The New England Patriots have won 6 Super Bowls under Bill Belichick and Tom Brady. There are many reasons why they’ve been successful, but one of them is keeping things simple for their players so they can play fast and execute at a high level. One of the things they do offensively is spread teams out with empty formations. The beauty of this is the patriots will do this when they have 21 or 12 personnel on the field. This means that the defense will have their base defense, or in other words, their bigger players on the field to try and stop the run. That is because when the Patriots have two backs or two tight ends on the field, the opposing defense is thinking they are going to run the ball.
One of their favorite empty concepts is called hoss y juke. The hoss is a condensed word that means hitch by the #1 receiver and a seam rote by the #2 receiver. The Y, usually the TE, has a juke route which can actually be 3 different routes depending on the leverage of the defender they are running off of. Here is a diagram of the play.
As you can see, the #3 receiver, called the H in this diagram, will run his route based on the defender, usually the mike linebacker. In general, he will sit if it is zone or run if it is man. To take it a step further, if the defense is playing zone coverage and the Mike is walling him inside, he will return back out. The outside receiver on both sides also have a rule. If the defender presses him, he will run a fade. If he plays off and gives them cushion, he will run a stop route at about 5 yards.
The Patriots will sometimes run this play multiple times a game. The play has answers against essentially every coverage. The Patriots also can go hurry up in a run formation with Brady under center, and then hurry to the line and spread them out in empty. Usually, the patriots will put their best receiver, Edelman, at the #3 because it will get him matched up on a Mike linebacker. They put their fullback or running back out wide. There are two reasons for doing this. One, if a linebacker goes out to cover the running back out wide at #1, the patriots know the defense is in man coverage. if they have a corner out there, it means the defense is in zone coverage. Linebackers that only play in the box are uncomfortable going out wide and playing where corners normally play.
There are many examples of this play since the Patriots have run this play for decades, but the best example is from the Super Bowl last year against the Rams. With the game tied at 3-3 and neither team could do anything offensively, the patriots reverted to hoss y juke.
The Rams play a quarters coverage. The Patriots actually use 22 personnel, aligning their fullback and running back on the outside. Edelman will run his route off the mike linebacker, who has inside leverage at the snap. Edelman will return out, because of the defender’s leverage. Easy gain of 13 and a first down.
The next play, the Rams play a single high coverage. They know the Patriots are going to exploit the matchup again with Edelman on a linebacker. So they decide to double both Edelman and TE Rob Gronkowski in the slot to the bottom of the screen.
Against a single high defense, Brady will go to the hitch/seam combo. He sees the corner #22, at the bottom of the screen, play off with his eyes inside. With the corner playing off, Brady throws it out to the running back Burkhead for a gain of 7 yards.
On the third play, the Rams are late to get lined up, but again play a single high coverage. Brady does a great job holding the free safety in the middle of the field, by looking to his right, away from Gronkowski, in the left slot. The Safety is unable to influence the throw, and Brady throws a perfect touch pass, laying the ball out where only Gronk can get it. since the linebacker was late getting over, he was behind Gronk by a step, just enough space for the pass to be completed.
This series of 3 plays single handedly won the Super Bowl for the Patriots. Hoss Y Juke is a play the Patriots use for so many years because the players can execute it and it gives them an answer vs any defense. While many would say, “why can’t they stop it if they run the same play for years,” the patriots run the play out of different personnel groupings and move guys around. When used with tempo, the play becomes even more dangerous. The Patriots always seem to find advantages other teams can’t and this is just another example of their brilliance.
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