The Gun 4 WR Slot Outside has one of the best outlet passes available in Madden 09. Obviously, you'll want to look further downfield once the play has begun to try to pick up bigger chunks of yardage. However, it's nice to know that there's one route in particular on this play that will consistently net you five or more yards against any zone defense. In this tip, SportsGamer's going to showcase that route, as well as three or four other reads on this play that make it one of the game's best. Take a look at the complete breakdown below as we take you through the setup process step by step.
Quick Setup
Step 1 - Hot route the (B) receiver to perform a streak (360 - Y + receiver's icon + up on d-pad / PS3 - Triangle + receiver's icon + up on d-pad).
Step 2 - Hot route the (X) receiver to perform a slant (360 - Y + receiver's icon + flick right analog stick right / PS3 - Triangle + receiver's icon + flick right analog stick right).
Step 3 - (optional) Shift your line protection to the right (360 - LB + d-pad right / PS3 - L1 + d-pad right).
Play Breakdown
In this first image you can see the offensive assignments for the Slot Outside play. The route that's so tough for zone defenses to stop belongs to (Y) receiver Felix Jones. However, first we need to setup the rest of the routes on this play to give up multiple reads on the field.
Defensively, our opponent is in a basic cover 3 zone. Check out the next couple of images below as we finish the pre-snap setup for this play.
The first thing we do to maximize the spacing on the field, as well as improve our passing options, is to hot route the highlighted (B) receiver to perform a streak on the far right side of the field.
Next, we hot route the highlighted (X) receiver to perform a slant route over the middle to give us another read slightly deeper down the field. Another option to consider with the (X) receiver is hot routing him to perform a smart routed deep in if you prefer that route instead.
The last step of shifting your offensive to the right before the snap is optional, but we would suggest using it because your first read on this play is (A) Terrell Owens' route into the flats on the right side of the field.
As soon as we receive the snap we prepare to begin rolling to our right to hit Owens underneath in the flats. If your opponent is in a man to man defense this route is almost always open. However, if you're opponent is in zone, then you will need to read if there is a defender moving into the flats before making the throw.
