Playbooks
All Curls out of Wing Trips WK Nasty Mug is a zone beater built to attack soft spots underneath and at the intermediate level with every eligible receiver breaking down into a curl route at staggered depths. The trips side creates natural picks and spacing against zone drops while the backside receiver runs his own curl to hold the corner and give you a two man read away from the trips bunch. Primary progression starts with the deepest curl to the trips side, working down to the shallower curl if the underneath zone defender sinks, then coming back to the backside curl as your outlet against man coverage or blitz.
Identify two high safeties pre-snap, since Cover 2 and Cover 4 shells leave natural throwing windows in the underneath curl zones between the linebackers and corners. Watch the flat defenders after the snap, if they sink too deep chasing the curls you have an easy completion in the shallow void they vacate. Beware Cover 3 with a sky safety rotating down, since that extra underneath defender can jump the shorter curl route and bait you into a turnover. Check linebacker depth at the snap, shallow linebackers who immediately drop into curl windows signal a zone match scheme designed to take away this exact concept. Look for man coverage on the outside receivers with no deep half help, that alignment tells you to hot route away from curls since press man corners can squat and jump the route before it settles.
Use this play on second and medium to second and long when defenses are more likely to sit in zone shells like Cover 3 or Cover 4 rather than crashing with man pressure.
Read the flat and hook defenders pre-snap to identify if the defense is playing a hard shell or trying to disguise a blitz, since curls sit down right in the throwing lanes of those zone droppers.
Hot route the backside curl into a speed out or slant if you see man coverage with no safety help, since curls can get picked off in tight man coverage from cornerbacks with good zone awareness.
Pair this play with Curl Flat and Stick from the same set to give the defense conflicting route depths on curls, forcing linebackers to guess between sitting and dropping deep.
Sequence All Curls after running Four Verticals or Dash Corner Up to condition the defense to sink deep, then hit the shallower curls underneath once safeties start cheating back.