Passing in the Single Wing Offense

The next statements are the single most important factors in the success of your passing game. Develop, practice, then master protection schemes for each drop and sprint series. Linemen are the key to your team's success. It is an honor to be O-Line. Make sure everyone on the team knows it.

Passing is a symphony; comprised of good protection, route running, reads, and execution. This is why passing is challenging to implement well below the high school level. There just is not enough time.

Coaches your job is:

* Understand the different coverages. You need to be able to recognize cover 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. Know the weaknesses of each coverage and the areas of the field that are easiest to exploit.
* Watch film. Even at the youth level. Film every opponent and trade film. Look for tendencies and tells. Most athletes are animals of habit. Studies have been completed on pre-performance rituals in sport. Use them to your advantage.
* Coach up the athletes. Give them a chance to work on fundamentals and drill the routes, reads, and adjustments. Passing requires more work than the running game. Demand good technique and proper decision-making.
* Simulate game conditions as close as possible when running drills. Work on the plays you plan to use in the game. Use the playbook, 7-on-7, chalk board, defensive recognition drills, and videotape.

The Single Wing Quarterback must:

* Learn to read defensive schemes. The method for reading the defense should be the same each time. Look to the middle of the field; locate the free safety, then the strong safety. Look left at the cornerback. Look right at the cornerback, then at the linebackers. This has to be done in 2-3 seconds. Expect the defense to move around and try to disguise the coverage.
* When looking for the safeties, determine if the middle of the field is open or closed. Do this by seeing if a safety is between the goal posts or center up on the formation. Check the depth, eyes, and leverage of the cornerbacks. These give you an indication of zone or man coverage.
* If the corners are off 6 or more yards, lined up on or outside of the receiver and looking at you, it is probably a zone. If they are closer, either in bump and run or under 6 yards and looking at the receiver, it is probably man coverage.
* If the middle of the field is closed, the defense is cover 1 or 3. If the depth, eyes, and leverage of the corners look like zone, then the coverage is cover 3. If they are in a man look, it is cover 1.
* If the middle of the field is open, the defense is in cover 0,2,4, or 5. It is cover 2 or 4, if the corners look to be playing zone. It is cover 0 or 5, if the corners are in man. If the safeties have cheated up to under 10 yards and have their eyes on a man, expect cover 0, and if they are back, it will be cover 2 press, dog, or cover 5 depending on what you call it.

One last point that I see most coaches below the college level fail to do is to diagram each of the passing concepts within the system against each of the defenses. This one exercise will immediately improve the decision making speed and accuracy of the quarterback.