Giants training camp: Shane Vereen hopes to be "a complete back"

Shane Vereen's mark of 52 receptions with the New England Patriots last year would be the most out of any New York Giants' running back since Tiki Barber in 2006. And remember, Barber was the definite starter whereas Vereen was a rotational back. Now that he's left New England, Vereen hopes to bring an new dimension to the Giants' offense as a legitimate pass receiving threat out of the backfield. Vereen is confident his skills will translate well from New England to New York.

"I think it can be very effective. I think we have a lot of weapons on this offense and the more we get going, the more we start trusting and learning each other, and just feeling comfortable with everyone on the field, I think the better we’ll be."

The good news here is, there won't be a difficult transition to moving to Ben McAdoo's offense from the one in New England. In fact, Vereen believes the two offenses "do very similar things."

"Yeah, there are some similarities, a lot of similarities, and a couple differences. I think the biggest thing really though is just the terminology, it’s completely different," Vereen said. "I think both offenses kind of do very similar things."

With these two offenses being similar, it's essentially a given that New York will look to utilize his receiving talents often. However it is still early in training camp as Vereen states that even he doesn't know what his exact role will be.

"I guess we’ll see. It’s still a waiting game. I mean, we’re still on the cusp of day one, first practice, so I guess the role is kind of going to play itself out. The more we get on the field, the more practice we get, the more repetitions, I think it’ll kind of speak for itself, and the role will be cut out in some shape or form."

Vereen hopes to prove that being a receiving threat is not the only thing he can do well. After all he is a running back and he hopes he can do it all now that he's in New York.

"If anything, I’ve always taken it upon myself to show that I can be a complete back. I take pride in that, I take pride in doing all things well that are asked of a running back, and just trying to advance my game from there, and just be a very solid, dependable back."

Whether he's running or catching the ball, there's little doubt that Vereen will turn into a useful weapon for the Giants' offense.