As Mizzou bolsters safety room in portal, Trajen Greco still battles for opportunities
COLUMBIA, Mo. — Trajen Greco never expected to put on as much as weight as he has.
During his senior season at Hoschton (Ga.) Mill Creek, he listed at 6-foot-1, 180 pounds. But by the start of fall camp his sophomore year at Missouri, he built into his frame, weighing in at 193 pounds and adding versatility to a deep safety room.
“I’ve always grown up loving competition,” Greco said. “I’m a competitor. Everybody in the safety room’s willing to compete. So just bringing that competition, it’s gonna make us one of the best secondaries in the nation.”
Greco appeared in all 13 games for the Tigers as a freshman. He hit the field for 200 snaps and saw a role in the special teams unit. But when Missouri entered the offseason, the program focused on retooling its secondary.
The Tigers signed transfers Santana Banner (Northern Illinois), Jalen Catalon (UNLV) and Mose Phillips II (Virginia Tech) this winter. The team also retained Marvin Burks Jr., Daylan Carnell and Caleb Flagg, who has shown “tremendous” growth to safeties coach Jacob Yoro.
With Greco’s size, though, he thrusted himself into a rotational position between safety spots. Yoro has believed speedy, bigger-bodied defensive backs adapt well to roles in man coverage and inside the box to play in run stops.
“Obviously, I didn’t commit to him,” Greco said of Yoro. “But at the end of the day, who knows? It could have been a blessing in disguise. I feel like I’ve grown a really strong connection with him, and just the way he coaches and understands the game of football, I’m blessed to get another great coach like that.”
Sidelined by a soft tissue injury at the start of fall camp, Greco will return to a limited capacity in practice Sunday, according to head coach Eli Drinkwitz.
Yoro readies for second season
Yoro will wrap up his first offseason as the Tigers’ safeties coach this fall. With a full year in the role, it offered the tenured staffer an opportunity to apply his defensive goals.
“I just think that having a full year allows you to really be able to implement the things that you’re trying to implement,” Yoro said. “Especially during the offseason, developing the mentality, developing some of the finer coaching points that we’re trying to get done. And so it was really nice to be able to have that with these guys this year.”
Yoro joined Missouri in early 2024 as a defensive analyst before his preseason promotion. Previously working with defensive coordinator Corey Batoon at Hawaii, Yoro’s West Coast connections have strengthened the Tigers’ recruiting efforts.
“For us to be able to just open up other pockets that we may have connections to and be able to really get the information we need in the recruiting process, I think that always benefits the program,” Yoro said.
“Leaving Georgia and being previously committed to a Georgia school, a lot of people take notice back from where I’m from,” added Greco, a former Georgia Tech pledge. “And they always check in to ask me, ‘What do you think?’ I’ll just tell them, ‘You have to go where your heart’s desired and what you think is best for you,’ but at the end of the day, me leaving turned me into a better person and just a better player.”