Justin Tryon plays larger roll vs Buffalo

I traded emails with Mike Garafolo of the Star Ledger concerning Justin Tryon. Mike told me that the play Tryon was credited with a tackle was a blown coverage by Antrel Rolle in corner roll, Rolle had the inside receiver, Tryon had the outside receiver. Tryon saw the throw going to the inside receiver, left his man and moved in to tackle the receiver right after making the catch, for a 14 yard gain. Justin saved some run after the catch, a heads up play by Tryon.

From Mike Garafolo.....Final 30 seconds of the first quarter:

As for the 60-yard TD pass from Fitzpatrick to WR Naaman Roosevelt, the Giants were trying to show man coverage and then rotate into a reverse Cover-2 look. By reverse, I mean Rolle jumped down to the cornerback spot in the flat and CB Justin Tryon became the safety. 

I missed seeing that Tryon was in the game this early, and as Mike Garafolo points out Perry Fewell was moving him around, this might be more responsibility than Brians WIlliams was given before being let go. This may speak to a higher level of trust, that Tryon is a smart guy and generated some trust right away with Perry Fewell.

The defense found trouble early on when they tried to mix up the looks. On one play, they showed Cover-2 and then rolled into Cover-3. It didn’t work. Later, they showed man and converted into a reverse Cover-2. It was a disaster. (See below.) Finally, Fewell trusted his DBs and allowed them to play tight, aggressive man coverage, even on the final drive when teams often drop back and play soft zones.

Theres a few things going on here, in the past we've gone into the nickel by having Antrel Rolle leave his deep safety spot and move to corner, lining up on the line of scrimmage. A linebacker goes out, and safety Deon Grant comes in.

Thats whats on film, teams know we do this, so we to try to confuse the opposing offense. This is what I thikn Garafolo is describing. Rolle comes to the line of scrimmage, but no LB comes in, Justin Tryon is in and plays deep. Rolling from a cover 2, to a cover 3 means somebody rolls out to deep cover so there are 3 deep safeties instead of 2.

Cover 3 in a nickle situation leaves 2 players up front and 3 deep, so the underneath throw might be a better choice for the QB. Unlike the standard Cover 2 nickle where you would see 3 corners up close and 2 safeties deep.

Hopefully what happens is you bait the quarterback to throw to an area he thinks has coverage he can take advantage of. And instead the quarterback throws into the strength of the secondary, possibly for a pick. Well it didn't work, so Perry Fewell went to man coverage.

And so early in the 3rd quarter, Rolle playing out of position, just like against Seattle when Aaron Ross and Antrel Rolle had a miscommunication, Rolle lets the receiver past him, the quarterback saw it and threw for a completion but Justin Tryon saw the throw and moved over to make the tackle, preventing some serious run after the catch.

I think Perry Fewell is liking what we've seen from Tryon, that 1) we can trust Tryon to perform to confuse coverages, and 2) maybe Tryon should be the standard nickle back, not Rolle. This keeps Rolle at his natural position safety, and allows the Giants to line up 3 competent cornerbacks at the line and bump and run in man coverage while keeping the Kenny Phillips Antrel Rolle tandam over the top, where both are excelling. The 4-2-5 cover 2 might, for some defenses, leave a vulnerability deep. But Kenny Phillips and Antrel Rolle are fast and make good reads. Having these 2 guys deep for the Giants might be as good as a cover 3 for other teams that dont have 2 quality safeties, because our 2 guys can cover a lot ground.

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