also: split · nasty split · receiver split · nasty
How far a receiver aligns from the formation. A nasty split is a deliberately tight one, close enough to change the defense's leverage and its ability to get help.
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A receiver's split is how far he aligns from the formation, measured to the next player inside him. It is a coached number rather than a preference. It is one of the cheapest ways an offense changes a defense's problem without changing anything else.
Wide splits stretch the defense horizontally and isolate defenders. Tight splits pull defenders inward and create room outside. Neither is correct; the split is chosen for what the play needs.
receiver split, alignment splitnasty split, bunch and stackA deliberately tight split, with the receiver aligned near the formation rather than out toward the sideline, often only a few yards outside the tackle. The name is descriptive of the problem it creates rather than of anything the receiver does.
What it buys is leverage. A defender covering a receiver in a nasty split has less room to his inside and a much longer way to go for outside help, and the same alignment gets the receiver into blocking range on a run play while still threatening a route. That dual threat is the reason it appears in run-heavy offenses rather than in passing ones.
nasty, tight splitslot, split**Nasty split is a value in Playside's own diagram editor Split chip**, which means a coach meets the term inside our product before he meets it anywhere else, and currently has nowhere to find out what it means.