Turns out, the two appear to be made for each other.

“You have to be a force on the outside in the run, and you’ve got to have enough athletic ability to be able to drop into coverage, and you want to be able to be four-down pass rusher,” Rodgers said, describing the prototype edge. “So, it’s the most versatile guy on the defense. We’re asking a lot of him, and I felt watching his tape from years prior that he could fit this scheme well.”

“You go through this process every year, especially going through the draft. The [most important] trait you would look for is a guy who can rush the passer. So, there’s always that plan of, can he do the entire package? And until you put him through it, you don’t really know. Once you put him through it then you have a pretty good idea of the level of play that they can play at. He’s done that for us.”

Granderson said the biggest difference is he now operates in space, mostly freed of the double teams he encountered at defensive end in the 4-3, and totally freed from the responsibility of sliding inside to defensive tackle on certain plays, where bulk was an asset.

“I’m just playing in space and I’m back at home,” he said. “That’s a big difference. You get more opportunities to win one-on-one to try to go make plays in the backfield. That’s a big thing, whereas in a 4-3 you might be doubled. Coming off the edge is a big thing in our defense.

“I really should have been in a 3-4 in college because I was around 240 at that time, playing the 4-3. I was a little lighter and could move – I played receiver in high school as well, I always could move.

“The transition wasn’t too bad, but when I first came into the league to a 4-3, I had to put on a lot of weight just to be able to take on some of the double teams and to play inside. But I realized my first two years, I had a lot of production when I was playing around 270, 275.”

That’s roughly 100 pounds more than he weighed as a high school linebacker and receiver, but his current growth is more mental than physical. The physical part, he has.

“He had a really good game,” Rodgers said. “He had pass rush production, he had run production, he had a couple of defensed passes, and I don’t think anybody caught a ball on him, either. It doesn’t surprise me, because that’s the way he’s performed in practice through training camp.”

Partly, because he returned home.

“It’s definitely another challenge because it’s a whole new defense,” Granderson said. “I’ve been playing the same defense for six years and to play a whole new defense in a whole new position, it’s a challenge.

“But I’m up for the challenge and I’m only going to get better at it.”