Shotgun/Pistol Dive vs zone read vs read option vs RPO

Shotgun/pistol dive is what we seemed to have run quite a bit this year. It is a hand off all the way. The backside DE may or may not be accounted for in the blocking scheme. It is power football from a traditionally not power football formation. You can run different blocking schemes as well....From the exact same formation and you can attack different gaps. It may look like the same play to us, but two consecutive runs may have actually been to different gaps using different blocking schemes.

Zone Read is out of the same core formation. The backside DE is not accounted for in the blocking scheme. The QB reads him. If the DE appears to be playing the dive, the QB keeps it. The backside LB has responsibility to contain this (unless he has some sort of run blitz thing happening) By having to contain this, he may be a step slower getting to help out the dive if it happens. The zone read doesn’t work if you can’t win at the point of attack for the dive though.

Zone Read Option is the above plus technically having another option, though I think you will hear the Zone Read be called the Read Option by announcers. At this point, you are getting into semantics I guess.

RPO is typically run out of the same formation types, but the option is reading the coverage. If the QB seas a quick pass will work, he may choose it over handing it off. To make this more confusing, you can have hot calls for receivers to run these same routes and it is pass all the way, though we may see it as a RPO.


We saw a lot of press coverage this year which limits the RPO and quick pass audibles.

We did use the jet sweep as a kind of read option play, though technically it isn’t. The jet came from the “play side”. Aka where the dive would go based on the formation, so, in other words, the jet guy was running the same direction that the QB would in a zone read, but he has a full head of steam and is one of your fastest players. 87 got this play a decent bit and we had pretty good success with it. It kind of has the same affect as the zone read, as it keeps the backside contain more honest. In fact, you can run the Zone Read Option with the jet, which we didn’t do very often, but we showed it some.

For any option play to work over the course of the game and season, you have to show it. If you don’t, it makes the option part of it less respected by the defense. Though, some coaches can lull a team into not respecting something and then burn them on it at a key time. Football is a game of measures and countermeasures .