when a huck gets caught just outside the endzone

This is a fairly common situation. A long pass gets caught by the cutter just short of the endzone line. Their defender gets there pretty quick, but perhaps other players might take a little time to catch up with the play.

In theory, scoring from here shouldn't be very difficult. The endzone is close, the defence is poorly organised, and there is plenty of space to work with, considering the number of players not up with the play. (that is, there is plenty of space for use by the first offence-team team-mates to arrive on the scene).

While this situation often does result in a quick easy goal, there are many times when it doesn't. Instead the stall count gets high, and there's a surprising number of riskier-than-you'd-like passes that have to be made to continue the offence. Then the play settles in to a more structured endzone offence versus defence scenario.

I've been thinking about why there is that difference. After a huck is caught outside the endzone, why is it sometimes a quick goal, and sometimes so much more difficult.

Since the offence is poorly structured, there are a couple of things that happen, that can hinder clear passing opportunities. Basically, as players catch up, they can all get in each others way.

• As cutters overtake the player with the disc; looking to cut for a goal or to set up a stack or whatever endzone offence they use, they bring defenders with them and they can block options for cutters already in the endzone - or worse - get in the way of handlers trying to reset.
• Multiple players try to set up as the dump (that's bad; I've done it myself once or twice).

Anyway, there are plenty of little things that can go wrong that hinder an easy passing opportunity. But none of the ones I've thought of explain how it all started. What happened that was the difference between this huck-to-just-short-of-the-endzone situations being one of times its a quick goal and one of the times it isn't?

It's got to be something to do with the first cutter that gets there (We'll call him Freddy First-Cutter).There is a certain cut often made by this guy. Running straight past the guy with the disc from behind the forcer, towards the open lane. That cut so rarely seems to work out. If Freddy has a few yards deep on his guy, the forcer sees that and moves to either switch onto Freddy First-Cutter or moves his mark around to front up for a moment. If Freddy hasn't got much separation from his defender, the angle he cuts to the endzone (diagonally from the centre of the field towards the open side) means that his defender gets first bid if the pass is thrown.

This straight in cut, the "it's just a race and I think I'm winning" cut. This is the problem cut, I think.

My solutions: make a cut that doesn't look like that. Anything with a double movement is a good option. drive up into the endzone, plant and turn hard. Or maybe on your way up there, stop outside the endzone and run a give'n'go with the guy on the disc. Freddy First-Cutter can throw the goal instead of catching it.

That's pretty much the end of my blog post. Although I do have another theory on the on how sometimes this situation is an easy goal, and how sometimes it's not. So I'll keep going.

Theory 2. The guy who caught the huck, lets call him "Ricky Receiver", isn't the teams best thrower. Or at least he's not a particularly confident thrower, and because of that he's reluctant to try and throw goals. So even if Freddy First-Cutter looks fairly open, Ricky Receiver won't throw it to him.

Theory 2.1 - Ricky Receiver has okay throws. Its just that because he's good at catching hucks and his name is Ricky Receiver, all his team mates assume that his throws are bad. They want Ricky to cut and dump. They'll be very critical every time he throws something that's not a dump. And this has made him goal-throwing-averse, rather than any actual lack of throwing skills. ("Look to your dump Ricky Receiver, let Timmy Thrower throw the goals").

I don't think either of theories 2 or 2.1 are true. Think about anyone in real life that could be called Ricky Receiver. What are their assist stats generally like? Plenty of assists!

P.S. Time-outs. Some people take a time-out in this situation. I'm not a fan of that. It completely nullifies some of the advantages that the offence should have, and what's more, it seems like a waste of a time-out to me. If a team takes a time-out everytime they're in this situation,  they'll run out of time-outs fast. (not that I'd never ever do it, I'd just be a little reluctant).

update on offence versus open side poach.

This is an update of a previous article "offence against a poach from an open side dump"

In that piece I listed the 4 possible approaches that I had thought of for dealing with the poached open-side handler situation.

(they were: ignoring the poach, using the poached player to move it to the breakside, using the poached player to throw an unmarked huck, and running a give 'n' go with the poached player).

Here's another one (Ben Wiggins mentioned it in the 3-4 offence part of his coaching clinic before the Siege of Limerick Tournament). He was describing an option for dealing with the defenders of the handlers without the disc in a 3-4 offence (specifically when the disc is in the centre of the field) - the other 2 handler defenders are probably looking to get in the way or get a poach block. (so on the open side - it would be relevant to what I was discussing before).

The idea was to have the handler clear out, upfield, just to make space for the offence. Achieved by a cut right in front of the thrower, coming infield from where they started. If their defender doesn't get close with them, the thrower can give this handler a short pass to gain just a few metres, keeping the disc central and creating a better hucking opportunity with the forward momentum. If that pass isn't on, the defender has gone with them and the open side of the field then becomes much easier to work with.

Seems like a good idea to me.

This one is fairly specific to 3-4 I think. Whereas the likes of using the handler to move it breakside seems to me to be better for a vertical stack scenario.