Answer: The syntax is not so bad. I've seen worse.

A cadence really is a way to end a phrase. Speaking in terms of harmonic cadences, for example, not every V-I is a cadence - only a V-I that ends a musical phrase. Cadences are often likened to punctuation in language: the equivalent of a period or comma.

For example, the wonderful Brahms melody quoted in a video on p. 87 of Exploring Theory begins with a V-I, but that's not a cadence. The first phrase ends with a half cadence (I-V), the second with an authentic (V-I) cadence.

But there isn't a name for that opening V-I, except that since it begins on a pickup beat it's an example of "anacrusis." Maybe anacrusis, an unstressed pickup to the opening downbeat of a phrase, is sort of like the opposite of a cadence.