Cornerback Jayron Hosley was drafted by the New York Giants in the third round this past April. Each week, the Virginia Tech alum and Florida native will provide an inside look at his journey of making it in the NFL. His first post begins with players reporting to the University at Albany for training camp:
When you arrive on campus here, you get that feeling like you have arrived – that this is the NFL. You see all the veterans driving in with their nice cars, and the rookies are just looking at them like, 'What's next?' You're looking to them to kind of lead the way and get you started with things like showing you the ropes.
I flew up from Florida on Wednesday and took the bus over with a couple other rookies, Jojo Nicolas and Adewale Ojomo. I'm rooming with my former Hokie teammate David Wilson. Having him up here is cool because he is a very outgoing dude – that's him. He's a very fun dude to be around, always laughing and joking. So he brings that liveliness to it. He's a good guy to be going through this with. You know he's going to work hard, so we're pushing each other. And that's all the rookies together. We're pushing each other just trying to make us better and enjoy the ride together.
It definitely sunk in that I'm in the NFL now once practice started on Friday. That made me go, 'It's official now.' I'm just trying to get in the mix of things out there. I was there at the facility in New Jersey in the spring for a month, so I'm kind of acquainted with things a little bit. But when camp started, you're getting re-introduced to some things that you learned in the spring. It's just a process and you have to take it slow and take it day by day. That's what I'm doing.
Right now it's just an adjustment to the defense and going against NFL-level players and being able to pick up the speed of the game and know your assignment. You have to be able to think and react at the same time, but right now it's just getting lined up and knowing my assignment. Once I get that part out of the way, you're just out there playing ball.
As far as the veterans getting on the rookies, they sent me to the store to buy some things. I just had to get some stuff for meetings, like snacks, sunflower seeds and some deodorant and lotion. It's just a rookie thing, everyone knows how it is. You come in and they're going to not really haze you, but 'Hey, you've got to pay your dues.' It's all love, though. They've shown me a lot of love. They're helping us rookies out.
They're really being leaders in the sense of showing us how to be champions or how to prepare to be champions. I'm really just talking to anyone I can, honestly, whether it's a safety or a corner. I'm just trying to learn anything I can that can help me through camp or just learn the defense. I've talked to Corey Webster, Terrell Thomas – "T2" – and Kenny Phillips and Antrel Rolle helped me with some things. So it's a mixture. I try to hustle and pick up anything I can from any one of them because they've all been successful at this level.
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