Coaching Defense: Effective Ways to Bracket or Double Cover a WR/TE in Man Coverage

How to double a top WR in the NFL and College Football!

Part  of game planning is how do you neutralize or take away a teams best wr or top 2 wr in a game. Sometimes a team will have a great wr and also a tight end that is deadly like the Chiefs for example. 

Some questions to ask going into a game is

1. Who is that guy and how good is their supporting cast.

2. What is the plan for when that wr lines up in the slot and they use motions to move him. Tough to press a guy off the line. 

3. What is the plan when that #1 wr is a tight end .

4. Do you want to go more zone concepts or man concepts in the game plan.

5.Can you match up your best against him and shut that wr down?

Zone Principles

In Zone you want to try to  get an extra man and roll to the best side of the best wr. This allows you to press him off the line, while helping over the top. Easy to do when the #1 wr is to the boundary or single side. 

Man Concepts

There are 2 trains of thought when doubling in man.

Vs a slot WR- bracket him inside and outside. I prefer this method vs inside WR.

Vs. Outside WR- I prefer to high low him or over under outlined below. Play the front man in man with an over the top defender helping

In man you can double or bracket a certain wr. This can be done in various ways as well. Here’s a chart courtesy of my friend thehonestnfl on twitter who shared this with me. We will discuss these concepts later in the article. It covers numerous ways to handle a double coverage situation.

Let’s start with South Dakota State.

They bracket the #2 WR inside and outside from a 2 high look! You can see from the safeties alignment and the sams alignment how they will bracket.

Sam Inside Safety Outside

Sam Outside Safety Inside

Film!

Double team On Justin Jefferson

They bracket Jefferson who is #2 to the bottom of the screen with the safety on that side. So if Jefferson goes inside, the safety takes him, if he goes out the corner will have him. Once the move happens the other player will pass it off and look for work.

Pre Snap!

Jefferson is #2 on the bottom.

Post Snap

The Safety takes him inside and the CB looks for work once he passes him off!

Film

When the Bucs had Mike Evans and Gronk, they would get some special attention on the outside. In this situation, they are both doubled with bracket coverage.

Evans #2 on the bottom

Gronk #3 WR up top next to the tackle

The Sam LB has outside leverage on Evans with help inside. The LB has inside leverage on the TE with safety help outside.

Film Clip!

Dave Aranda Double Bracket

They double both slots on both sides of the field. They have inside help with outside leverage.

Doubling Outside WR

Lets look at a few examples of doubling a wr on the outside!The 49ers are Doubling Adams with safety over the top. They trail him with the cb because he has help over the top

On 3rd and 8 

They double Devonte Adams. They double him with the CB on man with the safety over the top with inside leverage. The CB is outside.

The coverage is great and no other receiver gets separation.

again a nice double concept knowing where your help is.

Taking Adams away with the coverage concept.

Forces the check down. 

Excellent concept

Nice job on the double on Adams on the bottom of the screen.

In the next picture we have the NY Giants double the Eagles Smith on the outside. They have the CB play outside leverage with the safety helping inside on him!

They Bracket the #1 wr with inside outside concept.

Film Clip!

Chiefs Playoffs 2023 vs Waddle and Hill

They double Hill at the Line of Scrimmage and Waddle over the top. When Waddle goes in motion they double him with the safety and bracket him.
Hill has 2 guys on him and he still manages to get open.

PATRIOTS BRACKET CONCEPT

The Patriots are one of the best at bracket concepts. They will often try to take out a teams best WR.

Here they run a bracket concept on the Rams in the Super Bowl. The WR was woods since Kupp was out with an injury.

The Patriots bracket Robert Woods in the Super Bowl in 2018. They end up winning the game 13-3 but doubled woods on several occasions.

They play man on everybody else.

Excellent bracket technique as without kupp he was the guy.

nice job and execution.

all eyes on woods as they took him out and made someone else beat them.

See the concept again as they take woods out of the picture.

These are just some of the ways you can take away a top wr. More clips will be added as we go.

Hope you enjoyed this presentation on ways to double cover a top wr or tight end with man to man concepts.