How to train your QBs during the year

Yearly Plan for QB Development

This is our yearly plan for quarterback development. As I mentioned we have a 12-month plan. Obviously, we have a four-year progression to get them to where they need to be. But every year we go back to this plan of how we’re going to attack both off-season, pre-season and in-season with the quarterback.

January

We meet with the quarterbacks one day a week in January. At the same time, the team is in the weight room doing speed and agility development, just getting back to things.

February

In February, we start incorporating some quarterback workouts where the throwing with the Wide Receiver once a week, pitch and catch. We’re not running any of our offense at this point. Wide receivers are getting their hands back in tune. And they’re serving as props or they’re catching for the quarterbacks during our workouts. This drill work lasts for about 45 minutes to an hour, one day a week. But we’re also in the classroom, one day a week as well. So that we don’t use up two days, we will meet once a week. Generally, we’re meeting on the weekend because I’m running this with our Quarterback Academy which is open to kids that aren’t in our program and youth players as well. We’ll go in on the weekend, and it’ll be a two-and-a-half-hour workout. We’ll get both the classroom sessions and the field work done.

I always invite quarterbacks of other programs, and they can bring their receivers to catch for them. And then I open up the classroom sessions to the receivers as well so that they can see what the quarterbacks are going through. It’s great to develop that chemistry with the receivers and get them on the same page.

March

And then in March, we start to amp it up where we’ll meet with the quarterbacks two days a week. For the guys in our program, we’ll meet with them both one day during the school week, and the other day will be on the weekend. And then in March in California, you can have off-season workouts that are non padded workouts. We start to practice as a team once a week. This would be a little more skill work, where we’re going to start to install our offense a little bit. Those team practices are 90 minutes, but we also have a separate skill session for our quarterbacks one day a week. In those skill sessions, because we’re running it in conjunction with the Academy, we get it all done on a weekend where we’re coming in for an hour or two and getting the classroom and the field work done as well.

April

In April, we do our Quarterback Academy two days a week, and one of those days will actually be in con-junction with our team practice. When we go team practice in April, right before the team practice, the quarterbacks will come in, and we’ll get some classroom time with them. And then the second will be on the weekend where they’re getting their skill work. We’ll have the quarterbacks do both the classroom and personal skill work, where we’re working on the development of working on mechanics on the weekend.

May

And then when we get to May, it is now spring football. We generally won’t bring them in on their own on the weekends once we get to May because we figure going four days a week is more than enough. We do the Quarterback Academy two days out of those four practices during the week. The spring football practices are 90 minutes to two hours. And then now we want to attend one spring seven on seven tournament with the team where we can start to work on our pass offense a little more and test out things that we’ve been working on.

June

And then in June, we’ll hit a dead period and we’ll have 21 days where we’re not on the field and we’re taking a break. We get on the field beginning the last week of June. So, we’re back on the field and when we go in the summer, we go four days a week, two days out of those four, the quarterbacks are coming in on their own, where we’re going to Quarterback Academy. At this point, we’re starting to work our offense a lot more. So, we’ve progressed from the intangibles and the general things about playing quarterback to the specific things as they relate to our offense.

July

Now as we get to the end of the summer, we’re really amping up our Quarterback Academy. We’re now meeting with the quarterbacks three days a week. At the end of the summer, we’re watching seven on seven films and we’re doing installs with them. We’re looking at our offense. We’re also finishing up things that would be part of their developmental progressions as well. And now we continue with the summer workouts, lifting, conditioning, get-ting skill work done and we’re working on our scheme. We usually host the seven on seven and trench wars.

August – December (Season)

And to finish up the summer we’re going for four weeks. And then at the end of the summer we’ll finish generally with one seven on seven tournaments. As a team, we don’t do a bunch of seven on seven tournaments. We do a lot of different things that we’re getting accomplished to develop the quarterbacks at practice with 11 on 11 and specific drill work. And then that gets us ready for the season. And once we hit the season, which we consider August through December, it’s football season! Our quarterbacks by that point, we believe are game ready, and we’re game planning with the quarterbacks, we do film review with them, and we keep their skills sharp through the season.