the Atlantic Coast Conference for softball.

Now as a graduate student relief pitcher for Syracuse, Paul, 23, has maintained her close relationship with her younger brother as she’s developed bonds with her younger teammates, too. Paul has pitched the fewest innings of any pitcher and has an ERA north of 11, but most of her value to the team is intangible. With 13 underclassmen on Syracuse’s (14-19, 4-5 ACC) 20-person roster, Paul’s teammates nicknamed her “grandma” and often seek her guidance in the dugout or away from the diamond.

“She’s an amazing leader,” sophomore reliever Miranda Hearn said. “I just think that because she has all that experience, it’s easy to look up to her and respect her.”

Paul remembers playing “H-O-R-S-E” with her brother in the backyard of their Shaker Heights, Ohio, house when they were younger. Though they both loved sports, the two connected more through their “creative minds,” Paul said, and that still holds true today.

“(Brendan) was really the only reason I came here, to be honest,” Paul said.

At SU this year, Brendan and Paul see each other “all the time,” Brendan said. Whenever he needs his laundry done or wants to grab a bite to eat, his sister is on speed dial. Like with the softball team, Paul is there for her freshman brother “in case I ever need anything” or to talk through any issues, Brendan said.

As Brendan pursues a degree in sport management, he and his sister dream about working with each other one day by meshing sports agency, advertising and their shared passion of music. Brendan calls their future business endeavors a “collab,” but Paul’s vision is even more ambitious, in line with Jay-Z and Beyoncé.

“Who knows,” Paul said. “Maybe we’ll be like the next Carters or something, but siblings.”

Once Paul committed to SU, she sent a tweet announcing her move. Ace of the pitching staff Alexa Romero, who didn’t have a roommate at the time, read Paul’s tweet and direct messaged her. Now, they live in an apartment right across from Brendan on South Campus.

 

Just when you all thought I was done posting game day pics… the journey continues! As I head to Syracuse to earn my Masters in Advertising, I will also be joining the softball team. So excited and so blessed. Go Orange!

— Logan Paul (@logz_paul) May 16, 2018

“You can chuck an apple from door to door,” Paul’s father Curt said on Wednesday as he and Brendan looked on from the Skytop Softball Stadium bleachers.

At the start of the season, head coach Shannon Doepking asked Paul what she expected her role to be. She responded by saying she’d be a “wise leader” on and off the diamond. Paul had endured the grueling schedule of a softball season — long bus rides, frigid temperatures and doubleheaders — and she could offer a “state of reference” to younger players.

Paul helps make the game fun in dull moments with jokes and constant cheering, Romero said. When the game gets tense or goes “awry,” Paul is always there to steer the pitching staff back in the right direction, Romero added.

Her teammates showed their affection last Friday, when Paul scored the walk-off run as a pinch runner in Syracuse’s 9-1 rout over Notre Dame. As she crossed home plate, her teammates jumped up and down and mobbed their “grandma.”

Published on April 2, 2019 at 12:17 pm

Contact Danny: dremerma@syr.edu | @DannyEmerman