Description

Long time youth football Coach Gip Johnston provides helpful tips for coaching ages 7-8 youth football.

Transcript

Clubhouse Gas Casey: Today on Clubhouse Gas we continue our series where we’re following these Youth football teams throughout their season so stay tune it’s going to be exciting to Clubhouse Gas. Gip: (Coach Gip Johnston) Well three basic fundamentals that we really work on are tackling. Tackling is of ultimate importance you got to learn to wrap up a lot of these kids just like to grab and then, but we got to learn to wrap up when we tackle and learn that you know that you can be a little physical and then also we work on the offense, I mean obviously we got a bunch of plays and learn how to hit holes as hard and then the other really key is playing you know hard, tough nose football and learning the lingo what the line of scrimmage is, what the penalties are just learning how to line up. So it all comes together and we’re looking forward for our first game coming up here soon. You know it’s kind of funny because you get out here and you forget that these kids don’t know the terminology of football. You know you forget about, you know when you say get on the line of scrimmage they say coach what’s a scrimmage you know and you say you know hustle when you break the huddle, they say what’s a huddle, what do you mean huddle so you know you forget that these kids who are first year of pewee have really have no idea what we’re talking about so it takes a little time to take the lingo down and to help these guys to understand what’s going on. And once they do that it begins to progress pretty quickly. A tip your looking for and actually coaching pewees football is to you know I think is as I said make sure that these kids know the lingo, know what’s going on, know that the game of football form an organized standpoint and then you got to get in to the numbering system with the holes you know 2, 4 and 6 holes on the right side 3, 5, and 7 on the left side and then try to build it from there. So a tip I would say is to get organized, write a basic playbook down and then have an organizational chart put together so you’ll know how to run that practice in an organized fashion. Also what we try to do when we’re teaching the numbering system of the holes is you get like a fire hose and you paint the colors of the hose red, will be the 2 hole, yellow will be the 4 hole, green will be the 6 hole and then you have those guys go to those holes and they know exactly where to run to instead of running and grabbing the ball in the quarterback and then running to the hole, you can actually teach them where the holes are and how to actually you know line up in the line of scrimmage. The fire hose painted really works well. Well the PeeWee Broncos this year had a pretty good draft. Obviously, I had to get my son and Steve Whitmers son and they got slaughtered and I picked up some good players and speed guys rally here, got him and you know obviously what I talked to Casey about earlier is the you know trying to build on speed you know get some guys or athletes in speeds and then you build your bigger guys at the end. So we got some good speed guys and got some good athletes and we’re excited to get playing. Casey: And so as far as position wise, do you feel like your going to have enough to put your line the way you want it? We talked about having little guys on the line and you are more of all guys running off the ball and how’s that going to look for you, you’re going to have any middle momentum on the line maybe? Gip: Yeah we got a— as you said I mean at the end of the draft I mean you draft for either you know he’s got a cool name or he’s got a good looking mom or a you know you draft or just anything and those guys are always on the line just like this and do this like this but we did a couple of guys early on. We got a big 100 pound guy and a big 85 pound guy so they’ll anchor one side of our line and you know and we got a good two good running backs and I think we’re going to have some fun. PeeWee football is so much fun PeeWee football is so much fun but you know I just said your always playing in the other coach and not playing the other team and the couple of the guys were over here and you know that’s all we do is talk about who’d you get how’d your team look so it’s fun. Riley you got a bum on there, tell me what happened. Riley: I twisted it funny in practice and it somehow cracks my bone and it hurt a little but it didn’t hurt that bad. Gip: Well it maybe came back to the huddle when I was going oh come Riley just rub some dirt on it and get back on there. They did not say that? Riley: Yes you did. Gip: And then Riley’s dad called me the next day and said its fractured coach and I said oh I feel great but how you doing? Riley: Good. Well how you liking football? Gip: Good, a lot. Well tell me what you like about it real quick? Riley: I like tackling and getting fumbles and catching the ball. Riley is one of our wide receiver so we’re looking forward to him getting and getting back into this offensive scheme. My number one folk is on our game tomorrow is making sure the back is nowhere to go making sure that we understand you know how to fire along the fire off the line of scrimmage and also have a tackle and just to make sure these guys have fun and relax because their going to be nervous. We’ve done a lot of scrimmaging but when the lights come on and their in their uniforms for the first time, their going to be like deer and head lice so we just want to relax and have some fun. Go tackle or get tackled the first time. It will be just like playing in the front yard. You know the one thing I say about PeeWee football is that it is fun. You know there’s nothing I look forward to about 4:30 to 5:00 and cutting out of work and getting over here and having fun with these kids. You know people who know me I sometimes get a little intense but I love these guys and I think if you just, if you have fun doing it and you’re out there for them you got nothing but great rewards from it and you know being out with your seven our eight years old is just like 7 or 8 year old kids is just a lot of fun.