How to Hit an Open Hole as a Running back

Video Transcript

"Hi, this is Sean Hobson, for Expert Village. What we want to talk about now is when our running back takes a hand and he's coming through the defensive line or when he's getting ready to take a hit, it's very important for him to have balance and to have good body lean. What we mean by good body lean is that he never wants to come through the hole standing upright or he doesn't want to be susceptible to a hit because he's stopped and he's off balance. He always wants to come through the line ready to give a hit where he is leaning forward and can initiate contact going forward. We always want to be going forward. You never want to see a running back going into the backwards direction. You always want to see their body leaning forward. Tanner's going to walk through it. As he takes the hand off, once he takes the original hand off he wants to stay good and low. He wants to keep that good, low body lean so when he comes through and takes the hit, hopefully he's going to be down low and he'll drive through that hit instead of being up so when the defender comes through he pushes him backwards. You never want to see that running back going backwards. We always want to see him come through low, good body lean, and when we see a defensive guy get hit we want to see him go backwards instead of our guy going that direction. So, stay low, stay with good body lean and you'll be good as a running back."