Pop Warner and AYF National Championships

Dave- I havent paid much attention to things this year, Just had a new family member, ...anyone down in Disney running double wing and 46 Gambler? We had quite a streak going ...maybe it was finally broken?

AFL must be AYF, because I know the S.I. Hurricanes were AYF 2 yrs. ago when Co-Op City played them.

Steve,

Union Road is there. They lost their first game, 24-20 and won today 41-8.

--Dave

I will be posting my findings/observations over the next 2 weeks
Shot a ton of film, got some great interviews from both tourneys Coaches, Refs, Pres AYF
Lots of game film clips that I will post as well

None of it suprised me-
No one running sweeps to win
No one running reverses/boots to win
Good tackling, blocking
Only 1 game in 16 that I saw was taken over by 1 player ( AYF Cadet level- 7-8s)
Every team there was trying to establish off tackle and had speed
None of the teams were beating themselves with turnovers and penalties
Good sportsmanship for the most part, minus a handful of fools in the stands of the Midget Championship game ( cant stand it when 20-25 people in the crowd didnt take off their hats or stop talking/yelling during the national anthem)
Pretty descent officiating minus several offensive face masking calls at the AYF games ( you have to grasp not just touch the mask)

I will be doing postings over the next 2 weeks of Pop Warner and AYF National Championship game film clips, maybe an interview or two:

Here is 1 of the Richmond, FL (Miami area) Midget DI team in pre-game. Note the size, of the kids, no fat freddies (Pop Warner weights) but most of the kids pretty tall. The Head Coach is about 5' 10" -5'11"( I interviewed him and I'm 5'9" exactly)
The assistant giving the speech is right at 6 foot.

Minimum Play strategies:

I saw a number of different minimum play strategies with varying degrees of success. The whole minimum play thing requires plenty of planning and execution in order to maximize the effectiveness of your team.

The head coach of the Richmond, FL Giants team that won the DI Midget title (the TV game) in an interview he did with me, said that “One of the main keys is getting your mmp plays out of the way so when the game is on the line, you have your best players on the field.” His team had all their mmp plays in by halftime. His strategy was to sub those players in a play here and there, alternating series with specific players on defense and offense, primarily in the line as well as a few spots on special teams. He talks about it here:



A Junior Midget team used an odd strategy that seemed to work for them, they would sub out 8-9 kids in to start an offensive series for the first 2 plays and then sub enmasse. The first 2 plays turned out to always be conservative running plays from their base offense, the would then come in and throw or if they were in 3rd and say 7, try and get at least half of it on a run, then go for it on 4th down. Seems like a risky strategy, but it worked for them. They made every 4th down attempt I saw them try. They started off a number of series just like that, in 1 early series they had the 8-9 mmp kids in for 2 plays on offense, they got 3-4 yards, the first teamers came in and got a first down and then the 8-9 mmp kids came back in for 2 plays got 2-3 yards, then the first teamers came back in and stayed in etc. It looked like a Chinese fire drill.

A Junior Midget team, subbed in an entire new offensive team for complete series of plays. They were a Power I and Spread Gun team, when their MMP kids came in it was Power I all the way and all the runs were between the tackles. This was a team PSL played, PSL must have seen this in previous film, because they were ready for it. I doubt the Power I team made more than 1-2 yards on any of the plays when those kids were in. It was 3 and out every time. So the Power I team wasted several drives and gave up field position in a game that was still in balance. After each time the backups were in PSL scored on the ensuing drive.

Coach Cisar, Based on the high number of teams that were running the "I", would you say that those teams also had good personnel to run the i.e, fairly talented TB and decent O-Line?

Im pretty sure the PW requirement is quite a bit higher than that, making it even more important.

Dave, Thanks for posting all this...
Since I did not coach this year it gives me a bit of my football fix

ESPN360.com has several PW games available to view online for anyone that's interested.

Dave Hartman
CYFL Coach

I can't find them... am I missing something?

Lee Summit Missouri vs Far West Jets

The film clips:





This is the 2009 Pop Warner Pee Wee Division II Title Game. Pee Wees are 9-11 years old 75-120 lbs and 12 year olds 75-100 lbs

Keep in mind as you watch this film these are the best of 1000s of teams, so whatever I say here really in the whole scheme of things is nit picking. If you look at the pad level, effort to the whistle, base blocking and tackling ( you rarely see a missed tackle), pursuit angles and being in position, most youth teams aren’t in the same strata.

This was the only game where I saw a Significant difference in the size of the kids. Far West was much larger, not only as the kids went through the handshake lines, but just comparing the kids to the size of the head coaches, which were both about 5’10”. I thought the Far West team had a little more talent, but they killed themselves with a few very costly penalties, 1 was a 15 yarder deep in their own territory that gave LS the ball on the 15, 3 other holding penalties all wiped out offensive plays of 10-15 yards. They also jumped off-sides on a “no play”, giving LS a key first down. LS had just 1 five yard penalty the entire game. LS also play called better- see below

Another thing that struck me if you real close is Far West’s offensive line “false steps” more than any good youth team Ive ever seen. Im not sure if their 2 point stance is the culprit or not, they come off with good pad level and effort, but they are a ½ step late on most plays because they are stepping back before they step forward.

Lee Summit:
Runs a double tight straight T for all but maybe 4-5 snaps, when they were in the Power I, 2 snaps with a wideout in the T. They threw the ball 1 time, just before the half with 10 tics left. They ran power probably 75% of the time. The kids come off the ball hard, stay on their blocks, good pad level etc. They ran a handful of counters and just 1 trap. The counters where they G block the EMLOS they do real well with, 3-4 times for 7-15 yards every time. When they just base block it 2 other times, still gains of 5 or so. They ran just 1 trap and it was a nice one late in the 4th for about 8 yards. They were content to try and drive the ball 3 yards a time. They did split the end out and crack him down on 2 sweeps which worked well after about 30 powers and saw the DEs pinching. When they ran sweep to the short side with a wideout, they had angles and numbers, that was a good move. Would have liked to see them formation more.

On defense they ran a 5-3 nothing fancy, they tackled very well and their LBs played aggressively, great pursuit angles. They had an excellent onside kick and got one back at a key point in the game.

After the half Lee Summit finally figured out FW was running a 5-2 monster with the monster playing wide side of the field, or when they were in the middle of field to the offenses right. They finally started calling power to the short side and eventually a nice counter and sweep to that side as well. A simple midline count should have shown them that early. They did a poor job of running the clock out at the end of the game. FW had just 2 time outs, LS should have run plays rather than kneel and used up the entire 25 second clock before they snapped.

FW wanted to come out in a DT Bone and they moved the ball pretty well early, but they shot themselves in the foot with penalties. When they grew a little frustrated with their progress they went to the Spread to throw. Later they went to the “I” with a WR and Flanker. Out of the bone they only threw 3 times, completing 2. When they went spread they completed just 1 pass, they threw another 4 incompletes and the QB got sacked several times. Out of the I they had some descent success running the ball but mixed in a negative yardage sweep or penalty to take them out of drives. Watch the FW offensive lineman, nearly every play there are multiple kids “false stepping”, they lose a split second on every play. At this level of success Ive never seen a team false step so much. While their pad levels are pretty good for the most part and the kids obviously effort pretty well, maybe their 2 point stances have something to do with the false stepping. They block pretty well for being so awful at this basic skill.

The best play FW had was the QB in an empty gun, running the ball. Unfortunately they only did it 2 times. They had some mice size in the backfield and #1 may have been the fastest kid on the field at QB. I thought they should have run him more out of the gun. Late in the game FW finally runs some split flow stuff and moves the ball. No way were power sweeps going to work against LS, I felt maybe more split flow and misdirection plays inside the tackles made more sense. The timing on their jet Sweep series was poor, it took way too long, very poor mesh and Im not sure why they ran a QB follow to the edge on that series, didn’t make much sense to me. They also didn’t adjust their defense when it was obvious LS was running away from the monster. Not sure why they had a safety at 10 yards or even 7 when inside the 5 yard line as LS passed just 1 time.

We don’t know if LS threw the ball a bunch in an earlier game. There is a ton of gamesmanship in these tourneys, guys not showing stuff until the championship game or guys trying to throw other teams off by doing a whole bunch of odd stuff when comfortably ahead in the semi games. I have no way of knowing what the scouting report said.

While both teams did a lot of fundamentally things well, I think if LS had been in a traditional Power T offense and just ran trap/power/keep out and counter, they probably could have won this one by 2-3 TDs. OTOH I think FW could have won this of course if they cut down on the penalties but also if they would have run inside counters, traps, cross bucks and a well timed PA pass out of the base. They could have scrapped the spread or at least just ran out of it. On defense they should have forced LS to throw, either going to 6-2 Monster or 6-3. If they were going to run Jet, they should have run it with #1 or not at all and run the powers, traps, inside counters off of it.

All in all a good game with lots of contact, but frustrating. Again, my kids went 9-1, 9-1 and 7-2 so I don’t know how I feel critiquing a team that did so much better than mine, but this is what I saw. IMO FW may have even been able to win the game just by not false stepping so much, that was just awful to watch.

Pop Warner Junior Midget Division II National Title Game

This is Junior Midget level which is age 10-12 85-135 lbs and 13 year olds 85-115 lbs.
The yellow team is Port St Lucie Florida, the Aqua team is the Detroit Dolphins.



Since Jeff Miret the head coach of Port St Lucie (PSL) is a friend, the video I’m posting is limited as will my commentary. I watched both of PSL’s games and was very impressed with this team, unfortunately I wont post all the video or comment on the defense.

On offense PSL as you can see from the video runs some of my stuff, it is their base, but they are a multiple team. They come off the ball well and their backs hit the hole full force, they execute well and are patient. They pull well and not only get nice double teams, but adjust their blocking a bit against Detroit. The PSL linemen do a nice job of getting a piece of those linebackers in the 4-3. Detroit had so much speed and numbers on the edges PSL limited 95% plus of their runs to inside the tackles.

Jeff is a former successful High School coach, who knows his stuff. As a business owner he has the flexibility to put in a ton of time preparing his kids and does a lot of film work. I’m not sure any coach is better prepared or have teams that are better prepared than Jeff’s teams and he has great kids. I spent some time around them and saw them “in action” at Universal the day before their big game. Great kids, great coaches and very supportive fans.

They were in the tournament last year at Pee Wee and finished third. I watched the Division I Junior Midget Championship game on Saturday and felt Jeff’s team would have been neck and neck with the winner, would have trounced the loser. Jeff does a great job of play calling, game planning and making adjustments. Tournament experience is huge and the PSL kids and coaches have it. I sat in the stands with several coaching friends from Florida and accurately predicted several plays he would call, which I thought were just right for the defense, down and field position. Jeff knows how to play in a tournament, what to show and not show as everyone is well scouted in these games.

As you can see PSL is very good on special teams, they have one of the better on-side kicks I’ve seen and are very crisp on both sides of the punting game. His defense held Detroit to just a handful of first downs, the TD they gave up was a long fluke play.

Detroit had excellent skill position players. They did not block as consistently or stay on their blocks as well as many of the other teams I saw in Orlando. They did not pull, trap or crab block. On offense they were a 4 and sometimes 5 wide spread team. They had very athletic skill players and a very mobile quarterback. While there were times the receivers had a little room, the pressure on the quarterback was relentless and when he got to the open field on runs he was limited to gains of 10-15 yards, nothing real big. PSL had some athletic DBs and LBs who are well trained "football players". PSL tackles well, especially in the open field.

Detroit tackled fairly well also, but they stayed in the 4-3 most of the game and got 4-6 yarded to death. PSL threw I think 3 passes, 2 for completions with 1 TD. PSL can throw the ball effectively and efficiently, but with the 4-3 it just didn’t make much sense.

PSL had just 2 off-sides penalties from what I remember, while Detroit had several 10 and 15 yard penalties that took them out of good plays. PSL did a great job of controlling the tempo with their no-huddle offense with wrist bands. Loved seeing them rattle off 3 real quick plays before halftime which helped them meet their mmp reauirements.

Detroit on the other hand blew at least 2 complete drives because they subbed in their entire mmp group in on offense en masse to get their plays in. When they did this they ran out of the Power I rather than the spread and only ran between the tackles. Obviously Jeff had this scouted and these plays went for negative to maybe 1-2 yards, they did not get first downs when the mmp kids were in and lost field position on every drive they chose to use this mmp strategy.

All in all a fun game to watch because I knew some of the coaches and players and knew a little bit about this team. PSL dominated this division and in my opinion this division had the greatest amount of separation from the #1 team to the rest in the division.

Just like all but 1 of the 15 games I watched, no 1 player or running back "dominated" the game.

Well what do he or I know?
His team just won a National Championship and finished 3rd last year doing it that way LOL