The all-purpose Henry Hynoski

Henry Hynoski is lighter than he was when he last played a significant offensive role for the Giants in 2012, but the fullback said he feels stronger.

"I feel like I have a lot more pop," he said.

Hynoski, down to 257 after playing most of his career at 265, missed most of 2013 with knee and shoulder injuries. Now that he's back, he'll be called on to play myriad roles for the Giants, and this week his name came up when Tom Coughlin was going through tight end options.

"He's not going to line up on the line of scrimmage, but he will line up at the up position, in the flood wing position and all over the backfield," Coughlin said. "He can do those types of things."

It's similar to the role Bear Pascoe played for the Giants, only Pascoe evolved from a tight end to a fullback. In a competition with John Conner at fullback this year, Hynoski is happy to help anywhere he can.

"Right now I can play fullback obviously, running back, and tight end is something I feel I can do also," Hynoski said. "Getting into some routes, some inline blocking and that type of thing. In this league, the more you can do, the better. It certainly won't hurt if I can expand my role a little bit more."

His primary job is fullback, though, and he's looked pretty good doing it. In the Hall of Fame Game, he escorted rookie Andre Williams into the end zone on a 3-yard run. This may be a new offense with new faces, but for Hynoski it was a flashback moment.

"That was vintage," he said. "When I was playing in 2012 we scored on that play a bunch of times [with Andre Brown], so we're excited to get the ground game going again and show that we're the physical presence again on the field."

And Hynoski is just happy to be on that field. He said sitting out in 2013 gave him a new appreciation for his sport.

"It was a terrible year for me, a humbling year, but one thing I took away from it is I don't know what I would do without football," he said. "I really learned how much I truly love the game being away from it."