114 Youth Football Plays

114 Youth Football Plays

The world of offensive football is exciting, but vast. Where does a coach looking to build a youth football playbook start? 114 Youth Football Plays includes a wide variety of running and passing plays encompassing multiple concepts and formations. These complementary plays have proven to be effective for tackle football players age 8 through 12. In these pages you will find plays that will fit any coach’s philosophy and any team’s personnel. Each play is diagrammed, each player’s assignment detailed. In addition, this book includes eight defensive formations, suggested special teams alignments, and more! Excerpt Welcome to offensive football! Since you put down hard-earned money to purchase this book (thank you!), we imagine you have a keen interest in coaching youth football and learning more about concepts that can help your team move the ball and score points consistently. If you are hard working, creative, and detail-oriented, this experience will be a lot of fun. What follows are diagrams and individual player assignments for 114 plays designed for tackle football players aged 8-12. They encompass not only plays that our teams have used but many sound plays run over the years by our opponents. These can serve as the basis of your team's playbook, or as the starting point for completely new plays you and your staff draw up. That is the beauty of offensive football -- there are endless ways to move the ball. Before diving in, here are some things to consider. * We aim to enter games with 10-12 bread and butter plays, capable of being run either left or right, and 5-6 additional one-off plays with special formations or actions. This comes to roughly 30 total plays. Resist the urge add too much beyond this -- you will not have the time to practice these plays sufficiently, or if you do you will likely be neglecting other important fundamentals. * When possible, install complementary plays run from the same formation that build off each other. For instance, 26 Lead sets up 26 Bootleg, 26 Bootleg Pass, and 26 Bootleg Shovel Pass. Most players' assignments are the same or similar for each, with slight changes, so you are really getting four plays in one. * The majority of the plays in this book are depicted with the quarterback under center. In recent years our teams have increasingly used the shotgun to great effect. Either method can be effective, and play assignments do not change dramatically. See what your kids can handle before committing to either. * In our experience the widest possible line splits create optimum running conditions. There are certainly times when this is not the case, like when your team has a considerable size advantage on the opposition and pounding the ball behind all that beef is your best bet. But for average or undersized teams, wide splits create larger running lanes, and blocking struggles can be addressed with numbers, angles, and misdirection. * Passing is certainly possible in youth football, but consider what your kids can do. In full equipment, even the strongest-armed child will only be able to throw the ball 20-25 yards in the air. In addition, you should not expect Joe Thomas-level pass protection from your offensive line, or a quarterback who can cycle through multiple progressions. Consider all of these variables when planning your receivers' routes, the number of receivers in each route, and the number of players you devote to pass protection. * Whatever plays you choose to run, the installation process is critical in your players' understanding of what you are trying to accomplish. Consider using a whiteboard to draw up formations and illustrate player assignments. In the preseason we install 3-4 plays per day, running them as an 11-player unit on air before drilling skills in smaller position groups, then reconvening to run them against a scout defense. As you teach your players the offense, consider their learning styles and tailor your approach to the greatest number of kids. * Take video of as many of your activities as possible. Game video is a must, but practice video can be just as important. Use video to analyze flaws in your play design or execution, and adjust accordingly. Or, if everything works perfectly, celebrate with your kids! Capturing and reviewing video does not need to be expensive or time consuming -- no grinding the remote until 3 a.m. necessary -- but can really help you teach your kids the game better and put them in position for maximum success. * These plays are diagrammed to be run against a 5-3 defense where defensive linemen are required to line up directly across from offensive linemen. It is certainly possible to run these plays against a 4-4, 6-2, 4-3, or other fronts. We could go on and on, but you want to get to these plays. So give them a look, and let us know what you think. Email me at scott_tappa@hotmail.com, connect on Twitter at @scotttappa, and let's help make each other better! Scott Tappa is a football