How to Play Football : How to Play Cover 2

[cooldaniel6]

I still don't get what the cornerbacks responsibility is. Could someone explain more in depth. What is the flats by the way?

[manbearpig28mc]

@cooldaniel6 my school runs the cover 2 and our corners responsibilities are to cover 1/5 of the field so they drop back maybe 4 or 5 yards and cover the flat. Thats just us its different for aother schools

[ajlepisto]

@cooldaniel6 Flats are the area from about the line of scrimmage to about 5-6 yards deep and outside of the hashmarks.

It depends on your specific scheme, but lots of times corners will be in a semi-man coverage on a receiver. There is a thing called hard cover 2 where they will play zones in the flats, but otherwise they stay with the WR unless a HB releases into the flat, in which he will leave his WR and cover the HB in the flat. The safety then moves over to cover the WR.

[ajlepisto]

For example, manbearpig said his school has the corners cover the flats. That's essentially hard cover 2, meaning they stay in their flats regardless of the route being run or the flats being empty.

This can be exploited with mid routes if you have good timing, due to cover 2 zones being weak down the middle, esp with 3 WRs

[THEnickNOrris936]

@ajlepisto at my school when we run a cover 2 corners have flat-pitch, but they read the number 2 reciever. like if the number 2 reciever goes deep then you lock down on the number one

[goodie4life10]

ok hot shot you let me know how to beat a cover two

[THEnickNOrris936]

@goodie4life10 run a spread and have both recievers run a deep route and have the running back run a route in the flats..or a screen. that would beat the cover 2 my school runs but theyre all different

[blinky855]

@THEnickNOrris936 its not that simple. outside or middle linebackers typically take backs out of the backfield man to man.....now if a linebacker does take the man out of the backfield man to man, that frees up the reciever to run a slant/dig route across the middle without getting killed if the QB throws it fast enough.

[Palar47]

@blinky855 you're talking about 2 man...a true cover 2 has the corners in the flats, backers in the hook/curl or hook (S & W, M respectively) and the safeties in deep halves...2 man is a wrinkle with a man variant (obviously), but base 2 is all zone

[goodie4life10]

its not about one single route its a combo of routes that makes a safety make a choice that beats cover 2. what works best from my exp. is a play action flooding one side of the feild. keeping the safety honest with a corner and a comeback he has to make a choice and you have your x coming across and posibly a back in the flat! try it you will be surprised at how open one of your players will be

[MaR1nE101]

i dont really like cover 2 our team plays mostly 3-4 or 4-3

[goodie4life10]

ahh hahaha i hope you mean cover four 3 under

[RajWireman]

Not true at all! Depends on what type of cover 2 you are teaching. You can have your CB play inside leverage and not get killed. You have to teach your DBs how to correctly read 2 to 1. When you can successfully do this it is easy to do.

[rapiddominace]

if you play your corners inside out in cover two you'll get fuckin' killed, and seams aren't generally the weakness if you run it the way people are running it now. In fact if you run it right, you'll either pick or swat 90% of the seams they throw at you.

[coolcot]

wow, I have never heard of any cover 2 where both of the nbr 1 wrs are pushed outside sounds like an easy 6 points for the offense.

[rapiddominace]

yeah, no shit, but that's what this guy is preachin'

[wurldwarrior]

you push out the recievers to stop your saftey from getting stuck with two deep routes

[andreas76]

actually the biggest weakness is the seam area in the middle and the corner routes in between the corner and the safety. the go routes are handled since the safety is already over the top and the corner can ride him 5 to 10 yards. that's why teams that run the cover 2 predominantly, like Indy, Tampa, Chicago, they don't get beat deep usually. it's posts and corners that get them. or screens and draws.

[goodie4life10]

you have heard of the tampa 2 obviously! but do you know that the lineback straight bails to cover the middle? so i dont think the post is gonna beat tamp or indy...

[andreas76]

i've heard of the Tampa 2, better known as The Steel Curtain Defense.....and yes, the seams, whether they be posts or go's will beat the the cover 2 zone. and so will trips all go's, or doubles all go's. corner routes etc.

[rw9cb]

that's stupid...the biggest weaknesses in the cover 2 are the middle of the field (post), and the outside seams (go routes). this guy has no idea what he's talking about and it's evident from him stumbling through explaining it...expert village my ass