Playing Football - Drills to Improve on Handoffs and Ball Security
March 7, 2009 by admin
Filed under Football Coaching Drills
When you are trying to learn how to play football, learning the basics in a handoff is essential to a strong offense. Let’s look at a simple hand off between a quarterback and a running back to point out the fundamentals of this skill. A running back at the start of a hand off should give the quarterback a target by opening up his arms that are in front of his chest enough to allow about one and a half footballs in. When the running back receives the football he clamps down both arms hard on the football to protect it. The running back should stay low.
When you need to know how to play football, you should be aware that practice can help drills. There is a golden rule in football defense, get the ball to the offensive team as quickly as possible. The fastest way to gain possession of the ball is to force an offensive player to fumble the football. A great way to practice is have two players line up, one as the defense, the other with the football as the offense. The defender will practice stripping the ball by bringing his hands up quickly with a clenched fist to grab the opponent and as he does so to aim to knock out the football. This drill is most effective if you begin it very slow.
When you need to know how to play football, you should know that ball security has to be the most important aspect of a strong offensive team and you should know this when you need to know how to play football. This of course is even more important for wide receivers and running backs as they handle the ball more than most.
One drill that has been used several times to improve ball security is called the gauntlet drill. This drill is set up with one ball carrier, there objective is to run through a group of opponents that try to knock the ball out. The opponents can line up in any scenario, the most common being two lines and the ball carrier must run through them. To be effective with this drill have the ball carrier run the drill holding the ball in several different positions.
