The anti-reset mark can effectively make the backfield dump a very difficult throw. Here are a few ways to prevent this defense from making your life as a thrower difficult.
First of all, the D is most effective on a high stall count when you are running out of time and options (and many teams will only shift their marks to take away the dump once the stall count gets high). Looking to your resetter very early lessens the chance that the anti-reset mark will be set in the first place. In a similar vein, faking and pivoting early and aggressively will make it less likely that your mark can tell when you’re actually looking for the reset.
If you do find yourself with an anti-reset mark and a dump that’s covered up the line, there’s a simple trick that you can use to make your remaining options seem much less daunting: turn your back to the sideline and then mentally rotate the field 90 degrees so that you now imagine your endzone of attack to be in the direction you are facing. The mark will now be a regular angled, force one-way mark, and the person at the front of the stack is now standing in the open side lane.
Chances are their defender may not have adjusted to the mark opening up your options to hit that front of the stack player. Make sure your reset handler and their defender stay out of the way, preferably by staying back for the dump so that the mark continues to force the same way. The front of the stack player is now in a good position to either make a cut on what is now the open side, or even better, simply wait for you to put a pass out straight in front of you for them to run onto. From the perspective of what the real field actually looks like, this pass will be a cross-field pass into the middle of the field. With a little bit of float on that throw, you can put it out in front of your target such that they run onto it with momentum towards the break side of the field, and their mark trailing them on the open side- great opportunity to a continuation yardage cut on the break side!
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