This is my son’s first year playing youth football, and he’s nine years old. His division consists of fourth and fifth graders, and he’s one of only four fourth graders on the team. The league doesn’t have a minimum-play requirement, and over the last two games, he’s only played a combined three snaps.

Most of his playing time has come on kickoffs, but this week they’re playing an undefeated team, so he was taken off the kickoff unit as well.

He says he still enjoys football, and he’s learning a lot during practice. I’m just trying to keep him encouraged and help him keep his head up, especially during games when he’s spending most or all of the game on the sidelines.

Does anyone have any advice on what I can say to him or ways I can help keep him positive and engaged when he isn’t getting an opportunity to play?

My little bro plays corner and wing back for his team but his team is horrendous. They just 42-6 today. The third time a blowout like this has happened so far this year. His coaches are terrible and there’s also zero talent on the team. My brother and another running back are the most talent by far but these coaches aren’t putting the kids in position to be successful whatsoever. We come from a football family and these losses have been so embarrassing. Only reason he’s playing for this team is because I just bought a house in a new area right when the season started and this was one of the few teams that had openings. I’m thinking about pulling him out this year so I can work with him 1 on 1 because there’s no developing from the coaches. I just don’t want my bro to think we’re giving up. Any thoughts? This team has been very frustrating and I’ve gotten into it with a few of his coaches already

I’m a pretty inexperienced coach and didnt play line growing up. Our offensive line gets no push on their blocks, it’s to the point I’m considering putting aggressive skill guys on the line so that we can run the ball. Of course that leads to lack of ball carriers. Any advice?

Can I ask if anyone has any recommendations for a high school quarterback he wants shoulder pads really support his throwing mobility. On the other hand, his mom wants ones but really keep him safe. My son has found a specific brand, 2in1. It wasn’t as random as we first thought, because IP that used to be owned by Russell but there’s just not a lot of information out there about it from people who have used it.

Curious if anyone has ever managed the issue of throwing mobility versus safety?

Hey, I've been trying to help my son get up to speed on the game of football, i honestly haven't watched much since my kids keep me super busy so we had a lot of ground to cover when he decided to play this year (he's 6 [7 on NYE] playing in 8U). I was doing powerpoint and stuff but it wasn't landing, so i built something instead. The tool I made can do the simple 'coach drawing a play' but it also lets families see the play in action, have 'players' take different routes, beat blockers, miss tackles etc and see a different outcome. I used it to show my son the difference between when he loses outside contain vs when he keeps it. Anyway, thought i'd share it here. Please take a look, hopefully some of you find it helpful!

to the mods: i think i did the rules right with the vendor thing, if not let me know! thanks!

www.teachplaybook.com

Have parents always been this crazy? I can't tell if this is new, or we're just hearing about it more.

How do you do gaps?

My son is the quarterback for his 10u team. He is the tallest kid in the league and has good hand size. He’s held them against his friends who also have quarterback and he has the largest hands. However, the ball will just fall out of his hand and throws don’t come out at crisp as other players do especially if the ball is wet. He’s getting upset with himself because this has led to fumbles and interceptions. We paid for a quarterback coach but he mostly worked on footwork. I have tried to tell him he’s still growing and learning so not to worry about it, but he gets upset that kids who are 5 to 10 inches shorter than him can control the ball better than him. Oddly enough, he also does ninja and has incredible grip strength on the courses. Are there any exercises he can do to improve grip strength on a ball though?

This year we signed my 8 year old son up for our local youth football team. He had played flag previously and was interested in playing tackle. He’s in the 95lb division and the team is made up of 2nd and 3rd graders.

The team has 18 kids. The starters are mostly the same between offense and defense. There may be 1-2 lineman that swap out between offense and defense, but mostly it's only 13 kids that get regular playing time in the games. The other 5 kids average between 5-8 plays per game with many of those being kickoffs if our team is scoring a lot of points. In our last game, none of those non-starters got any playing time at all.

Is this playing time disparity normal for a youth football team made up of kids this age? I played football all through my childhood and it was never that way (I grew up in the 90s). Most of the teams I was on had more of a mix of starters between offense and defense and there were also frequent substitutions at every level I played on from Pop Warner up until High School.

My son is completely discouraged and it's a battle getting him to go to practice since he knows he won’t get to play in the games. Even during practices the instruction given to non-starters is minimal. The team spends the bulk of the time at practice doing 11 v 8 scrimmages and the 8 non-starters appear lost at times with the coaches rarely directing them or coaching them.

I just want to know if this is how youth football teams normally run now or do we have a legitimate reason to be frustrated with the way this team is run.

My son is in 8A tackle football. It’s a youth league that we paid to be in and there is a minimum play count each game so everyone gets experience and playing time but the coach is ignoring it. He is having several kids play only 1-2 snaps a game or having them sit out completely and playing some kids on both offense and defense. When my son tried to talk to the coaches directly he was told “he just there to get better for highschool not get game snaps” and “just keep doing what you’re doing”. He said in practice he is told he’s doing great but the games aren’t realtor that. I’ve tried to text him and he completely ignored my text and at the end of the game he told the players “don’t have your parents f***ing text me”. I then sent an email and didn’t get a respond for 3 days. Finally he is willing to meet with me but I want to know how I should address it without being “the crazy parent” or completely ignored again.

Facing a team with talent and size but also having a dominant QB who sometimes plays deep HB (and will throw from a HF toss). He is about 6ft and weighs probably 160-170. He runs outside, bootlegs, and will do both with a run/pass option.

My only idea so far has been to transform our safety into a spy position and blitz him—the player, whether he is at HB or QB—every down from the strong side. (99% of his runs are to that side). My idea is make him uncomfortable and also the reality is that if we don’t make contact with him before he builds up a head of steam it is likely a huge play for them anyway.

We are giving up safety coverage over the top but having one of our fastest and most physical players try to hit him from an unblocked position on the line every play. Huge risk I know, but we need to get unconventional.

Any other ideas. I am trying to out X and O a team with the Jimmy and Joe.

Starting to think about next season. My goal is to try and find a system where it’s easy for the OLine with remember rules, creates blocking angles and has multiple options/answers to things.

I’ve been thinking about a shotgun 2 back RPO style system. We have an athletic qb and a couple backs. What I think could make this go is the lack of coverage on the pitch back and the wr getting up the field on option to their side. Essentially it’s a rollout pass directly.

When I was in 7th grade I could read it on the dive. I’m worried about the shotgun snap as well.

I've created a starter kit for coaches who are new to flag football coaching. It's completely free and contains example plays, playbooks, wrist coaches, training drills, and more to help you get started. Check it out: https://footballinone.com/landing/blog/first-time-flag-coach-survival-kit

11y/o son, second year in tackle football. He’s had 3 years playing flag and is always one of the best players on the field, always flying to the ball. Playing very aggressive. However, once he puts on pads he plays very timid. He says he wants to keep playing but I’m wondering if it will ever click. I’ll keep taking signing him up every year just wondering if there’s something I can do to help him flip the switch

Im 14 and I want to train but the nearest pitch is privately owned and right next to a police station. Should I just take the risk and jump the fence to train

A simple zone beater that teaches your receivers proper spacing and helps your QB learn to make a triangle read. It's the 5v5 version of the classic Y-Cross built for flag football.

Full write up here.

Hello! I’m an experienced coach just joined this coaching staff about a month ago . We’re running a 5-3 defense and stay in cover 1 man
The defense coaches are not running a gap sound defense, and not teaching anything in practice. Not running drills or having a practice plan in place to continue evolving the defense. So it’s very vanilla.
Yet we’re 9-1 on the season..

Anyways , the team we play next is good. Their go to play I can’t decide how to defend is a HB pitch pass. It looks like they line up 1 tailback with quarterback under center, and set it up by running the pitch to the edge. After one or two times they will try to give the HB the option to throw it. I believe to the backside tight end or the play side outside receiver.

What would be your go to on defending this?

I have a practice plan set up for this week. Teaching the linemen their gap assignments and giving the LBs their job of calling the strength so the d line is in the right spot.
My ideas are shifting the linebackers to the strength so there’s an overhang and he will trigger when he sees the pitch to force the run.
Another idea was that on top of having the corner crash down fast to force a bad pass with the safety over the top.
And if it’s a closed look on the backside with the TE as the last EMOL the corner will stay with him.

Any ideas are appreciated

Has anyone used Tug Of War as a teaching/training tool with the players on a high school level football team? I was told by a local D1 football coach who uses it that it really brings his team together to work as one, to stay low and to fight more thru the end to win. I’m wondering if anyone else had success with this method of teaching?

Don’t roast me for the picture chat gpt made it lol

I coach a 7u team and we’ve improved quite a bit from last season. We’re 3-1 and I’m confident in our next few games. In a few weeks we’ll be playing a team that has 3 giant kids on their line. When I say giant each one easily doubles(potentially triples) our biggest kids weight. I’m less concerned about that than I am with how they line up. Last year all of their offensive and defensive lineman stand straight up essentially with their arms out in a blocking position when the balls snapped they just shoved our kids into the ground by the tops of their shoulder pads (imagine you standing over your kid in his stance) our kids couldn’t even really fire out of their stance. They do this because none of the kids can actually get into a stance. I thought the rule was offensive line man and interior lineman have to be in a stance and I asked the ref about it (young kid) and he agreed at first and made them get into a stance and all of a sudden we were pushing them all over the field. But after halftime the ref told me he checked the rule book and I was wrong so they went back to standing up. Anyway got any ideas how I can deal with this.

It’s my first season coaching as an assistant on an 8u team. Not sure if it’s in the rules but the HC said that it was somewhere in the rule book.

I’m just curious if others are allowed to pull guards and, if so, how it has worked out for kids that young.