Giants' Tyrone Tracy Jr. went from one goal to long list of them for upcoming season
Giants running back Tyrone Tracy Jr. during training camp in East Rutherford, N.J., on Aug. 6. Credit: Ed Murray
A year ago around this time, Tyrone Tracy Jr. had a simple goal: Make the team. He was a fifth-round pick, a converted wide receiver still adjusting to being a running back, and just trying to prove he could play in the NFL.
This year he’s in a very different place as Labor Day weekend rolls around. No longer a roster bubble-sitter, he is the starting running back for the Giants and coming off a season in which he gained more than 1,000 all-purpose yards. He said he’s tried to keep his mentality the same, to stay humble and grateful and just focus on making the team again. But things obviously have changed.
Every time he looks at his phone, he is reminded of that.
The lock screen he showed to Newsday on Thursday is a list of all he wants to accomplish in 2025. It consists of:
* 1,500 rushing yards and 2,000 all-purpose yards.
* 15 touchdowns
* Pro Bowl
* NFL Network’s Top 100
* All-Pro
He’s come a long way. Clearly he wants to go even further.
“I feel like the same dude I was last year, to be honest,” he said. “I’m still out here, maybe not really fighting for a spot, but more so fighting to get where I want to be. I’m never going to be complacent. I always want something more.”
Can he accomplish everything on that list?
“It’s very possible,” running back and mentor Devin Singletary said of Tracy’s ambitions. “I don’t know why not.”
It was Singletary who was the starter going into the 2024 season and whose role eventually was diminished by Tracy’s development. Rather than resent him for it, Singletary kept pushing Tracy. He still is.
“He had a great offseason, came in prepared,” Singletary said. “Any way I can help him, I will.”
Tracy is grateful for that. So are the Giants. Coach Brian Daboll spoke about the growth he’s seen from Tracy, and that naturally led to him talking about Singletary.
“It’s helpful with Motor in there with him,” Daboll said, referring to Singletary by his nickname. “Motor’s been around the block and the ultimate pro, and I think Tracy’s really developed in that area as well coming into his second year . . . He’s made good steps, good strides.”
The Giants also have exciting rookie Cam Skattebo, who runs like a monster truck, in their backfield this season. It’s a solid room, even if it did spend most of this summer overshadowed by the passing game, with all the glitzy new quarterbacks throwing to the rejuvenated receivers on the team.
Come next week, though, the running game will be a key to any Giants success, and Tracy will be at the top of the depth chart at the position.
There is another aim not on Tracy’s phone, one that is so obvious to him that he didn’t bother jotting it down. It supersedes the others.
“The number one goal in my head is to win football games,” he said. “When you win, obviously a lot of the other stuff will come with it, the rushing yards and the accolades.
“When you look at most of the people in Pro Bowls or All-Pro lists, they are off of good teams, winning teams. When you look at people getting marketing deals, the money, all that stuff, they are off of good teams.
“So winning is the number one priority. Obviously, I have personal goals, but if we don’t win, then the personal goals don’t really matter. When you start focusing on numbers, you start forgetting some of the other stuff that matters.”
So Tracy is going to spend this weekend away from football sort of the way he did last year, grateful for the opportunity the season ahead has in store for him. He’s no longer a rookie, no longer an unknown. He’s proved he can be productive in the league. He’s shown he can be trusted to wear that “starter” label.
“Where I am right now, my skill set, it’s enough,” he said of what he proved last year. “Me going out there and being free is enough to make plays, explosive plays, and be a great running back in this league. I know I can do it. It’s just about going out and producing.”
He said he had confidence he could do it last year, too, even when he was sweating through the roster cutdowns, unsure what was ahead of him as a rookie, and getting one or two handoffs a game in the early months of the regular season.
“You just need a little more confirmation,” he said. “I knew it, but I wanted my teammates, my coaches and the world to know that Tyrone Tracy Jr. is a good running back.”
And when he returns on Monday for Week 1, he’ll get to work on that audacious to-do list, the written and the unwritten elements of it both.
Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.
