Summer Workouts For Wide Receivers

We think playing football wide receiver is science and an art form.  It requires many different skills. There are many myths about playing wide receiver.  You must be tall.  Not exactly true.  You must be very fast.  Not exactly true.  You must be shifty. Not exactly true.

Routes and pass patterns are lines drawn by coaches in playbooks. The routes don’t get you open, it’s what you do during those routes that gets you open.

For Flag or Tackle Youth — How you to get better.

There are many skills that you need to work on. Catching balls, running routes, getting off press coverage, blocking. Each of these skills is essential to being a good wide receiver. What can you do to improve these skills?

Catching the ball.

You have to train your hands and eyes to work together. It’s like taking a picture with a cell phone, your eyes need to be behind the camera so you can see what you are taking a picture of. Wherever your hands go, your eyes must go. Your eyes should always be behind the “camera” Your hands should be in the same position as holding a cell phone.

Use lacrosse balls or baseballs, but catch them like a football with 2 hands, it trains your hands to stay together and forces you to look the ball in. It also forces you to have “soft” hands and have some give when catching a much harder ball.

Running and tracking a lacrosse ball and catching it with 2 hands trains your eyes and hands to work together.

Running Routes

Running a good route requires a good stance and start. False steps and wasted movement is wasted time. You have to practice getting off the ball at the snap as quickly as possible.

Use cones or t shirts to run routes at the proper yardage. Always add 1 to 2 yards to the route when practicing. Meaning if you are working on a 10 yard post route, practice it always at 12 yards, in a game things get sped up and players run their routes shorter.

Work on the routes you run the most. If your team runs hitches and out routes, work on those, not on deep go routes and deep posts if that is not something your team does much of.

Getting Off Press Coverage

If you can’t get off press coverage you will struggle to be a productive player. There are 3 major factors to getting off press coverage. The 3 P’s (Patience, Plan, Practice)

Patience, most players rush getting off press, be patient, work a move, clear the DB’s hands. Plan, you can’t decide what you are going to do once the ball is snapped, you have to have a plan. EX I’m going to fake inside then go outside.

Practice, you have to practice the different releases you are going to use. You have to have 2 good releases, good DB’s figure out 1, so you need a changeup. Get a partner and have them be in press coverage, work on getting off the press, focus on getting the DB’s hands off you.

Blocking

Blocking as a wide receiver is a difficult task. You usually have to block a talented athlete and you have to do it out in space.

You have to be under control. Do not sprint at the defender, he will just step around you. You have to breakdown, 3-5 yards in front of the defender, you have to have your hands up and be prepared to move “mirror” the defender. Work on keeping your weight back and do not lunge.

To practice this, get a partner, get them out and space, sprint to a distance 3-5 yards from the defender, mirror his movements, eventually the DB will “trigger” or move to the ball, that is when you can block the defender.

CONCLUSION:

Whether you are a flag or tackle player, NFL Alumni Youth Football Camps believes in teaching the wide receiver to be a “complete football player” — which will lead to more playing time and success.