Good receivers are usually good because they naturally have good hands. Catching comes easy. However, there is more to being a great receiver than simply catching the ball. It’s our jobs as coaches to take their natural skills and combine it with some techniques to make them great receivers.
In the CoachTube Video below Ohio State Coach Urban Meyer, one of the most successful college coaches of all time, demonstrates how to work with receivers at the top end of four different routes. The clip is from the course called Coaching Receivers
The video was shot when he was an assistant at Notre Dame. As with all of the written and video posts on this site, my hope is that what you see can stimulate your thinking and stimulate staff discussion to enhance what you are currently doing. Don’t take the drills, adapt them and make them your own.
The video has sound so make sure your sound is turned on. A description of the drill is found below the video
In this drill sequence Coach Meyer likes to have his receivers work on just the final seven yards of their route. What he is trying to accomplish in the first drill is simply getting the receiver to be confident and comfortable coming out of their route full speed and having the ball on them quickly.
He does the drill with the top ends of four different routes. The curl, speed out, dig (square in) and the post corner. For each route he asks only for the receiver to run the final seven yards, turn around and catch the ball. He wants them to come out of the break and get the head and shoulders around, catch
the ball and pop it away. He asks the players to give the coach a number call and then accelerate up field.
Coach also likes to add a collision to this drill. This allows him to stress his techniques related to ball security. In his collision drill coach has two managers with bags strike the receiver after the catch in an attempt to free the ball. He teaches the receivers to as fast as possible catch the ball and cover the point with the index finger. Then slam the ball high and tight against the ribcage squeezing the ball with the forearm. Once the ball is high and tight he has his receiver lock down their elbow to the side of their body and then place the off hand on the top of the ball to secure it. He feels in this position the ball is less likely to be stripped out. As the receiver runs through the pads of the managers he stresses to lower the shoulders but keep the head up and never point the top of their head at the collision.