QB Counter Game

DYNAMIC QUARTERBACKS

Today's game of football is starting to trend toward athletic more dynamic athletes at the QB position.  The ability of the QB to be an effective runner and thrower is forcing defenses to change how they want to defend an offense now.  Not only is there the read option game, but you now have 10 personnel sets essentially becoming 20 personnel sets because the QB is a very efficient runner sometimes acting as another tailback.  This gives you the ability to spread the defense while still attacking it with hard, downhill 2 back style runs.

Today we will talk about the QB Counter as a misdirection play to compliment and protect your fast flow outside runs.  One of the most important things to remember as an offensive play caller is you must have plays that protect your plays. If you are a team that likes to run jet or fly sweep types of plays with flat motion, you will need plays off of this action that help slow the defense down.  One of the first things a defense will do to stop the jet action is roll a safety down to the motion side to gain an extra player with leverage on the jet sweep.  You must be able to attack the areas of the defense that are vulnerable when this occurs.  Misdirection or counter plays help slow the defense down by making them honor the runs or throws away from the motion.  By doing this you are protecting your fast flow plays by slowing the defense's reaction down.  Play action passes, screens, and bootlegs are also effective ways to keep the defense honest.  A good offense must slow down the reaction time of the defense and cause doubt in their mind.  The best defense's are generally aggressive in nature with players that fly around and play very fast.

The QB Counter for me was always a predetermined, called run that we would not read.  I wanted plays in my offense that let me dictate who has the ball.  The Read portion of the QB Run game can be extremely effective, but a well coached defense can dictate to you who the ball carrier is.  The scheme is very easy to teach because it follows simple gap down rules.  About 85% of our run game involves gap schemes which makes it a lot easier to have carry over in your run game.  The counter scheme is almost identical to the power scheme because you have gap down play side rules with a player responsible for kicking a C gap player out, and a player responsible for wrapping on an inside LB.  The misdirection is provided by adding a jet sweep or outside zone player that will carry out a fake away from the counter that holds the defense longer giving your lineman the angles needed to win on their leverage side.  

I made sure to include a read scheme in the video for those of you who want your counter game to be part of your option game or packaged plays as well.  The counter play can be drawn up from several formations with several motions to "dress it up" and make it harder to defend.  Make sure you block first level players first as the key to any good offense is avoiding negative plays.  I hope you can add this play to your offensive arsenal to drive defense's crazy and help you move the chains.

PLAY FAST