Youth Football Practice - Assessing Your Talent Levels

Taking a Peek at Next Years Teams

Many coaches like to know what kinds of kids I have to work with so they can make comparisons with what they have. My guess is our experiences are fairly similar.

FASST Peek

While running our FASST program it's hard not to take a peek at a few of the new players coming in. Like most of you, looking at the new players is like opening a box of chocolates, you are always hopeful, but you never know what you are going to get. When your teams have huge gaps to fill, those hopeful thoughts can almost be thoughts of desperation.

As many of you know I'm head coaching 3 teams this season for a variety of reasons, an age 7-9 team, an age 10-11 team and an age 12-13 team. Every team has it's own unique strengths, weaknesses, personality and needs. All three of these teams are incredibly different from one another.

Age 7-9 Team

Here is how next years squads stack up:

The age 7-9 team finished 7-2 but really came on strong at the end, winning 7 games in a row. At seasons end we were averaging about 30 points a game and no one wanted to play us. This was the youngest team in the league and all but 3 of our players were brand new to youth football. All of the players on this team signed up to play again but a few aged out to the next age bracket.

We have our entire starting offensive line back and all are "stripers" meaning they are over the running back weight. This is a very unusual group and we even have 2 new kids that are 'striper" weight as well. We are almost always one of the smallest teams in the league, so this will be a welcome change. We have our starting Wingback back, but will move him to "Quarterback" as he did get a few snaps at that position last season and can handle the position. All of our other starting running backs moved up, so that will be our challenge. About 70% of our touchdown scoring moved up to the next age group. On defense we lost one starting defensive end, one starting linebacker and one starting corner. While this sounds like a lot, it isn't anything compared to what we had to work with last year with this group, they were almost all rookies. We have a real nice coaching staff with this group including 3 returners. This team should be very solid and has potential to be one of the better offensive lines I've coached. We will need more out of our right tight end on this team or find a replacement. If we find a descent blocking back and an average wingback and fullback we should be able to average about 40 points a game with this group.

Age 10-11 Team

The age 10-11 team had every player but 1 sign back up to play again. This team went 9-1 last season, "mercy ruling" 9 opponents. Unfortunately, most of the starters from this team are moving up to the age 12-13 team. There are just 6 players back on this team and only 2 were starters. With the younger players moving up, we can fill a number of holes, but we will be by far the smallest team in the league with just 1 "striped" player. All of our backs are under 90 pounds and we will have at least 10 rookie players on this team. Over 90% of the touchdowns scored on this team moved up to the older group. The coaching staff is good but thin, just 1 coach with lots of experience, a 2nd year coach, a rookie coach and me. Needless to say this will be one of my biggest challenges in my 15 years of coaching youth football. We are small and slow and will have little experience in an age bracket full of teams that will be much bigger, better and more experienced than us. I love these kinds of challenges and look forward to coaching these kids probably more than the other 2 teams. My guess my very best effort can at best yield a .500 season.

Age 12-13 Team

The age 12-13 team will have descent experience, with just 5 rookie players on it. We again will be the smallest team in the league with just 1 "striped" player. This group has lost just 2 games in the last 4 years so there is nice continuity and experience but no size. We will be the youngest team in the league at this age group, with just 6 kids that are 13 years old. For those of you that have coached youth football, you know how important it is to have good numbers at the top age in the age bracket. However these kids have consistently put up 35 points per game, so our expectations are high. We need some tight ends, an offensive lineman, a safety and some descent backup running backs. The coaching staff on this team is made up entirely of coaches that have coached with us for the last 3-4 years, a nice group. While we will be the youngest and smallest team in this age bracket, and have a few holes to fill, our expectations will be high for this team.

Why Share This Information?

Why am I sharing this with you? I think it's important for you to know I still am a hands on youth football coach. What I'm imparting to you I'm field testing with my own teams. What I'm suggesting to you is working now in 2008 it isn't something that worked back in 1992. I remember back in 2000 when I took my break from coaching to grow my fledgling youth football program. I took that time to study the best and worst programs in the country to come up with a system that would allow our teams to compete, relatively talent independent. During that time, I was often asking my coaches to do things that were not doable. Because I wasn't in the trenches I was a bit out of touch, even though I was at all the practices and games. I can assure you that isn't the case now, I'm having many of the same thoughts and concerns you are feeling right now and anxiously looking at what's in my box of chocolates.

Dave Cisar-

Dave has a passion for developing youth coaches so they can in turn develop teams that are competitive and well organized. He is a Nike "Coach of the Year" Designate and speaks nationwide at Coaches Clinics. His book "Winning Youth Football a Step by Step Plan" was endorsed by Tom Osborne and Dave Rimington.

With over 15 years of hands-on experience as a youth coach, Dave has developed a detailed systematic approach to developing youth players and teams. His personal teams to using this system to date have won 94% of their games in 5 Different Leagues.

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Football Plays

A Taste of Dave's teams:

Youth Football Practice

Offensive Line

Football Field Dimensions For Different Levels of Play

In North America, football is a game where the male players are wearing helmets and pads and the field has goal posts on opposite ends. The official or regulation dimensions of a football field may vary depending on the levels of play.

Here are the dimensions of football field in different levels:

National Football League (NFL) or Professional

Outside Dimension:
Length - 120 yards or 360'
Width - 53 and 1/3 yards or 160'

End Zone:
End zones are ten yards deep.

End line:
The end line border is 6'and it marks the end zone's back.

Team Benches:
Team benches are set next to the restraining line which is between the 30 yard markers.

Field Numbers:
NFL field numbers are about 6' in length and 4' in width.

Restraining Line:
All NFL fields have a 6' restraining line next to the side lines. These lines mark the closest area non-players can be to the football field.

Hash Marks:
The hash marks of NFL are the thinnest among all of the levels of football game. It measure about 70' and 9" from the side lines and are about 18' and 6" in width.

Goal Posts:
The goal post of NFL is about 10' in length and 18' and 6" in width.

NCAA or College

Outside Dimension:
Length - 120 yards or 360'
Width - 53 and 1/3 yards or 160'

End Zone:
An NCAA end zone is ten yards deep.

End line:
The end line border is 6'.

Team Benches:
Team benches are also set next to the restraining line which is between the 30 yard markers.

Field Numbers:
The field numbers of NCAA are about 6' in length and 4' in width.

Restraining Line:
All college fields have a 6' restraining line next to the side lines.

Hash Marks:
The hash marks of NCAA measure about 60' from the side lines and are about 40' wide. These are wider than the NFL's hash marks.

Goal Posts:
College or NCAA goal post is about 10' in length and 18' and 6" in width which is the same as NFL.

High School

Outside Dimension:
Length - 120 yards or 360'
Width - 53 and 1/3 yards or 160'

End Zone:
End zones are ten yards deep.

End line:
The end line border is 6' and it marks the end zone's back.

Team Benches:
Team benches are set next to the restraining line which is between the 30 yard markers.

Field Numbers:
The side line field numbers are about 6' in length and 4' in width which marks the ten yard line mark.

Restraining Line:
All high school football fields have a 6' restraining line next to the side lines.

Hash Marks:
The hash marks of high school are the widest among all of the levels of football game. It measure about 53' and 4" wide and the distance is the same from the border of the side lines.

Goal Posts:
The goal posts of high school measure about 10' in length and 23' and 4" in width. These are wider compare to the NFL and college level.

Canadian Football League (CFL) Football

Outside Dimension:
Length - 150 yards or 450'
Width - 65 yards or 195'

End Zone:
End zones are 20 yards deep.

Dead Line:
The end zone's back marks the dead line.

Field Numbers:
The field numbers of CFL are about 6' in length and 4' in width.

Hash Marks:
The hash marks of CFL is designated 24 yards from the sidelines of the playing field, thus, its width is 17 yards or 51'.

Goal Posts:
The goal post of CFL is about 10' in length and 18' and 6" in width.

All fields have the same outside dimensions except for CFL. The hash marks are different for all levels. Also, the goal posts for high school are different from the other levels.

Click these links of you want to know more about football field dimensions or sizes and dimensions in general.