also: chip block · chip and release
A back or tight end hitting a rusher on his way out into a route. Not a block that has to be sustained, just enough contact to slow a good rusher down.
A back or tight end delivers a short, deliberate hit to a pass rusher on his way out into a route. He is not blocking him and is not expected to stay: the contact only has to disrupt the rusher's path or timing before the receiver continues on his assignment.
The reason it is worth its own word is that it is the cheapest help available in pass protection. It costs the offense nothing in bodies, since the chipper was leaving anyway, and against one dominant edge rusher it is often the difference between a protection holding and not, without committing an extra blocker for the whole play.
It is also almost always aimed at a specific player rather than a spot, which makes it one of the few blocking calls made about a scouting report rather than about a scheme.
chip blockbig on big, seal and wall offWorth teaching at high school level specifically because most programs face one genuinely dangerous rusher a season and have no other answer to him that does not cost a receiver.