Playbooks
Breakdown
Orbit Shallow Cross lines up from Bunch Spread Nasty in Shotgun with a pre-snap orbit motion sweeping the RB out toward the flat for a checkdown or outlet on the cyan route. The bunch releases into a classic shallow cross concept: the blue receiver runs a deep shallow drag under, the red receiver crosses over the top of it on a shallow in, and the third bunch receiver (gold) sits down on a curl/hook after settling in the middle. The outside gold receiver clears vertically on a go route to hold the deep coverage and open up the crossing routes underneath. This is a man beater built to create natural rubs and picks off the bunch, with the shallow cross combo as the primary read and the RB check release as the built-in outlet if the crosses are covered.
Defensive Reads
Pre-snap, check if a linebacker or safety shifts to shadow the orbit motion man, this confirms man coverage and tells you the crossing routes will have running room against trailing defenders. Watch the middle linebacker's depth at the snap, if he sits shallow and stays with the drag route, look to red's crosser working over the top instead. Beware of Cover 3 or Cover 4 defenses that keep a robber or lurk defender sitting in the shallow zone, since a well-timed user lurk can jump the shallow drag and bait a turnover. Man coverage with underneath help (Cover 1 with a rat linebacker) is the toughest look for this concept since the rat can rob the shallow cross with clean eyes on the quarterback. If the defense shows a hard blitz look pre-snap with the bunch stacked tight, expect a nano blitz off the edge, so be ready to get the ball out quick to the RB's flat route as a built-in blitz beater.
Usage Tips
Use the pre-snap orbit motion to identify man coverage: if a defender follows the RB across the formation, you know you are getting man and the shallow cross combo will win versus trailing defenders.
Read blue's shallow drag first since it works underneath almost every zone drop, then progress to red's deep cross if the shallow is taken away by a spy or scraping linebacker.
Against zone shells, target the gold receiver's curl/hook sit route in the soft spot between the underneath zone and deep coverage, especially versus Cover 3 or Cover 4 where the middle can be vacated.
This play shines on third and short to medium since the shallow cross combo generates natural rubs against man coverage and creates easy YAC for the drag runner.
Pair this with Orbit Fork Whip or Orbit Smash Whip out of the same bunch look to keep the defense guessing on whether the RB is releasing to the flat or running a whip route, forcing linebackers to hesitate on their run fits and coverage drops.
