Youth Lineman Camps in Washington

Barton Football Academy is pleased to announce the launch of our Youth (5th and 6th grade) Lineman Camps! Every Saturday in April from 11am to 12 pm at Garfield High School.

These will be introductory type sessions that will allow young players to grow and learn. One thing that sets our sessions apart from anyone else: we teach skills. We do not run kids through drills and call it good. Our sessions will consist of 2 phases each approximately a half hour in length.

Our focus will be on:

Defensive Emphasis: Proper explosive get-off, use of proper hand technique and defeating blocks.

Offensive Emphasis: Run blocking fits, playing with angles and leverage, and utilizing solid pass protection footwork.

"Start Young, Never Quit"

Regardless of level or system these fundamental tools will help any lineman become a more rounded and explosive player. I look forward to the great work we will do!

Please go to http://www.bartontraining.com/home.php to register and stay updated on the many exciting events we have planned for the summer months, and information on camps for the other positions.

Clinic Season

Every play is drawn up to score

Had the privilege the last few weekends to attend the All-Sports Clinic as well as the Glazier Clinic in Seattle.

So as I mentioned in last years clinic post, I don't go into theses sessions to learn grand schematic changes. I am only looking for better ways to teach, insights that I find interesting, maybe a drill or two that complements what we do, and ultimately if I get one or two 'nuggets' it has been a great clinic. So here you go. Enjoy.


1. Wisconsin D-Line vs Run and vs Pass by Charles Partridge (Asst H.C./D-Line/Co-Defensive Coordinator) at Glazier

***** Went to this session to learn the 'anti-technique.' We are oil and water and we need to know what 'they' are doing in order to defeat it*******

      a. Pass Rush: Outside arm reach= key to having a good pass rush
      b. Pass Rush: Defensive Ends- Must have depth awareness. Defensive Tackles- Must have ratio awareness
      c. Pass Rush: Vertical for 3/4 steps before making decision. Most Ends want to take the path right through the tackle.
 

2. Faster than the Fly: Rocket Sweep by Blair Hubbard (Head Coach at Faith Christian High School (CO) ) at All-Sports

      a. 'Hyperactive Outside Zone'
      b. Pre-Snap motion means defense has to 'cheat'- roll, move and try to set leverage
      c. The speed of the ball getting to the edge means you can false pull and set-up huge backside action      (screens and counters to take advantage of the over pursuit of the defense) 

Some film from Coach Hubbard


3. Wyoming Spread Run by Head Coach Dave Christenson at Glazier

      a. They use huge splits because they don't have great personnel. Allows them to only have to 'wall-off' instead of block
      b. QB depth was 6 and TB path crosses the face of the QB for 2 steps before either bouncing or banging
      c. It was great to see a college offense using the same types of schemes as you. This was validation for some of the things we will put emphasis on next year. Which I thought was pretty cool.




4. Inside Zone and Outside Zone by Aaron Best (Offensive Coordinator/O-Line Coach at Eastern Washington University) at Glazier

      a. In general O-Line coaches have to love technique more than most positions. They are going against guys that are better than them on every snap.
      b. "Replace guys"- that will put you were they are at.
      c. Think about this: We are the only position on the field with our backs to the ball.

Outside Zone

Get the edge set...

One the better compliments to the 'tight' zone we run is the 'outside' zone.

We tell our tackles and guards on the playside to 'secure' the playside, and everyone from the Center back will 'punch through the fat guys' and 'get out and run' to the big uglies.

In practice we go over the different kinds of combinations that the tackles and guards can see and the appropriate blocks to run through the edge. After that I just make sure everyone is running to a spot.



Here is some film. With the type of kids we consistently get this is probably our number 2 running play.

Outside Zone

Lineman Camps in Washington

I recently had the opportunity to head up the Lineman Skills camp at the Barton Football Academy. For Washington, we offer sessions every weekend during this off-season time to prepare kids to go into the season ahead of the curve. The emphasis of these sessions will be on the development of proper technique, footwork and fundamentals of offensive and defensive line play.

Offensive Emphasis: Run blocking fits, playing with angles and leverage, and utilizing solid pass protection footwork.

Defensive Emphasis: Proper explosive get-off, use of proper hand technique and defeating blocks.

Regardless of level or system these fundamental tools will help any lineman become a more rounded and explosive player. Sessions are held on Saturday and Sundays at local high schools throughout the area and are open for registration on-line. Please see the website http://www.bartontraining.com for more information.

Also, see here for a little video of a recent session: http://www.northwesteliteindex.com/articles/jordan/feb12/bartonevent1.html

 More about this opportunity will be upcoming.

Lets Rock-n-Roll!

Boo-Yah!

Practice

"I'm a strong believer that the structure of your practice is the singularly most determining reason for your success or lack of success as a coach."  Bob Knight

So this article took shape a long, long time ago. It has just been very difficult to FINISH it...but here is what has been completed. 

Practice tenant: "The faster we go the better we get."

I have approximately 20 minutes on Tuesday and Wednesday of game week to do our individual drills. We split those two days up, Tuesday being a station day and Wednesday being a refinement/scheme/mental day (depending on what needs to be emphasized or prepared for.)

Tuesday-3 stations. (I do have the privilege of  having 2 assistant line coach who I absolutely trust. They are extensions of me and I am very fortunate to have them.)

We have two stations that that never change: a Drive Station and  a Screen station.

Drive Station: 7 or 8 players driving the sled. For us, the sled is not some mystical object that requires us to move it so much per season or per day. For us it is a way to ease the banging on the body (as the JV guys just played the day before) while allowing us to work the fit and the feet.

Screen Station: Here is essentially what we do. See the video is the best way to show it.

The final station I usually lead. It rotates between a pass pro drill and a zone station. The pass pro I call the 'hot box drill' and it's emphasizes a quick pass set and the quick short post/set steps that come from that.

For the zone station, we use a target system for the foot movement and step over bags for the track.

Most of this is here. This is from our summer skills rotation:

zone: The presentation

To kind of condense things and try to make sense of where I am going with my zone system, I built this presentation. This is really my first time doing this from a schematic point of view and not just throwing a bunch of tape together.

If anything jumps out or appears to be odd, please let me know. Would love some feedback.

Zone Presentation

Compliments to the Zone Scheme

Was playing around with these thoughts after watching a great Glazier eclinic the other day.


VEER?
As a change up of the backs aiming point, run veer away from the normal stretch of zone. All runs the same, must have tackle execute the sift correctly..ie if backer sits, you must block, if backer flows crack force.

MIDLINE?
Running Zone towards the back. Same look as veer, but a little bit hard hitting (more downhill.) Here the PST would make an under call, to go under the dive key.

We see almost all the teams we play slant to the back on our zone plays, and I think these would be great compliments to take advantage of those defensive adjustments.

Here is a similar concept we ran this year...a simple dive play, with out the reads. You can see, I think, how dynamic adding that wrinkle would make us.

http://www.hudl.com/presview/44824

Some Counters

Here are 2 of our favorite counter plays off the base zone action.


The first is a simple power look. We like this action because it starts out looking exactly like zone and then we bend it back over (hence the counter portion of the play.)

http://www.hudl.com/presview/44696

The other is similar action, but it is a tackle wrap play with the QB providing the counter action.

http://www.hudl.com/presview/44698