Go ahead, make Jayron Hosley’s day.
Go ahead Matt Ryan, throw Jayron Hosley’s way.
The little rookie cornerback who doesn’t seem to know he’s a little rookie cornerback becomes a big Giant in Atlanta Sunday when he steps in for Prince Amukamara opposite Corey Webster. The task is all the more daunting if Roddy White, who will be a gametime decision (knee), gets the green light to wreak more havoc alongside Julio Jones.
Hosley was David Wilson’s teammate at Virginia Tech and it is his turn now, too. He sounds as if he would do backflips if Ryan decided to pick on him.
“You’re a corner, that’s what you live for. That’s what you live for in this position,” Hosley said. “That’s how you make your name.
“It’s like putting that hand on the stove. That first time when you were a kid? That second time you think twice about that.”
Are you the stove or the kid?
“I’m trying to be the stove,” Hosley said,
With the Giants fighting for their playoff lives, The Stove has some hot advice for Matty Ice he hopes will burn him.
“Go with your game plan, go with the game plan. … I hope I get something my way,” Hosley said. “That’s what I want. I hope I get something, but … I’m pretty sure they got something they’re whipping up over there, and we got to be ready. We’re going be ready.”
You’re going be ready?
“I got to, without a doubt. Without a doubt.”
The Falcons will move White and Jones around, but Webster followed White around in last year’s 24-2 playoff victory. Either way, Hosley has detected weaknesses in both receivers that he believes he can exploit.
“What I seen, they had trouble with getting off the press and guys being physical with them,” Hosley said. “That’s something that I seen on film, and I can use to my advantage.”
Hosley’s eyes lit up watching the Panthers’ 30-20 upset of the Falcons last week. “When I seen ’em play Carolina, I seen a guy who put hands on ’em, and it was a little difficult for them, so that’s something that I definitely want to do this week, just stay in their hip pocket … just play my game, you know, play my game,” Hosley said.
Hosley opened defensive coordinator Perry Fewell’s eyes in practice yesterday.
“He has great ball skills,” Fewell said. “He’s one of those guys in practice, he seems to always be around the tipped ball, he can always tip a ball up and intercept it and catch it, and you just kind of shake your head because he’s always making plays.”
“He was playing a coverage, and the receiver ran an in-cut, and he saw it, he broke on the ball, and I kind of joked with him, I said, ‘I didn’t know you were that fast,’ ’cause he broke on the ball and intercepted it, he was in the end zone before I could turn my head. He had a really good day today.”
Hosley (one interception against Cam Newton) has started two games at corner and two at nickel. Amukamara also has full confidence in Hosley.
“I know he’s not shaken by this at all,” Amukamara said. “It’s just another game to him.”
Hosley is 5-foot-10, 178 pounds. Jones is 6-foot-3, 220 and White 6-foot, 211.
“Julio is a faster guy, bigger in size, very competitive on the deep ball, and a guy that’s aggressive down the field,” Hosley said. “Roddy runs very precise routes, and a guy that you definitely got to respect.”
In the dog mentality world of the Giants, Hosley is a chihuahua who thinks he is a Great Dane.
“I think he’s fearless enough, and I think he’s physical enough because again, I think the young man accepts the challenge,” Fewell said. “I don’t think he backs down from anybodyI don’t believe that he thinks of himself as a smaller man. I think he thinks of himself as a football player that can go out and get the job done.”
I asked Hosley what makes him so confident.
“It’s just how I was raised, man,’’ Hosley said. “People always told me you weren’t big enough, or you weren’t this or you weren’t that, but as a youngster, you don’t want to hear that. You feel like you can do anything. At the end of the day I look at it like, you got to play me, you got to challenge me, I’m going to challenge you, or whateverAt the end of the day, it’s mano-a-mano, and you got to do your thing.”
Hosley was a fan of Deion Sanders and Asante Samuel growing up in Delray Beach, Fla. “Asante was a guy I kinda compared myself to, ’cause he was a smaller guy, and I was always a smaller undersized guy,” Hosley said.
Ironically, Samuel will be trying to intercept Eli Manning Sunday.
“It’s a pleasure to see him out there and play, but I got to go out there and play my game too. At the end of the day, I gotta go handle my business. I know he’ll be handling his, I gotta handle mine.”
Hosley expected to be drafted earlier than the third round, but tested positive for marijuana at the NFL Combine.
“If you take the chance on me, I definitely can promise you that it’s something that won’t happen again,” he recalls telling the Giants. “I’m past that now. I’m here now, and I’m moving forward, man. I’m here to make a name.”
Go ahead, make the kid’s day.