How to Become a Great Tight End in Football

Bubba Franks, professional tight end.

The tight end position is one of the most demanding spots on the football field. It requires a carefully balanced combination of extremely varied skills and abilities, and a rare body type. To become a great tight end, there are numerous things that a player needs to do. Here's a list of them:

Things You'll Need

• Size
• Speed
• Good hands
• A hard-nosed attitude
• Courage
• Dedication

Instructions

How to Become a Great Tight End

1. Become an excellent blocker. Remember, your blocking skills as a member of the offensive line are much more important to your offense than your pass receiving skills. So, learn to block well before you focus on becoming a highlight-reel kind of tight end.

2. Keep your weight balanced. As a tight end you need to be able to block like an offensive lineman and catch like a receiver. In order to do this you'll need to keep your weight carefully balanced between giving you enough size to act as an effective blocker and enough mobility to be a good tool for your football team's offense.

3. Learn the passing game completely. In order to be a great tight, end you'll need to learn every facet of your football team's offense, especially of the passing game. Learn all of the routes, audibles, and assignments completely and make sure you have it all memorized.

4. Train with both positions. Many tight ends make the mistake of only practicing with the receivers or with the offensive line. Ask your coach if it's all right for you to train half of the time with one group and half the time with the other. This will vastly improve your skills as a versatile tight end.

5. Learn the linebacker position. If you don't play defense, and never have, then ask your coach if you can play second-team linebacker during practice. This will give you a lot of insight into the minds of the defensive players against whom you'll be playing.

6. Forget about an "off-season." Great football players realize that there's no off-season to the sport, only the regular season, the playoffs, and training season. Whenever you have a spare moment you need to be lifting weights, training, or learning more about the game.

Tips & Warnings

• If you have trouble catching the ball and acting as an effective receiver, consider bulking up and trying to move to the guard position on the offensive line,

• Remember, speed is necessary to the passing game. Work on your sprint times to become a great tight end.

• Remember, the tight end position is a very difficult one and there aren't many roster spots reserved for tight ends. So, in many ways, it is safer to try to develop your offensive line skills fully and be able to make the switch to an offensive line spot if necessary.