How Do You Coach Football

Specific questions pertaining to coaching High School Football
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@CoachMac8740

[@hunterhurst6444]

Really want to be a Head Coach someday, and I really appreciate your videos.

[@CoachMac]

Thank You, work hard and do your time. Don't try to climb ladder too quickly.

[@CoachMac]

If you are not in the education field then I suggest trying to volunteer at a local High School or Middle School. If you are a High School or College Student I suggest getting into the education field because the hours and schedules are most conducive to coaching.

[@jakobethomas5108]

Thomas MacPherson my BIGGEST dream is to be the greatest football coach in the football industry so THANK YOU🐐

[@coachworthy_]

I really appreciate all of your videos. I’m heading into my final year of college and plan on being a teacher / coach when I graduate.

[@mattlawrence6077]

This is the realist statement.

[@LoneWolfe_XX]

@@jakobethomas5108have you started your journey? If so how is it going?

[@asapra7elite591]

1. No huddle 2. Dual threat easily 3. Run the damn ball 4. Defer 5. Even 6. Two high 7-8. Depends on personnel and subject to change yearly based on the guys I have The 9. Swinging gate 10. Will install both preseason but will change week to week based on opponents weakness 11. Depends on my depth/practice time, pro style is more effective but requires more skill and time spent in practice. Shield isn’t as reliable but if you only have 20mins for punt each week it’s more time efficient 12. Speed kills, there’s a reason why the measure 40 time and not Max squat at the combine

[@CoachMac]

Love it

[@rcooper9110]

I'd love if you did a video on how to do a no-huddle offense? how do you teach it? How to make the calls from the QB?

[@rogerwelsh2335]

Great topic. In this day of KZbin I think it is so hard for coaches, especially newer ones to get overwhelmed by what philosophy, etc.. they should take on. There are so many great approaches to choose from that make it difficult to find your own identity. This video points out that you need to self assess which leads you to the right answer. Used to be in the old days was you coached like you were coached. You only knew what you were exposed to.

[@CoachMac]

Great point on the rules, was only thinking of it schematically. I was also thinking more of the personnel on the field with lineman being used in the shield effecting coverage. Differences in rules certainly play a part in schematic decisions.

[@romeda5156]

I’m just starting the transition from player to coach, so I appreciate that these videos are still up 👍🏾

[@CoachMac]

Thanks for watching

[@garymoore1600]

thanks coach! only thing on the punting...In the NFL ineligible receivers cannot pass the line of scrimmage until the ball is kicked, while I believe that's not the case in NCAA/HS. Because of this, many colleges utilize the shield punt formation, where you release all of the linemen into punt coverage immediately after a quick punch into their gap and getting out into their lanes, while leaving 3 punt protectors to block. So if it were allowed in the nfl more teams would do it

[@troyboy1179]

Great Video! Are you speaking at any clinics this off season?

[@CoachDomCosta]

Thank you for this Coach!!!!!!!!!!!

[@CoachChaneysTHECOMPLETEATHLETE]

Love your channel Coach...Thanks for the content!

[@CoachMac]

Thank you for watching.

[@klanker22]

Great video, Coach. Do you have any advice for someone looking to get involved in coaching? How did you get involved in coaching?

[@CoachMac]

Our kicking game was poor last year and has to improve. In high school I prefer to try and block punts due to the inconsistency of punters.

[@matthewkoster9967]

Just starting to get into coaching and loving this videos

[@CoachMac]

Thank you, hope it helps

[@frankblair8638]

Coach, can you explain how you adjust to motion out of your 2 Read concept? 3x1 to 2x2 and vice versa, TB motion, Motion to Quads, Motion to Trey out of 21 personnel. Really enjoy your blogs. Thanks Coach.

[@GG-lr3gv]

Huddle or no huddle? - I’m old school in this sense, I love huddling. In my first year coaching 8th graders we huddled 90% of the time and ran extremely efficient and effective offense. As an assistant in HS, we’re totally no huddle and have been since I was a player here, but I do miss huddling as a form of communication on offense. Limiting penalties that come from people not knowing what’s going on is how you win close games. Traditional or dual-threat? - My brother was a rare traditional QB who earned All-State honors as a senior. I love the QB run and so does our HC/OC and there was open competition when my brother was a junior. However, I don’t think you can put a price on throwing a good ball into tight coverage, it opens up tons of options in the pass game. The ability to manage a game and play well under pressure are important as well. Passing or running? - I am huge on establishing the run, but the best teams we’ve had have been built off of great receiver play and the ability to blow the cover off a defense. Receive or defer? - We take the ball. We want to be an aggressive team as often as possible even in bad weather games. We want that attitude in our players as well, go for broke. Odd or even? - Always depends on who we have. Single or 2 high? - Depends on who we have and who we play. Our DC likes zone over man for sure, but I personally like to get aggressive as often as possible getting more people near the line of scrimmage. I’ll live with a couple big plays, it’s those long time consuming drives that infuriate me. On the flip side, I see value in making teams earn every inch and opening up the potential for them to make a mistake. Attacking or bend but don’t break? - Attacking! In every facet. Man or zone pressure? - Love man pressure. Let’s coach our guys to smother receivers and give the QB nowhere to throw the ball. If he scrambles? So be it, still isn’t clean offense. If we can man pressure we’ll man pressure. Traditional PAT or SG? - We’ve always been traditional, I hadn’t thought about using the swinging gate on a consistent basis. To be honest, I like the idea. However, there’s other ways to fake a FG without constantly using swinging gate. (I don’t like field goal kicking teams to begin with, let’s go for it on fourth and short as much as possible. Step on throats. There’s no trophy for second place.) BP or PR? - Obvious. Block punts. For all the reasons you outlined. Speed or strength? - Our program trains both. However, in my experience it’s more difficult to train speed. I don’t often see kids get significantly faster from say age 16-17 but I do see kids get significantly stronger. I would say our program hinges on getting big strength gains from “fringe” guys as we call them from freshman to junior year. We turn a couple fringe guys into All-Conference guys we have a shot at a State Championship every year with the type of athletes we tend to get.

[@CoachMac]

Im 100% no huddle, love the increased practice time and reps from playing with tempo. It's really just a matter of opinion though. At the end of the day do what is comfortable for you.

[@TrumpeterOnFire]

Around here we have a lot more active kickers, being mostly soccer players, and rugby punts are more common, as they basically make every punt a run/punt option. Had great success with traditional punt return/block sets. I'd be interested to know what your experience is there as you didn't really address it.

[@lvn4x]

Question on offseason training: I understand that you would rather have quick, agile, fast players over big strong players if you had to choose. However, is it an untrue statement that great strength training will yield a much higher increase in strength than plyo and agility training will yield an increase in athleticism? IOW, you have a chance to get a Freshman from 6 bench press reps of X lbs to 15 reps as a senior. But a Freshman who runs a 5.0 and has a 28" vert will never run a 4.6 and have a 36" vert. Is that outdated or backwards thinking?

[@khalednaimat9581]

You also just can’t choose you also have to see what kind of players you have and use them to their fullest

[@CoachMac]

No, I did glazier 2 years ago and have not got a return invite. Bad sign!!!!

[@shoeboxmoney466]

Was offered a JV job and this was the 1st video that came up

[@CoachMac]

Congrats

[@curtisstrutt8685]

Hi Coach, I just found your videos. One phrase you never said during a choice was “player skill or style”. My challenge season to season is wide gaps in skill. So my choices are less mine and more player based.

[@CoachMac]

Curtis Strutt That’s a valid point. I’ve coached High School Football for 20 years and have seen all the differences in skill level. I still think you need your own philosophy

[@bmonty1915]

1. No huddle. Doesn't mean I am always playing tempo but I prefer the rhythm with no huddle 2. Dual threat. That argument is pretty much over at this point if you follow football. 3. Run the football first. Its the way I learned the game like so many others. Its becoming less and less important in todays game however. 4. Defer the coin toss. I always want the extra possession in the second half. 5. Even fronts are easier to coach and scheme with. Odd fronts are harder to execute in my opinion but have greater potential. 6. 2 high gives you more looks as a defense. 7. Attacking. Never liked the idea of taking shots vs giving them. That being said, the players you have every year dictate how much you can play that way. 8. Man pressure if you have the players to play man to man. A lot of these decisions come down to wether or not you have the personnel to run it. 9. Swinging gate PATs just because it gives the other team something to look at. Easy 2 point opportunities for teams who don't do their homework. 10. Return punts. Save the blocks for key moments in the season or implement them if you notice a vulnerability in the other teams punt formation. 11. Rugby punter for the high school and college game. You get more consistent results at the lower levels with it and you can make it hard on the other teams punt returner with direction. 12. Big time supporter of strength training in the off season. Build that mass. You still have to move and tackle people regardless of the way the game is played.

[@CoachMac]

Not backwards at all. You just have to think what benefits more, the 5.0 to 4.8 or extra bench reps. All good strength programs will develop both. My question was what if you had to choose?

[@nesnaj21]

Is it possible to learn how to be a football coach if you never played high school or college?

[@italiancapo7]

Other coaches and players don’t respect you much as you never played the game. Hard to relate when you’ve never actually played the game. I recommend you playing first if you want to coach.

[@restassured1490]

I really want to be a coach because I understand offense super well and even have good plays but I know nothing about defense.

[@CoachMac]

You can’t call plays unless you understand defense

[@larryarthur6666]

I like to be my own coaching staff

[@TheFrozo619]

I played varsity for 3 years as a starter, captain senior year, good relation ship with coaches. I’ve never coached before though, should I ask my former head coach if I could be on the staff?

[@CoachMac]

100%

[@TheFrozo619]

Coach Mac thanks Mac, I needed this motivation

[@CoachMac]

@@TheFrozo619 You are welcome

[@lvn4x]

Or could it be that making a player 5% more athletic is worth more than making him 15% stronger?

[@bradleylivingston8772]

Football

[@brysonreed8911]

Jesus Christ loves you so much!!!

[@CoachMac]

Blessed for that reason