Minimum Play Strategies in the Pop Warner National Championships:
I saw a number of different minimum play strategies with varying degrees of success. The whole minimum play thing requires plenty of planning and execution in order to maximize the effectiveness of your team.
The head coach of the Richmond, FL Giants team that won the DI Midget title (the TV game) in an interview he did with me, said that “One of the main keys is getting your mmp plays out of the way so when the game is on the line, you have your best players on the field.” His team had all their mmp plays in by halftime. His strategy was to sub those players in a play here and there, alternating series with specific players on defense and offense, primarily in the line as well as a few spots on special teams. He talks about it here:
A Junior Midget team used an odd strategy that seemed to work for them, they would sub out 8-9 kids in to start an offensive series for the first 2 plays and then sub enmasse. The first 2 plays turned out to always be conservative running plays from their base offense, the would then come in and throw or if they were in 3rd and say 7, try and get at least half of it on a run, then go for it on 4th down. Seems like a risky strategy, but it worked for them. They made every 4th down attempt I saw them try. They started off a number of series just like that, in 1 early series they had the 8-9 mmp kids in for 2 plays on offense, they got 3-4 yards, the first teamers came in and got a first down and then the 8-9 mmp kids came back in for 2 plays got 2-3 yards, then the first teamers came back in and stayed in etc. It looked like a Chinese fire drill.
A Junior Midget team, subbed in an entire new offensive team for complete series of plays. The Detroit Dolphins were a Power I and Spread Gun team, when their MMP kids came in it was Power I all the way and all the runs were between the tackles. The opponent must have seen this in previous film, because they were ready for it. I doubt the Power I team made more than 1-2 yards on any of the plays when those mmp kids were in. It was 3 and out every time. So the Power I team wasted several drives and gave up field position in a game that was still in balance. After each time the backups were in the opponent scored on the ensuing drive.
In any case, in order to insure your kids get into the game while at the same time maximizing your competitive position, you must have a strategy and a plan. For my teams we practice our plan just like anything else, making for a much smoother game day while maximizing our teams potential.
