Timeout Tips

There are a few quick tips you can use to make your timeouts more effective. First, when you approach your team, jog out and face the other teams goal line as you talk to your kids. Have another pre-designated coach bring water out, he can provide water as long as he does NOT talk to the players. Have your kids face your goal line, this helps them focus on you, rather than the other team. Secondly this give you a chance to listen and watch what the other coach is saying and doing. Just be completely silent for the first 15 seconds of your huddle as you look at your kids faces and get their attention- with silence. This also allows you to listen to the other coaches words. I’m deaf in one ear, but I’m amazed at how much I can usually hear.

Sometimes youth football coaches get a little excited and probably don’t realize how loud they are talking. I’m listening for tone, attitude and content. Sometimes you can hear them making adjustments, calling plays or even stunts. You can often times tell if a team is panicked or resolved. Often times when the opponents are on offense, the coach will spend time talking in depth to one player- the player getting the ball. When we are in our Spy call defensive set, we can match up our best player with the player we think is getting the ball.

In one memorable game back in 2002, I vividly remember a game where we were having remarkable success with our wedge play in the middle. With our 1 back out with an injury and the backup hurting from a lump sized knot on his shin, we were forced to run a few more wedge plays to our 2 back than normal. While we run the play out of several different play series, it’s still a wedge play to the 2 back. Well, the Defensive Coordinator for the opposing team was getting frustrated with us consistently gouging them with the play and finally called a time out.

He proceeded to yell at his kids so fervently that you could see the little spittles coming out of his mouth as he went on a tirade to his kids. He yanked his two best players putting them into the A and B gap to the side we were running and had his Defensive End crash to that side as well. As I listened in silence and heard him make his moves, I smiled and called 38 buck wedge. It is a play where we run the wedge play they have seen so much of, wedge blocking, 2 back running to the very same point of attack etc. BUT, the 2 back just as he approaches the wedge apex, hands the ball to our 3 back who is running a sweep, with 2 lead blockers. Think Wing T buck sweep. Well needless to say we scored a long touchdown on the play and that Defensive Coordinator could only shake his head and smile.

Calmly hustle out to your huddle, smile, be quiet and listen. Then make your calls and calmly and concisely give your coaching points and encouragements. When you are coaching youth football well, your timeouts should look seamless and smooth.

Copyright 2010 Cisar Management, all rights reserved. This article may be republished but only if this paragraph and link are included. http://winningyouthfootball.com

This Weekends Game Result. My 5-6th Grade Team

Many of you want to know how my personal team is doing- and rightfully so. My team won 28-0 over the Nebraska Football Academy of Grand Island. In a pretty tough game against a program that has been practicing since April. We played pretty well, especially on defense. We limited them to just 3 first downs while running 62 offensive snaps of our own. Was really happy with the play of our Defensive Ends on a scale of 1-10 they played a 9.5 game.  Our linebackers saw nice improvement after working them hard on pursuit angles and play recogntion last week. 

On offense we  had drives of 12,8,15 (time ran out on the opponents 1 yard line at the half), 6 (punt), 10 and 11 plays respectively. Our rookie blocking back played with great effort, but didn’t quite have his best game from an assignment perspective. But we were able to overcome that handful of execution mistakes to win the ballgame. The 25 mph winds limited our passing game to a season low 3 throws. In 3 games we have yet to turn the ball over and have gotten 5 takeaways of our own.

We were pretty flawless the previous week on offense and focused heavily on defensive fundys, and defensive team last week in practice. The day we lost due to lightning was our offensive day, but we shouldn’t have had 7 serious execution errors in our game.

They ran an “I” Formation Offense with a few interesting tweaks, the usual powers, counters, bucks, sweeps, option and play action pass plays to go along with a nice fullback G pitch play and waggle.

This week, back to the drawing board with the team offense, the kickoff team and punt return team. The offensive line has been very good, coming off the ball hard and playing to the whistle. We will start to sprinkle some fun stuff back in this week with 10 minutes of tackle baseball and Hawaiian Rules football. We also continue to develop depth by cross training players to do our base 7 plays. We are always 2 deep and try to go 3 deep with our 22 kids as we enter our 6th week.

This weeks Character Theme is- Perseverance

When Your First Youth Football Game Goes Poorly

Many youth football coaches panic when their first game goes poorly. Some panic and make massive changes in scheme and personnel, while some add in lots of plays and stunts and still others stick their head in the sand and do nothing. Maybe none of those options is the best choice if your goal is to turn your problem around.

The first thing to do is identify your problems and then prioritize their importance. If one of your problems is poor fundamental blocking your solution shouldn’t be putting in a veer scheme that week or perfecting a screen pass play. If one of your problems is weak open field tackling, the solution isn’t adding in additional stunts and blitzes on defense.
Poor play in youth football in most cases can be boiled down to alignment, assignment, effort and base technique issues. If you don’t solve the base issues, you will have the exact same problems in the new scheme- with lots more lost practice time AND coaches, players and parents who don’t believe in you.

Dumping schemes or making wholesale personnel changes won’t solve your problems, in most cases it will only make the problem worse. Is it ok to tweak the depth chart a bit after week 1 or 2 ? Of course it does, but making huge changes shows you were clueless in your ability to correctly evaluate your players. If you were clueless, you need to get better at evaluating players, search for the posts in the blog about how to do that.

While most of us have a pretty good idea what our problems are when our youth football teams don’t do well, sometimes we don’t. Film is an invaluable tool in helping you figure this out. During the course of the game, things move fast, you don’t have time to see everything. You are too busy getting kids into the game, watching keys, making adjustments and coaching kids up. What you see on the film may really surprise you, once you slow the game down and watch frame by frame. Film reveals all and will tell you exactly what needs to be worked on.

With limited practice time, it is sometimes an overwhelming task when you look at all the problems you need to solve before the next game. Instead of trying to solve them all and ending up solving none, choose just a few of the most important ones and make big strides with them. If your team was 0-5 passing, but made just 3 first downs because your linemen weren’t coming off the ball well and had poor pad level, it isn’t the time to spend a lot of time on perfecting your passing game or pass blocking. If your linemen aren’t coming off the ball hard, do lots of first 2 step drills, do the tennis ball drill. If they are getting manhandled, work crab blocking hard that week. If your backs are running hesitantly run lots of gauntlet, squeeze, chaser and power hour drills. Make sure and ELIMINATE all needless non football stuff from your practice schedule like cals, agilities and conditioning. If you have some basic alignment and assignment issues get rid of all scrimmaging for the week and do rapid reps on air or fit and freeze reps- you can do an offensive or defensive rep on air or fit and freeze rep every 10-15 seconds, whereas a scrimmage rep versus your scout team is one every 2-3 minutes. Reclaim that time to make your kids better football players instead of pushup, scrimmage and cross country champions.

Coaching youth football well requires you to be a good decision maker and that means setting the most optimum priorities. Don’t panic, identify the problems, look at the base issues, prioritize the problems in order of importance, develop a plan and solve them.

Copyright 2010 Cisar Management, all rights reserved. This article may be republished but only if this paragraph and link are included. http://winningyouthfootball.com

This Weekends Game Results

We have been posting our weekly game results with a short synopsis here on the blog for the last 3 years. Many coaches are interested in seeing how the system is working in real life and rightfully so. Theory is just that, you want to know how the system is working in real life today on the field.

Unlike past seasons, I am head coaching just a single team this season. We have built up a nice core group of youth football coaches that have bought into our approach and have a reasonably good grasp of the system and practice methodology.

I’m coaching a 5th-6th grade team this season which means players age 10-11. We added a new 5-6th grade team this season, so we divided the experienced kids into each squad evenly via “draft” like process. We had our first 2 games last weekend. I have a group of 23 boys, 9 are brand new to football.

On Saturday we won 44-6 after leading 36-0 in the second quarter. Our first team offense scored on every possession. Our backups played the very same amount as our starters, due to the score. We have played this team in seasons past and they were intent on taking away the off-tackle, so we only ran it 8 times. The numbers simply didn’t favor it. While this team aligned well, had just 1 penalty, got into solid stances and seemed to be pretty well organized, they couldn’t answer. In our league this year, when a team is down by 21 points or more, they can choose to go running clock OR freeze the score and play by regular clock. We were up 20-0 in the first quarter, when we scored our 4th touchdown and made our 2 point PAT kick, they chose to freeze the score. The score would have been 44-6 had the score not been frozen at 28-0.

In our North American Youth Football Tournament Championship game against a team from the Vancouver Canada area, we raced out to a 29-0 first quarter lead. We are a no huddle team and we were on warp speed that first quarter. We scored on the opening play, got a fumble recovery on the opening snap on defense, scored in 2 plays and it got ugly very quickly. This team came into the game at 4-0, had all my materials and were something like 12-2 in their league last year. The 12 man game may have caused them some problems and they were a long way from home. The very nicest and generous people you would ever meet. We jumped off the gas with a 42-6 second quarter lead. Fortunately there were no injuries and in the end both teams had a positive experience. The Canadian team may have gotten a bit banged up in their Saturday game.

Our next game is against a program that I did a clinic for about 4 months ago and has our materials. They have been practicing since April. Our 13th practice is tomorrow evening.
I’m going to look at the film tonight using Hudl to see where we need work. All in all a great first half in game 1, weak second half. Too many penalties, in game 1 we had 7, game 2 we had 3. Game 2 we played well. It was great to see 2 first year players starting at the 2 and 3 back spots. In game 1 the new 3 scored 2 times and the 2 scored once. They were all smiles. The offensive line dominated in both games, zero bad snaps by the first team Center, the backup snapped to the wrong player 2 times in game 2, but we were ok.
Defensively the first team gave up a combined 3 first downs, the seconds not as good. My competitors come to this site daily and do film us, so we do not go into much detail of the play series and adjustments until seasons end in mid November.

Helping Your Running Backs to Make Cuts When Coaching Youth Football

There are a few simple drills you can add to your practice plans to help your running backs make more effective cuts. While some of your very athletic players with excellent body control already instinctively make effective cuts, you will need to teach the rest of your players. Making cuts is all about body control. The problem is many youth football players simply have yet to develop a strong core and don’t yet understand how to effectively control their bodies. Sure you may have players that can run very fast in a straight line, but how may non special-teams plays in youth football are run in straight lines for over 30 yards at a time?

The game is played in short 5-10-15 yard bursts with lots of small changes in direction. The player that excels in the player who can start, stop, accelerate and make cuts without slowing down much. In order to make those cuts, the player must lower his center of gravity. Did you ever see Barry Sanders run? Every time he went into a cut, he dropped his hips so low to the field, it looked like he might drag his rear on the carpet. That is not an instinctive move for most youth running backs, it must be taught. Start first by just having your backs run a 7 yard sprint as a group, blow your whistle after they hit the 4 yard mark ask them to drop their hips (not their shoulders) about 6 inches for the duration of the 3 yards. Their backs are still straight at this point, we don’t lean forward into cuts.
This drill may look a bit awkward and feel uncomfortable to start with, but it is the very first skill a youth running back must develop to cut effectively. If a player is struggling a bit you can even hold a pole out across his path over his head, but held low enough that he has to drop his hips to pass under.

Once your kids start to consistently run that drill well, it’s time to let them try the skill out. Have them run the zig zag drill. Put about 6 cones out about 7 yards apart at 45 degree angles to themselves, creating a zig zag pattern. Without carrying a ball, have the players go the first cone to the right, lower their hips and touch the cone with their outside hand, planting their outside foot, and then heading to the inside to the next cone, then doing the same with that cone, accelerate, lower the hips touch the cone with the outside hand and plant the outside foot and head to the inside to the next cone. Next add a football and have them seat the ball high and tight and switch balls to the outside arm after making each cut. When they run left, ball is in the left arm, when they run right, ball is in the right arm. You can add a ball security portion to the drill by stationing coaches or players along the path to swat at the ball.

Most cuts in youth football aren’t as sharp as 45 degrees and don’t involve coming to a complete stop so for the third phase of this drill, we make a few changes. Put your long bags out parallel to each other about 3 yards apart, 4 should about do it. Place a cone about 2 yards outside dummy. Start the running back out at one end of the first long dummy and have him run to the edge of it, lower his hips, cut making sure NOT to run past the cone and run to the far edge of the next dummy in line, drop his hips, plant on that outside foot and run to the far edge of the next dummy. After one rotation through, add a football and ask them to change arms to the outside arm as we did in the previous drill.
Next we want to work on how to keep speed through a cut. Put cone X about 5 yards in front of a starting point cone Y which is at an imaginary line of scrimmage. Then put 2 cones about 1 yard away and 1 yard apart from each other at about a 60 degree angle to the right of Cone X. Now have the back approach cone X at full speed, about 2 yards from the Cone X blow your whistle as a signal to have the player drop his hips. Just before the player gets close enough to touch the cone, he cuts and runs between the 2 cones set at an angle to Cone X and sprints to a cone Z set 7 yards further away. This cone is set along the same 60 degree angle. Then add a football to the drill. Next instead of having the angle of the final Cone Z be along the same 60 degree angle, make it 90 degrees from the parallel cones after the cut. You can even add a squeeze portion of the drill by placing 2 coaches or players with hand shields at Cone Z and make the runner run through traffic and sprint to another Cone W set 5 yards past Z.

Next change add parallel cones at a 60 degree angle to the left of Cone X. Choose the left or right side before the drill starts for the running back, so he gets used to cutting in both directions. We are looking for lowered hips, very little slowing for the cut and explosive sprinting off of the cut. Now to help the player get used to making split decision of which way to cut, stand at Cone X and move your shoulders in one direction or the other just as the player gets in front of you. If you move your shoulders to the left he cuts right, you move right he cuts left. This will help your back improve both the precision of his cuts, but in which direction to make them.

Developing fundamentals is key at any age, but especially in youth football. Note that we like to add that final drill to our offensive running back play skeleton drills. We will run 16 Power with this drill set up at the 6 hole. This way the rest of our backfield can get reps in with blocking at the point of attack on shields or dummies while the running back gets drilled on fundamental running back drills. You can just adjust the drill to the hole you are running. To save time obviously you are going to rep just one play extensively before moving to the next one instead of rotating the plays.

Copyright 2010 Cisar Management, all rights reserved. This article may be republished but only if this paragraph and link are included. http://winningyouthfootball.com

Co- Head Coaching in Youth Football

In a handful for youth football programs instead of having a Head Coach, the organization head assigns co- head coaches. While it can work, in most cases it is going to be a disaster. Assigning co-head coaches is usually the result of the commissioner not being able to make a decision or some type of last minute politics. In this post I will spell out why it usually doesn’t work with youth football teams and how it can work if managed properly.

I decided to write about this after becoming aware and offering some advice to a coach caught in one of these co-head coach quagmires. This coach had studied my materials for a good part of the off-season and had laid out a very detailed plan for the team he was assigned to head coach. At the very last minute the organization commissioner assigned a “co-head” coach to his team, they were supposed to work out their responsibilities on their own.

Right from the beginning there were problems with this new dynamic, the new guy jumped in and demanded to run the offense, but didn’t have a playbook or a plan to implement it. Neither guy knew the other prior to this season. When asked what blocking rules and schemes the new guy planned on using, his response was that the simplest thing for the kids to do would be to “block the kid in front of them.” The old “no blocking scheme”, blocking scheme that reveals to all that whoever said it to has NO clue on how to coach youth football. Of course our friend had spent hundreds of hours in the off season doing research and had chosen and studied our blocking schemes, rules and techniques and was well prepared for the season. The other guys playbook – was “in his head” he smilingly stated.

So our friend bowed out to be a “team player” and decided he would run the defense. The only problem was his “co-head coach” didn’t like the defense our friend was putting in, and “couldn’t live with” several of the concepts of his defense. So while the bully “co-head” was adamant on running his offense- still being formulated in his head with NO blocking rules, he wouldn’t allow our friend to implement his very sound, proven, well thought out defensive scheme.

The problem with co-head coaches is, there is no one in charge. If there is an impasse, there is NO ONE there to break the tie. In most cases co-head coaching is a HUGE mistake that most coaches should avoid at all costs. This has been proven with this team as I had predicted. In just their 4th practice, they have “installed” 20-25 plays and have worked on defense a grand total of 30 minutes. They are scrimmaging after just practice #5 and yes, with just 30 minutes of TOTAL defensive individual AND team time. My prediction for this team- TOTAL FAILURE. Co-head coaches is almost always going to result in dysfunction, frustration and disaster.

My teams have consistently lead our leagues in scoring in 12 of the last 14 seasons and CONSISTENTLY average over 35 points per game without EVER going over 50 points (sportsmanship). We rarely go into our first game with over 8-12 perfect- integrated plays, let alone 25 after just 4 practices.

 We also understand the value of defense and divide our practice time evenly with offense and defense. In fact today our practice will be our 4th practice of the 2010 season and the entire 120 minutes will be devoted to defense. This new coach doesn’t have a clue and the boys are going to suffer through a disaster season because of it. Once this team starts getting blown out by 30-40 points every week, the parents will turn on both of them and GUARANTEED the guy making all the decisions will blame it on the other “co-head” coach as well as the players. GUARANTEED, he will say the kids didn’t “want it” bad enough, when in all reality, the kids were  just suffering from poor coaching.

In our friends example, a bully first year coach assigned the co-head coach role is dictating what should and should not be run on both sides of the ball it seems. It really doesn’t have to be this way. I’ve run organizations with 3-16 teams and assigned hundreds of coaches to over 200 teams. On just 2 circumstances did I assign co-head coaches. This season I have two guys, one owns several car dealerships and has coached with us for 3 years. He played college football for NU and is a great guy, very smart. Another coach coached with us last year for the first time, he has been a very successful head coach at 3 different small High Schools here in Nebraska. Both guys knew each other from our program and got along very well. The car dealer guy couldn’t always be at practice, he was going to miss about 20% of the time. The retired High School guy had a bad back, just had surgery and wasn’t going to be the “main guy” by choice. The car dealer guy’s wife was a very experienced and very competent team mom- so that solved some of the paperwork issues. Co-head coaching made sense for this dynamic- BUT WITH LIMITATIONS.

First I asked if each were ok with the relationship- that they could trust and work with each other. They spoke with each other over the phone and both were ok with the arrangement. Then I assigned one the offense and one the defense and let them work out the special teams between themselves. The practice organization/practice methodology, offensive scheme, defensive scheme and special teams scheme were already set for us, all 3 teams run the same system. They of course have the flexibility of selecting players for positions, which series they wanted to run and which adjustments to put in. We’ve never had any problems with co-head coaches because we always make sure we choose smart collaborative guys with experience and NO EGO. Then we make sure each understands their responsibilities and boundaries and of course they always know they can come to me for help in resolving any issues.

If you ever get asked to be a co-head coach, DON’T accept until you understand in BLUNT terms what your role is AND have spoken in blunt terms with your co-head coach as to how you are going to work together. If not, it will be a year wasted and a disaster season for the kids, take that to the bank.

Copyright 2010 Cisar Management, all rights reserved. This article may be republished but only if this paragraph and link are included. http://winningyouthfootball.com

What Your Your Clothes and Appearance Says About You When You Are Coaching Youth Football
What should you wear at practice and games when you are coaching youth football?
Clothes need to be functional but they also say a little about who you are. In youth football you have many audiences, your players, fellow coaches and parents. At games you have groups of fans and referees to add to that list.

First impressions are vital, what do people think about you when they see you for the very first time? While we probably should not develop long term outlooks based on exterior appearances, most people on this planet do. Most people make judgements about you the first few seconds they lay eyes on you. In youth football MOST of the people you see at games and practices aren’t going to be spending much time with you getting to know you. If you look like Charles Manson and have accumulated 300,000 miles on the local tattoo parlor frequent flyer program, many people are going to dismiss you without bothering to find anything about you.

First impressions are important; they can make or break most youth football coaches. It all goes to credibility, does the person coaching these kids pass the “5 second smell test.” Many people either don’t have the time or won’t make the time to try to determine what’s inside the wrapper if the wrapper is a mess. While we may not like that character flaw in mankind, we can’t ignore that it exists. Individuality and self determination is the cornerstone of our great country, but remember that football is a team game. Think about your appearance, how does it aid or detract from your ability to coach effectively? How does it aid or detract from you developing a positive view from your audience? Remember how important it is to develop trust and buy in from BOTH your players AND parents. Is it helping or detracting from you getting buy in?

In football, do we require that all players wear the same gold and black uniform, but then allow one player to wear a white uniform? How about letting the kids just wear a provocative t-shirt instead of the uniform? How about that grunge kid, do we let him wear a tattered practice jersey so he can make a “statement ?” Do we make parts of the uniform optional? Do we let kids stand out on game day by letting them wear earrings, face paint, wear capes, put on body paint, wear helmets backwards, sag pants and chew tobacco on the sidelines? If we don’t allow the kids to do any of this, then why allow the coaches to do the very same thing ?

Can you be a great coach and a great person and be tatted from head to toe? Sure. The same goes for guys that; sag, wear hats backwards, have piercings, wear tattered shorts, chew or smoke tobacco on the sidelines, wear grillz or wear tattered t-shirts with racy messages on them. But how do all of these things make you a better coach or make your job easier? How does it enhance your YOUTH  COACHING  reputation or the reputation of your team? What exactly does purposely standing out from the crowd in a team environment say about you?

I have no problem with my coaches doing or wearing any of the above when they are away from our team, but their appearance on the field impacts how people view them and our team. I want my coaches to be taken seriously and respected. I want my coaches to check their ego at the door and do what’s best for the kids and the team, I’m not sure drawing attention to oneself really does that.

Some teams coaches wear matching gear, that’s great if you can do it. Uniformity just says you take your job seriously. Other teams ask their coaches to wear the team colors in a polo style shirt and  wear khaki style pants. In some areas shorts are acceptable or even preferred. In some areas jeans are looked down upon. It’s up to the head coach to determine what makes the most sense and let the coaching staff know what is acceptable.

For my teams all I ask is that we wear a polo style shirt in either of the team colors or a team t-shirt. It doesn’t matter to me if they wear shorts or pants as long as they are clean, not cut off or tattered. Here in Nebraska, clean non tattered bluejeans (not torn, stained or tattered work jeans) are acceptable. Caps are turned face front and no bandanas. Earrings are fine, but not at practice and games and massive full tats need to be covered. I have nothing against tats, my dad had a big snake with a knife through it on his forearm, a souvenir of his Navy days. But tats that cover the entire arm, neck or body or are of a provocative nature, probably need to be covered with long sleeves and long pants. We once had an incredible offensive line coach who had full sleeves on both arms, pretty scary looking guy- but wasn’t. He got such a better reaction once we convinced him to cover up his tats.  We don’t allow guys to sag, wear grillz or to smoke or chew tobacco either. In Nebraska it’s not acceptable for them to wear anything but tennis shoes, no flip flops are allowed.

Now are all well dressed coaches good credible guys? Goodness no, but that isn’t the point. The point is you have just one chance to make a first impression and it needs to be a good one. Put the team first, be a team guy when it comes to coaching youth football. There are plenty of other times and places you can flaunt your rebel individualism.

Copyright 2010 Cisar Management, all rights reserved. This article may be republished but only if this paragraph and link are included. http://winningyouthfootball.com

How Should You Teach Your Youth Football Players How to Recover Fumbles?

When you are coaching youth football, should you teach your kids to scoop the ball on the run and take it the other way or to safely cover?

In the 20 plus seasons I’ve coached youth football, I’ve only seen 5 scoop and scores in the games I’ve personally coached. On the other hand I have seen well over 100 instances where one player had fairly reasonable possession of the ball after the fumble and then lost it in the end to his opponent in the mad scramble for the ball. Does this mean you should only cover safely when you see the ball on the ground? It really depends on a number of factors.

Over the last 14 seasons running the system we use now, we are scoring on over 80% of our offensive possessions. We’ve never been shut out, we’ve led the league in scoring 12 of 14 seasons and only lost 17 games during that stretch. We feel extremely confident we are going to score if we gain possession of the football. In that case the statistics and my personal experiences tell me it probably makes a whole lot of sense to just safely cover instead of risking losing the ball using a scoop and score approach. On the other hand, way back when before the Single Wing I had several teams that were ok defensively but we were REAL spotty on offense. We weren’t confident at all we could score, so we took a few chances, which meant scoop and score was the order of the day. Did it make a difference? Not really,  in 5 seasons we had just 2 scoop and scores for a TD.

The choice you make may have to do with what kind of players you have on your team. It’s HIGHLY unlikely that I’m going to teach any of my age 7-9 teams to scoop and score. Howevr, lseason I had a 7th-8th grade team that was very heavy on experience. We had 1 player who had the speed to take the ball all the way on a scoop and score and a couple of others who were ok in space and were pretty heady ballplayers. We gave 4 of those kids permission to scoop and score IF they saw the ball on the ground in space (no other player within 2 yards of it) and they were in a position where they felt VERY confident they could gain possession and grab it on the run.

Don’t think just because you are teaching “cradle” recovery methods that you are going to get the ball back every time the ball is on the ground, you have to teach it and practice it. It’s important to teach a proper “safe” cradle recovery. We ask our kids to use their backs to shield the ball from their nearest opponent. They need to have their backs turned toward their nearest threat to the football. We want them approaching the ball from the side, secure the ball with both arms around the ball deep into the stomach, then bend the legs up tight around the ball in a fetal type position with their head tucked in. Teach this by having the defensive player in his regular stance, throw a ball in front of him along the ground at about 5 yards distance away from the player. Have the player run to the ball diving with his head tucked at a point just outside the football, with his body perpendicular to the imaginary line of scrimmage. You don’t want your player diving on the football, it’s too easy to squirt out and when the pile ends up on top of him, he is going to get the wind knocked out of him. The next progression is to line 3 players up side by side in their stances. Toss the ball out on the ground about 5-7 yards in front of them. Let the 3 players fight this one out for the ball. Use a whistle to signal when the “play” is over.  This is a competitive drill you will need pads and helmets on for this one.

Often times we don’t  teach anyone on the team the scoop and score fumble recovery method. But if circumstances call for your team to empliy this method, this is something that has to be taught and practiced as well. The player must approach the ball under control with his fingers in the same position as we teach below the waist catches, pinkies together with hands outstretched and with the finger tips just off the top of the grass. The player must bend his knees and widen his feet a bit as he approaches the football to insure he gets a grasp of the ball on his first pass. Once he has the ball in his possession, the ball needs to be secured high and tight with the end of the ball covered by his hand. The player then has to accelerate to regain his speed.

Just line your kids up in a 2 point stance and roll the ball out about 5 yards in front of the line, you want the player gathering the ball while the ball is still moving. Once the player gains possession he has to take it upfield to a cone about 20 yards away at full speed. The next progression, have a coach stationed about 5 yards from where the ball is going to be tossed. The coach can either stay in place or move towards the ball as it is rolling. If the recovery attempt is threatened, the player uses the safe cradle recovery. If the coach isn’t close to the ball, the player can safely scoop and score and uses that recovery method. Teach your players how to make the right choice.

Whichever choice you make, make sure your players are proficient at recovering the ball. That includes when you are on offense or defense. Any offensive play with the ball on the ground is a live play even when you are doing drills or running plays on air with no defenders. Turnovers are a top 3 determining factor in youth football.

Copyright 2010 Cisar Management, all rights reserved. This article may be republished but only if this paragraph and link are included. http://winningyouthfootball.com

The True Story of Injury Risk in Youth Football

Some people, mostly the proverbial “soccer moms”  have a fear their children will be hurt if they play youth football. Even Lombardi/Outland winner Ndomukong Suh’s mother wouldn’t allow him to play football until he got into the 8th grade, she required him to play soccer. Mr Suh’s boredom with soccer and relentless pestering of mom finally resulted in her finally relenting and saying yes to real football when he turned 13.

My guess is most of the youth football naysayers probably have never even seen a youth football game. It seems many of them think Junior is going to be smacked around by 4.4 forty guys who weigh 220 lbs like they see on TV on Saturdays and Sundays. While it’s normal for moms to be protective of their children, medical facts and statistics just don’t support their fear. Most youth football players bear little resemblance to the guided missile freak athletes mom sees when she’s flipping through the channels and stumbles onto an ESPN highlights snippet.

The real facts found in a Mayo clinic report say that “the risk of injury in youth football does not appear greater than the risk associated with other recreational or competitive sports.” Interestingly enough the study also found there was no correlation between body weight and injury. So much for little Johnny being “too small” to play youth football.

Personally I’ve coached for over 20 years and I’ve only had kids suffer broken bones 2 times and neither were what most would call “serious injuries.” On the other hand I have had MANY of my players injured during the season, while doing non football activities. I’ve had kids break their arms and collar bones riding bikes and skateboarding. Had kids suffer neck injuries from swimming, concussions from riding horses and debilitating knee injuries from playing baseball. Unfortunately football has an undeserved reputation for being a rough sport with a lot of injuries.

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I find it amazing that most moms are just fine with Junior not wearing a helmet or ANY PROTECTIVE EQUIPMENT when he is riding his bike (on concrete), skating (on concrete), skateboarding (on concrete), Jet skiing, snow skiing or riding horses. Yet somehow playing football on a grassy field in a certified protective helmet with mask, shoulder pads, padded pants and mouthpiece is somehow more dangerous than all these other activities? Where’s the beef?

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In todays “helicopter mom” world where many parents seem to want to control the outcome of every event in their childrens lives, maybe we see more of this type of unwarranted fear. Or maybe our beloved sport is the victim of those that for whatever reason don’t like it. Personally I’ve never tried to convince a soccer family they should quit playing soccer and play football. I have however met lots of soccer people that are hell bent on convincing most people they meet that you are somehow unenlightened if your kids aren’t playing soccer. They seem to get frustrated that you don’t appreciate 0-0 ties and the insomnia relief watching soccer on tv provides to the non soccer loving world.  This is a problem I don’t have the answer to.

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Fortunately I’ve never had a mom come out and tell me to my face that they weren’t going to let their kids play because they thought the sport was too dangerous, but I know plenty of guys that have. The net is you have to feel bad for the kids, but do you really want an overprotective mom or dad trying to control every outcome for a player on your team? Do you think those kinds of parents are going to be fun to work with? Do you have LOTS of time to answer their loooooong daily e-mails? Do your best, put on a great face for our sport but don’t beg. You may get what you wish for and end up enduring that “season from hell” veteran coaches warn you about.

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The Mayo Clinic Story
Thursday, April 11, 2002
Injuries Uncommon in Youth Football, Mayo Clinic Study Reports
ROCHESTER, MINN. — A Mayo Clinic study of youth football showed that most injuries that occurred were mild, older players appeared to be at a higher risk and that no significant correlation exists between body weight and injury.
The study, which appears in the April issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings, found that the data for athletes grades four through eight indicated that the risk of injury in youth football does not appear greater than the risk associated with other recreational or competitive sports.
“Our analysis showed that youth football injuries are uncommon,” said Michael J. Stuart, M.D., a Mayo Clinic orthopedic surgeon and the principal author of the study.
Dr. Stuart and his colleagues studied 915 players aged 9 to 13 years, who participated on 42 football teams in the fall of 1997. Injury incidence, prevalence and severity were calculated for each grade level and player position. Additional analyses examined the number of injuries according to body weight.
A game injury was defined as any football-related ailment that occurred on the field during a game that kept a player out of competition for the reminder of the game, required the attention of a physician, and included all concussion, lacerations, as well as dental, eye and nerve injuries. The researchers found a total of 55 injuries occurred in games during the season — a prevalence of six percent. Incidence of injury expressed as injury per 1,000 player-plays was lowest in the fourth grade (.09 percent), increased for the fifth, sixth and seventh grades (.16 percent, .16 percent, .15 percent respectively) and was highest in the eighth grade (.33 percent).
Most of the injuries were mild and the most common type was a contusion, which occurred in 33 players. Four injuries (fractures involving the ankle growth plate) were such that they prevented players from participating for the rest of the season. No player required hospitalization or surgery.
The study’s authors said risk increases with level of play (grade in school) and player age. Older players in the higher grades are more susceptible to football injuries. The risk of injury for an eighth-grade player was four times greater than the risk of injury for a fourth-grade player. Potential contributing factors include increased size, strength, speed and aggressiveness. Analysis of body weight indicated that lighter players were not at increased risk for injury, and in fact heavier players had a slightly higher prevalence of injury. This trend was not statistically significant. Running backs are at greater risk when compared with other football positions, the researchers reported.
Other authors who contributed to the study include: Michael A. Morrey, Ph.D., Aynsley M. Smith, RN, Ph.D., John K. Meis, M.S., all from the Mayo Clinic Sports Medicine Center and Cedric J. Ortiguera, M.D., a Mayo Clinic orthopedic surgeon in Jacksonville, Fla.
Mayo Clinic Proceedings is a peer-reviewed and indexed general internal medicine journal, published for 75 years by Mayo Foundation, with a circulation of 130,000 nationally and internationally.
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Contact:
John Murphy
507-538-1385 (days)
507-284-2511 (evenings)
e-mail: newsbureau@mayo.edu

Copyright 2010 Cisar Management, all rights reserved. This article may be republished but only if this paragraph and link are included. http://winningyouthfootball.com

 Daddy favoritism is one of the most common and deadly team killers in youth football. Almost all of us have seen it, the average player who is put into a no-win situation by a well meaning but selfish or delusional father. The average baseball player who would make a pretty good outfielder is made the starting short stop or ace pitcher by his dad. In football, the average player who would make a real good Tight End, who dad has named as the starting Quarterback. Nothing tears a team apart quicker than this type of favoritism. The parents and kids quickly lose respect for the coach and when there is no respect, there is no trust and without trust, forget about having a team that is “all in.”

How do you make sure this ugly problem doesn’t rear its ugly head in your organization? It starts first in the coaching interview process. Some organizations don’t allow dads to coach on the same teams their sons are on. Others will let them coach Jr’s team, but won’t allow dad to coach the position his son plays. You can often find out where a dads coaching motivation is by asking him a simple question like; “We have a policy against dads coaching their own sons directly, how do you feel about that?” It depends how many quality coaches you have in your organization as to what type of policy you can live with.

No matter which direction you go, you have to set expectations with your coaching staff. Have EXPLICIT written out position descriptions for each and every position on your youth football team, so EVERYONE is on the same page as to what “flavor” of player you are looking for at each position. List the requirements for each position; list the type of speed, quickness, body control, strength, aggressiveness and smarts needed to effectively play it. Then map your requirements into your evaluation drills and games. Next, make sure you accurately grade those evaluations.

If the top requirement for position “A” is that the player be able to run through traffic, if little Johnny wasn’t one of the top three players on the Gauntlet Drill, he shouldn’t be considered for that position. The simplest way to figure some of these positions out is to make the drills competitive and group the players based on results. Let’s say you are evaluating players for Linebacker and the position requirement said the player must be one of the best athletes who plays aggressively and can tackle consistently in space. You could figure out who the best choices would be by running the Three Slot Challenge tackling drill in 3 groups. You line up 3 groups all doing the drill, if a player wins (ball carrier doesn’t cross the line of scrimmage) he goes to the group on the right, if he loses he goes to the group on the left. At the end of 15 minutes all your best in space tacklers are going to be in group 3. If you want to make it very interesting just have the remaining kids in group 3 fight it out. The winners get to stay in, the losers are out. If dads budding little Linebacker is in group 1, forgetaboutit, he isn’t a Linebacker candidate. Look to the Evaluating Players thread in this blog for more ideas.

Make sure to have a coaches clinic and emphasize that the goal is to maximize the team dynamic which means you have to have the kids playing in positions that are appropriate for their skill set. Let all the coaches know that there can not be any favoritism whatsoever towards their own children. It’s best to be stern and upfront so you don’t have to deal with the problem later on.

Just remember when you are faced with this situation that it isn’t the poor kids fault, most of them know where they stand in when it comes to their peers- they know. In fact it’s been my experience that most of these kids would prefer, enjoy and even excel at a position or role that was more in sync with their skills. Too many of these poor kids get turned off of the game because of a few dads that are delusional about their own kids skills.

If you’re lucky like me, you will run into coaches that error on the other side of the equation. I had one head coach who had a son with great hands but he rarely threw to him. I ended up having his boy play for me one season, he caught 11 touchdown passes that year. When I asked the dad why he didn’t throw to his very talented son more often, he replied he didn’t want to appear like he was playing favorites. Doing competitive evaluation drills saves you when your son is a stud player- those drills will show everyone what is what and who is who. As a dad you have to be fair, I’ve coached my own kids a handful of years and there was never any controversy. I made sure they never got issued a new helmet or new pants, put them at the back of every line to the point no one knew I had a kid playing on the team until they saw the roster in print or saw me drive home with the boy in the front seat of my truck.

Copyright 2010 Cisar Management, all rights reserved. This article may be republished but only if this paragraph and link are included. http://winningyouthfootball.com