Landon Collins itching to get back on field and prove himself

All his life, Landon Collins has been the guy who made the play.

In high school. In college. When it came to crunch time, he was there for the team. And as he sailed through the air with a near-interception against Tom Brady in his grip that would have sealed a potential Giants victory nearly two weeks ago, he likely was thinking it would be another of those times.

Then he hit the ground, the ball popped out, and Brady and the Patriots drove for the game-winning field goal.

"That was the first time I had the game in my hands and dropped the ball," the rookie safety said this week. "That was the first time that happened."

It was a new experience for him.

"It was definitely hard because I don't do that," he said. "I killed myself when I went home, I just couldn't take it . . . Just to feel that I let the team down is always in the back of your mind."

On Sunday, he'll get his first opportunity to avenge that play.

"He's a pretty tough, resilient kid," Tom Coughlin said of Collins. "I think he realizes what could be done to improve that [play]. All I'm interested in after the fact is how we correct it. I think he understands that, or I hope he does."

Collins has been under a microscope all season as a rookie starting at an important position. It hasn't always been pretty to look at. Against the Patriots, he spent more time on the bench than in any other game this season.

Although Coughlin said he won't make any changes to the starting lineup, the Giants likely will continue to use a three-man rotation with Collins and veterans Craig Dahl and Brandon Meriweather.

"We're doing this rotation thing now and we're just working on getting everybody in because all of us have been getting a lot of snaps and they're just trying to keep my legs straight and just trying to switch it up a little bit," Collins said.

Had he been playing better, though, it likely would have been harder for the Giants to take him off the field.

Last week safeties coach David Merritt said Collins is progressing "slowly" when it comes to recognizing offensive shifts and disseminating calls through the defense.

"I understand what he's saying, and that's always been something that we've kept our finger on because he's a young safety and he does have communication responsibilities," Coughlin said of that critique. "But we're deep into the season, we're in a very important time of the year for us. I think that whatever we prepare in the plan, I think Landon will be able to execute it."

There still are bad habits to break, though. After spending his entire football-playing life as a line-of-scrimmage thumping enforcer, Collins is adjusting to his role as a centerfielder.

"I think it's been said before, so it's not new news that one of the things Landon likes to do is kind of creep up," Coughlin said. "He'll have to learn to stay deep."

Collins said he thinks he's done a good job of focusing on that, and that often his first step is backward, not forward. Now, though, he's hoping to take a few steps forward in his progress. He's been working on hands drills, catching balls during the bye week and after practices. If the pass comes his way again, as it did against the Patriots, he said he'll be ready.

"It's killing me," he said, "to get back on the field and prove myself."

By Tom Rock

tom.rock@newsday.com@TomRock_Newsday

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.