High losses and some delay were inevitable because of Israeli preparations--mines, antitank ditch, firing platforms on ground overlooking the approaching armor, obstacles which channeled attackers into kill zones.... Just to get across the ditch the Syrians needed bridging tanks, yet they were high priority targets for the defenders.
None of these necessitate delays on the order of multiple days, particularly given the weak Israelis forces covering them. Mines, obstacles, and the AT ditches could have all been dealt with by engineering units protected by covering fire and smokescreens suppressing or obscuring the firing positions.
Granted Syrian tankers weren't as competent as NATO ones. I note, though, Pollack said they "weren't bad at handling their vehicles" rating them an "8" compared to NATO "10."
Pollack says they weren’t bad at handling their vehicles by Arab standards, but if NATO’s a “10”, then they definitely were
not an “8”. Probably more like a 4 compared to NATO or WarPac... or the Israelis.
Consider what happened three years earlier in a situation where both the skill and numbers were vastly more even but the equipment being used by the respective sides and their respective tactical situation were the same. In 1970, the Syrian 5th Division slammed into the Jordanian 40th Armoured Brigade near ar-Ramtha during a brief conflict between the two countries. After a day of fighting the Jordanians were forced to fall back, having lost 19 Centurions while the Syrians lost 10 T-55s.
The 40th Armoured Brigade was dug in along a defended ridgeline in a valley, just as the two Israeil brigades on the Golan were. The Jordanians did have more open flanks than the Israelis, but it didn't matter since the Syrians just plowed right into them and then launched a series of blunt frontal attacks rather than attempting to flank (notably, the Jordanians
also didn't try to take advantage of the Syrian open flanks either). The Jordanians also didn't have to worry about fighting at night as the Israelis did (the Syrians had better night vision than either the Jordanians or the Israelis) since they retreated after a single day.
Likewise the accounts of Syrian handling of their vehicles at the Golan do not paint a picture of decent handling. The Syrians just blundered forward in a straight line until the Israelis killed them. There was no use of stalking, no use of fire and maneuver, and only little use of marching fire. Syrian Artillery, although hugely outnumbering and outshooting their Israelis opponents, mostly didn’t adjust their fire on the frontline (although they did in their counter-battery role, so this was likely a breakdown in coordination) and kept hitting the same positions over and over. As I already alluded too, there were no use of concealment (even artificial ones like smokescreens). I’ve even read accounts of several Syrian tanks driving straight into the anti-tank ditch!
By Arab standards, the Syrians were okay. By WarPac, NATO, or Israelis standards, they were gros incompetents.

It's my understanding, based on what I've read, that Syrian SAM deployment sufficed to cover the whole Golan even before the war started. Assuming the Syrians sought to take just the Golan, it should've been adequate where it was.
But the Syrian plan wasn’t to stop at the Golan. They weren’t going for a measured and scripted advance as the Egyptians were. They were aiming for a breakthrough-exploitation into Israel’s heartland. Had they intended to just seize the Golan as the Egyptians did the Suez, they would have mimicked the Egyptians meticulous planning, scripting, and rehearsel. Instead, what they did basically amounted to a mechanized wave attack. What’s more, the Syrian AD net didn’t adapt even as the Israelis did and hence was eventually neutralized. Almost ten years later, in ‘82, they still hadn’t evolved their AD tactics... and got soundly thumped as a result.
In light of bitter experience before October 1973, the Syrian (and Egyptian) decision to hold their MIGs back, mostly, is understandable. Syrian MIGs almost never fared well in air to air combat. This had been demonstrated a number of times even before the clash of September 1973, which cost the SAF around 12 MIGs whereas Israel lost a single Mirage.
That just illustrates my point. The Arab defects in ‘73 were the same as in the previous wars and they paid for it. The Egyptians came up with some measures to mitigate it, even those proved temporary.
The chronic weakness of the arab interceptor arm--for which inferior Soviet equipment was at least partly responsible--explains the arabs's great investment in ground based AD. Rather wisely, I think, fighters were committed (en masse) only as a last resort.
“Inferior” Soviet equipment, which wasn’t remotely inferior, bears no responsibility at all, as can be seen by the fact that Arab states have suffered just as badly when flying Western aircraft. Vietnamese flying the same MiG-21s against the Americans over North Vietnam scored almost 1:1 against the same F-4s the Israelis were flying for most of the Vietnam War.
It is a poor user who blames their tools and the historical rule, proven over and over in every major air war, has been that skill decides with technology only tipping the scales when all else is equal.