Each year, football coaches search for the best ways to develop youth quarterbacks who can lead their teams. The quarterback position is one of the most challenging for young athletes to master, especially without a strong foundation to build upon. This article provides key insights to help coaches develop quarterbacks with skills that will carry them through every stage of their football careers.
Develop Youth Quarterbacks Beyond Just This Season
As a coach, your goal should be to develop quarterbacks not just for this season, but for all the seasons they will play. You are preparing them for their youth team, middle school team, and eventually, their high school team. Each step in their progression plays a critical role in their long-term success.
Don’t Get Caught Watching – More Than Just Athleticism
Does this sound familiar? Players take the field on the first day of practice, and coaches scan for potential quarterbacks. Some kids want to play the position, but many coaches still look for the most athletic player to take the role.
Once a couple of kids are chosen, they are placed behind center and start throwing routes. Coaches teach them plays, how to take a snap, call a cadence, and run a huddle. While these are essential skills, too often, young quarterbacks are allowed to rely solely on their athleticism. The kid who moves well, runs well, and improvises effectively may thrive in youth football, but by high school, when everyone else catches up athletically, their advantage fades. Without solid fundamentals, their ability to succeed at the position diminishes.
How to Develop Youth Quarterbacks for Long-Term Success
To develop youth quarterbacks, you must focus on fundamental skills beyond just passing and memorizing plays. Accuracy, improvisation, and decision-making are crucial, but so are footwork, drop backs, and ball handling in both the running and passing game. If these fundamentals aren’t coached early, it does a disservice to the quarterback’s future development.
Key Training Methods:
- Dedicate specific time to quarterback development in practice.
- Use cones for footwork drills and walk throughs.
- Repetition is key—build muscle memory through continuous drilling.
- Teach footwork involved in the run game, roll outs and drop backs until they become second nature.
As a coach, learn the essential footwork and ball-handling techniques for your offensive system and drill them into your quarterbacks so they are not just filling a position—they are mastering it.
Essential Fundamentals to Develop Youth Quarterbacks
- Run Game Footwork
Whether under center, in shotgun, or pistol, quarterbacks must learn proper footwork for the run game. Don’t let them “wing it”—teach them:- Which way to open up
- Which foot leads
- How to carry out a convincing fake after a hand off
- Dropbacks and Rollouts
- Use cones to set the proper depth for 3-step, 5-step, and shotgun drop backs.
- Teach rollout footwork, including depth and curl points, to put them in the best position to succeed.
- Teach quarterbacks to get their eyes in the right spots for the plays being ran so they can make the reads necessary.
- Run Game and Play Action Ball Handling
- Teach proper hand off techniques to ensure clean exchanges.
- Show them how to fake a hand off effectively—making every fake look like a real hand off to keep defenses guessing.
- Great quarterbacks are like magicians with the football; deception is a key skill.
- Drop Step Depth out of Under Center Exchange
- Slight drop step with non-lead foot to get small separation from the lineman. Helps prevent getting foot stepped on/tripped by center or other lineman.
- Teach ability to drop step with each foot depending on direction of open.
- This is not a full step. Step not only gets separation from center but allows a plant foot to get substantial depth with first full step.
These three fundamentals are not an exhaustive list but represent some of the most overlooked aspects of quarterback development at the youth level. Drill these skills consistently to develop youth quarterbacks who will not only succeed in peewee football but also excel at the varsity level and beyond.
Rep the Fundamentals to Create Muscle Memory
Playing quarterback requires extensive mental and physical skill. The last thing you want is for your quarterback to be thinking about footwork mid-game. Fundamentals must become second nature so they can focus on reading defenses and executing plays under pressure.
By teaching these skills early, they will carry over season after season. That’s why youth coaches should collaborate with local high school programs. If a quarterback starts learning varsity-level fundamentals at 10 years old, their development will be far ahead of schedule, benefiting both the player and the program as a whole.
For specific drills and more resources on developing youth quarterbacks, visit our Football Training page. We continuously update it with new materials to help quarterbacks and other positions reach their full potential.
BtL
Subscribe to our email list to get our content direct to your inbox!
Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok
To learn more about Ball to Life and our mission, click here.
