Football Library · Routes
Drag
Shallow crossing route — receiver takes a 1-yard inside release then crosses the formation on a SMOOTH NEARLY-HORIZONTAL ARC at 2-4 yds depth (canonical default ~3yd; in a mesh the OVER-drag rides slightly deeper, to ~5-6 yds, to clear the under-drag with ~1yd of vertical separation). The cross itself is at a very shallow angle (~2-3° from horizontal) — the receiver gains essentially no depth as he travels laterally; he is NOT climbing diagonally and the path is NOT a rigid straight line. Coaches reading the diagram should see a HORIZONTAL line across the formation that VISIBLY clears the LOS, not crammed against it. Foundation of mesh, drive, and shallow-cross concepts. Beats man coverage — the defender has to fight through traffic that the offense's other routes generate underneath.
Demo rendered on @X (outside WR) at 4yd depth. Only the route runner and the QB are shown so the break stays the focus; the same route family scales to any depth a play calls for, and concepts that use this route may set a different depth.
How to run it
shallow cross, find the void in zone.
Reading it by coverage
How to run the drag against what the defense shows.
- Cover 1:
- vs man — find the rub off another route, accelerate after the cross.
- Cover 2:
- shallow across underneath the two-deep safeties — sit in the window if zone.
- Cover 3:
- shallow across — find the void between the dropping LBs.
- Man:
- rub-and-accelerate — the under-route gets the cleanest release.