Playbooks
Quick Reference
In 1 playbook
Breakdown
Y-Spot Salem is a Cover 3 beater out of Shotgun Tight Open with 11 personnel. To the left, two receivers stack the flat and a short corner route to hold underneath defenders. To the right, the Y (TE/slot) runs the spot route settling into the hook zone while the outside receiver stems vertical up the seam before breaking to the corner, and the flanker runs a shallow drag underneath toward the sideline. The primary read starts with the Y spot sitting down in the honey hole between the flat and hook defenders, then works to the corner route if the safety rotates down to take away the spot.
Defensive Reads
Watch the middle linebacker depth at the snap since a shallow drop into the hook zone signals Cover 3 and opens the spot route window immediately. Key the flat defender to the trips side since if he widens with the flat route, the Y spot route sits in open grass behind him. Identify user-controlled safeties rotating down post-snap because that lurk threat can jump the spot route and bait a turnover if you force it. Against Cover 2 or man coverage, the corner route becomes the primary answer since it attacks the deep outside void before the safety can get over the top. Blitz-heavy defenses with man coverage behind them shut this down quickly if the quick game is not hot routed, so always have a check-with-me answer against pressure looks.
Usage Tips
Check pre-snap for a two-high or single-high safety shell before the snap since this concept is built to exploit the Cover 3 hole behind the linebackers.
If you see man coverage with no help over the top, hot route the spot to a slant or speed the corner route to attack the leverage of the corner immediately.
Use this on second and medium or third and short since the spot route settles quickly and gives you a safe, high-percentage completion against zone drops.
Pair this with Bench Z Spot or Dig Z Spot in the same set so you can run similar route stems and confuse zone defenders on drop reads.
Motion the flanker pre-snap if your version of the set allows it to identify whether the defense is playing man or zone before the snap.
