Hi Coach Marty, I'd like to know how it goes. We played against a very athletic team who played something similar to a 4-1 zone. They did have a rusher. From an offensive viewpoint, our head coach (offense) would call deep seam routes and a lot of post plays. It tore up their defense since they were not able to cover the multiple routes with one safety. We have a smart athletic QB who able to make the rusher miss the first attempt letting the play develop. While looking upfield, he was able to figure out the safety's assignment. Long story, short; you will have to give up some big plays if your rusher can't disrupt the QB. When the defense switched to a 3-2 (3 Linebacker playing 3-4 from LoS, and 2 secondary), we couldn't get any successful deep play to convert. I had our 10-11yo try a 1-3-1 (some call it 1-1-3; IE, 1 Lineman, 3 LB, 1 Sfty) it was very effective against the run plays. In our league, there are so many end-arounds and reverses that our kids get confused, so it is easy to tell them to 'stay-at-home' and let the play come to them and turn it back inside where the speedy lineman and middle linebacker can pull flags. We gave up the 4-5 yard gains, but prevented the really long runs. We did get burned for one long pass and TD, though. But we expected that. I hope you had a good week. I'll subscribe to follow the progress and see if we should implement the 4-1.
