31 replies to this topic

[Orange]

Thanks.........


We won our i9 tournament this weekend.The first game was definitely the best one.They had a big physical kid who could go up and get it and could truck down the field.They were ok and had some lazy kids so we ended up winning the 2nd half and winning the game.

The 2nd game was a blowout...The kids came out ready to play and just stepped up big.We rolled down the field easily to a nice win.I was proud of them.They of course threw water all over me once that game was over lol but it was great to win it all.

Yea! Great job!

[Coach Rob]

4) teach kids to blow by the defender when running. kids at this age like to "dance and juke", which usually ends up with the other team pulling a flag. we try and teach our kids to run full speed, don't look back, don't look down to see if someone pulled your flag and don't stop until you hear a whistle. we incorporate this drill with some end arounds, pitches or straight hand offs. usually a coach will be out as a defender and brush the runners flag to see if they stop or delay.

I have 3 players that do this. How do I teach them to stop. I tell them to go full speed, don't stop, but they always stop, trying to trick the defender.

This is why I like to use a smaller "alley" for a portion of my flag pulling drills. If a kid only has a 15 ft wide path to run through, dancing and juking isn't going to cut it, the best way to get by the flag puller is running full speed. I would also suggest taking the kids that stop, juke, look down and working with them independently. Every time they stop or slow down, start the drill over again. Once they blow by the defender without getting their flag pulled make a HUGE deal out of it. I've had several of my smaller 8 yr olds score TD's this year simply because they took off running and didn't look back.

I've also noted that it's the same players that get tricked while defending. My son is one of them and I want him to understand how to not get tricked and pull flags better. (as well as make the occaisional TD!)

Best advice I can give here is tell your defender to look at the opponents belly button or flag belt area. Kids have a tendency to look at the head or upper body. Same deal as above, the more reps on pulling flags, the better they will get. Once they pull a flag, make a HUGE deal out if it. Lots of praise, etc.

Bottom-line: Catch those kids doing something right and reward them through praise. Get excited, high fives, stop practice and say, "Did you just see what Billy did? That's how you pull a flag!".

CRob

One other thought, we usually pick 2-3 things on offense and defense to emphasize and leave it there. Keep it simple so the kids hear the same thing over and over again. "Remember, run full speed, straight ahead, don't look back" "Look at their belly not their head", etc. Pick a few and keep emphasizing them over and over again.

[HornFan]

Thanks, I think I do the praise thing pretty good.

I need to try not to cover too much and limit the things we emphasize. And working one on one should help. I just need to figure out how to get the head coach to go along with it.

[rushbuster70]

Alright So I've come up with a new practice schedule for my team.We ended our season with winning our championship.But our next season will be starting up here within a month.I"m looking foward to it...I'll post some drills that we plan on doing later...But I wanted to see if anyone had any QB specific drills for drop backs and WR for catching..

Thanks

Coach Anthony

[rushbuster70]

Coaches...When the season starts feel free to post your practice info in here so we can help each other out

[RMH]

This is my first season coaching 7-9 year-olds. We are in an i9 league, which means we get one 60 minute practice right before the game each week. This forum has provided some great drills; it's just been difficult to get to them all with such a short practice. I'm trying not to information overload the kids.

It's important to know I'm a very disorganized person. Because I know this about myself and I know the kids won't learn much at an unorganized practice, I spend a lot of time planning each practice. Here's my practice schedule:

 Practice Schedule.doc   42.5K   230 downloads
(It's normally a spreadsheet, but I can't attach spreadsheets)

Each drill has notes on it so that I'll remember what I want to stress. I also list "Optional Drills" at the bottom more as just a place to keep drills for planning the next practice. Any and all feedback would be appreciated!

[Brett]

There has been some great stuff in here, so first thanks to everyone who posts. I have a question for the group though. Im coaching in a 5 on 5 league. Which has a first down at midfield and only allows 3 downs to make a first. None of the kids on my team have a "cannon" for an arm and running plays only net us 10 yards max. I've got a great bunch of kids that know how to run routes, the problem is at QB. None of the kids are very good at reading defenses. Does anyone have any suggestions for how to improve my QBs vision and passing abilities? Do i just need to run more reps in practice for him. I've tried to break down on the playbook (which i also got from you guys, THANKS!!) which receivers to look to first. But its not helping. Any thoughts from anyone?

V/R

Brett Russ

[Coach Rob]

Does anyone have any suggestions for how to improve my QBs vision and passing abilities? Do i just need to run more reps in practice for him. I've tried to break down on the playbook (which i also got from you guys, THANKS!!) which receivers to look to first. But its not helping. Any thoughts from anyone?

Age group?

[Brett]

Does anyone have any suggestions for how to improve my QBs vision and passing abilities? Do i just need to run more reps in practice for him. I've tried to break down on the playbook (which i also got from you guys, THANKS!!) which receivers to look to first. But its not helping. Any thoughts from anyone?

Age group?

8-10 with 2-3 years experience playing flag football

[Coach Rob]

Sounds like you're allowing your QB to choose who is open on pass plays? If you have a rusher coming in full speed that will be a daunting task for 8-10 y/o's.

I'd say 80% of the time, my QBs know who the primary receiver is in the huddle. Most of my pass plays are play action or misdirection with the intention of our primary receiving being open. I have a few plays where I tell the QB to pick someone, but even those have play action or a hard roll out in a trips formation.

In our league you can send multiple rushers from 7 yds out upon snap. Also, the QB has 7 seconds to get rid of the ball, so scrambling around doesn't work so well. The teams that execute quickly on offense seem to be the more successful ones.

[Texas_D_Coach]

There has been some great stuff in here, so first thanks to everyone who posts. I have a question for the group though. Im coaching in a 5 on 5 league. Which has a first down at midfield and only allows 3 downs to make a first. None of the kids on my team have a "cannon" for an arm and running plays only net us 10 yards max. I've got a great bunch of kids that know how to run routes, the problem is at QB. None of the kids are very good at reading defenses. Does anyone have any suggestions for how to improve my QBs vision and passing abilities? Do i just need to run more reps in practice for him. I've tried to break down on the playbook (which i also got from you guys, THANKS!!) which receivers to look to first. But its not helping. Any thoughts from anyone?

V/R

Brett Russ

At this age (8-10) some kids can read defenses and find the open man and some just can't. You have to adjust your offense to the kids you have. If your QB is not good at reading defenses, use plays that misdirect the defense the other way so that there is a high percentage possiblity that his #1 option will always be open for him. My #2 QB is like that, so when he's in the game, I run short crossing routes that are easy reads and easy throws for him. They are the blue drag and green drag in my playbook posted n the playbook section.

[Texas_D_Coach]

If a kid only has a 15 ft wide path to run through, dancing and juking isn't going to cut it, the best way to get by the flag puller is running full speed. I would also suggest taking the kids that stop, juke, look down and working with them independently. Every time they stop or slow down, start the drill over again. Once they blow by the defender without getting their flag pulled make a HUGE deal out of it. I've had several of my smaller 8 yr olds score TD's this year simply because they took off running and didn't look back.

Coach Rob,
I used the gauntlet drill for the first time last night in practice. The kids really liked it and I really liked the flag pulling results. I think I may have made the alley a little too narrow though (about 10 feet wide), because nobody was able to make it past the second flag puller with getting a flag pulled. Do you ever have anyone make it all the way through? I also used this drill as an optimal time to work on spin moves as that seemed to be the best way to get past the defenders in such a narrow space.

[Coach Rob]

Do you ever have anyone make it all the way through? I also used this drill as an optimal time to work on spin moves as that seemed to be the best way to get past the defenders in such a narrow space.

You could scoot it out to 15 yards, but I'm looking for kids to get bumped around a bit so we don't make it too wide. Yes, some kids do make it all the way through, we'll have a contest to see how far each kid can make it. To make it through you're going to feel 3 kids tugging, pulling and scraping - so if you don't look down, keep the legs moving and run hard, you have a chance. We go nuts when a kid does that to reinforce the basics of running.

We use the drill to:
1) Get the kids pumped up right before the game
2) Get some success at pulling flags
3) Teach the runners not to stop and juke - run hard fast north/south
4) Teach runners not to look down even if they think their flag was pulled

[Nuno]

Sounds like you're allowing your QB to choose who is open on pass plays? If you have a rusher coming in full speed that will be a daunting task for 8-10 y/o's.

I'd say 80% of the time, my QBs know who the primary receiver is in the huddle. Most of my pass plays are play action or misdirection with the intention of our primary receiving being open. I have a few plays where I tell the QB to pick someone, but even those have play action or a hard roll out in a trips formation.

In our league you can send multiple rushers from 7 yds out upon snap. Also, the QB has 7 seconds to get rid of the ball, so scrambling around doesn't work so well. The teams that execute quickly on offense seem to be the more successful ones.

I am coaching 11-14 kids who are just starting to learn football because, around here, (Portugal, Europe) the game is absolutly ignored. We play 5 on 5 but since we have only ... 5 kids they have to practice against the older guys (17-23).

My QB was an interception machine but started to get it right as soon as we designated a receiving order and organized the routes to create always a two-receivers-in-the-same-visual-area situation with the near one being the primary.

We expect him to capitalize on the confidence the higher completion will generate to start working with more agressive routes.

Our sessions start with 15 to 20 minutes physical with the last ones focusing on speed and explosiveness. Then we move on to agility drills without ball (10 minutes). We keep on doing agility drills but with the ball (10 minutes), We then do offense and/or defensive game situation drills, like routes and flag pulling (up to 20 minutes). We always try to end with a game (maximum 30 minutes).

[COACHRAUL]

I'm happy to share what I do, and I'm certain each situation is different.

I have 6-8 year olds. First, we have three practices per week (1 to 1.5 hours each). I script what I want to cover the night before.

We have 12 players on the team, with eight on the field during the game. I don't have any assistant coaches (although I encourage parents to help if they want---but they rarely do). This is fine, however.

I try to stress "team dynamics" so we usually start in circle, where we lightly toss the ball around, and just talk about whatever is on our mind. As an example, in tomorrow's "circle" I want to talk to my team about congratulating each other when we make a great play (I want to see high-fives everywhere) and helping players (on both teams) get up in a game when one falls down. We did not do a good job at either in our first game.

I incorporate a "Player of the Week" award, which goes to the player who worked the hardest in practice, listened the best, and left everything he had on the field both in practice that week and in the game. Not necessarily who played the best, but who played the hardest. This player gets to wear a special jersey that I had designed during practice that week. He also gets to "autograph" the jersey, and will be our team captain for the week. Thus in the first practice of the week, we congratulate our POW.

Next I'll run some quick drills (Jingle Jangle, Mini-End Zones, etc). Something to get their juices flowing.

Next I'll line up all the kids and we go over the passing tree. The kids know all the routes now, so it only take 3-5 minutes.

Then we will begin going though our plays. Here is where it gets tricky. As mentioned we have 12 players and eight on the field. So I take eight of them, and we run plays, (with the remainder on defense) then I sub in and out. We do this for about 30 minutes.

We will then do another drill or two, and then go over plays again.

We end practice playing "sharks and minnows". This is where we start with one person on the field (the shark) with the other kids (the minnows) having to run past the shark without having their flag pulled. Whichever minnow(s) get their flagged pulled become sharks and we keep going. If you have not tried it you ought to, it is a lot of fun.

I then end practice with a quick pep-talk and we do our team cheer. I guess it sounds boring, but the kids (and I) really have fun at practice. As you know, it's merely a balancing act of teaching while keeping it fun.

I've tried to reach out to the different coaches in the league to scrimmage with us, but have not had any takers. One coach said he would, but then when I told him I had 6-8 year olds he changed his mind (he has 11-13 year olds). I told him we could "hang" with the big-boys, but he still declined.

I hope this helps some. If you want specifics on the drills I do, I am happy to send them to you. I have about seven or eight (but we don't do them each practice). I'm curious as to how you other coaches handle your practices.

Thanks