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Breakdown
Curl Flats out of Shotgun Empty Trey spreads five receivers wide with no backfield help, giving the quarterback five immediate options and forcing the defense to declare coverage before the snap. To the trey side the outside receiver runs a vertical seam that breaks into a corner route while the inside slot settles into a curl and the tightest receiver releases to the flat, and the backside single receiver runs a mirrored curl with an outlet flat route underneath from the boundary. This is a zone beater that attacks curl to flat and hi lo reads on both sides of the formation, with the primary progression starting at the trey side curl into the flat before working backside to the curl and flat combo away from the strength.
Defensive Reads
Read the underneath linebackers and nickel defenders immediately after the snap to see if they widen to the flat or sink to the curl, since you cannot cover both with one defender in true zone drops. Check for a single high safety pre-snap, because if he shades toward the trey side the backside curl route becomes a wide open window against man or zone. Watch for Cover 4 or Cover 6 shells with two deep safeties splitting the field, since this forces the corner route on the trey side into a tighter throwing window that only opens against zone drops that widen late. Identify user controlled defenders sitting in a shallow lurk technique between the curl and flat, as that user pick is designed to jump the curl route and take away your first read. Beware of a nickel or slot blitz off the trey side edge, since Empty formations have no backfield protection and a well timed blitz off the twist can beat the quarterback before the curl route sits down in its zone.
Usage Tips
Use pre-snap motion or a hard count to bait linebackers into showing their zone drops before the ball is snapped.
Attack Cover 3 and Cover 2 shells hard since the curl to flat combo on both sides creates natural hi lo conflicts for the underneath defenders.
Hot route the backside curl into a dig if you see a single high safety cheating toward the trey side to exploit the vacated middle of the field.
Pair this call with Four Verticals or Y-Post Ohio from the same set to keep defenses honest against both shallow zone beaters and deep shots.
Use this on second and medium or third and short since the flat routes provide easy underneath completions to protect against negative plays.
