One of the most popular plays in American football uses the lateral pass. This technique is often seen in popular football movies as well.
This technique, or pass, has a lot of risks to it so you need to know how to execute it perfectly.
This guide will show you how to lateral in Madden 22 and execute a successful pass more often. This will help you expand your offensive playbook when playing on a higher difficulty or even against your friends.
What is a Lateral?
For those who are a little familiar with the “hook and ladder” play, the same play is also called a “hook and lateral”. The play is where you have the wide receiver running near the sideline and suddenly runs diagonally towards the center or “hooks” into the middle of the field.
When the wide receiver catches the ball from the pass, you can either head straight down the field if it is open or pass it again to another player behind him as you have attracted all the defense’s attention.
This other player usually times the catch so that he can run at a full sprint as the catch happens and is immediately ready for the pass or lateral pass. At this point, the player receiving the ball from the lateral runs in the opposite direction from where the ball was received.
This forms a deception on the defense as that will cause a few seconds for the defense to recover and switch. The play usually runs with two wide receivers.
In short, the lateral is essentially the pass made between the two receivers and is the 2nd part of the whole play.
How to Lateral
With the play described above, you will need to play normally up until the part where the first wide receiver catches the ball. After catching the ball and playing the wide receiver who caught the ball, check the defense first.
If you are clear, just try to push for a 1st down.
If you’re not clear, you can press L1 or LB, depending on which platform you play on. This will perform the lateral pass and hand it to the closest teammate. If there are multiple teammates near, you can use the left analog stick to try and aim the pass.
Again, if you are doing the lateral pass, it really depends on your playbook. You can have a ton of plays where you can execute a play doing the lateral.
Once you perfect the lateral, you will be able to expand your offensive playbook and run new plays.
If you know how to taunt, you can mix in a few of those after executing the risky play.
Risks of Doing a Lateral
The most common risk is fumbling the ball and losing a couple of yards. Since you are throwing the pass back, you are sacrificing those yards for a pass that could easily be stopped by a tackle.
Or worse, you could risk an interception.
If you are not familiar with the play you called, it will be hard to execute it. For one, the camera angle is not in your favor. You will not be able to see who is behind you once you catch the ball.
You can change the camera angle to a top view so you can help spot an open RB behind you. Although, it does not seem realistic as a normal player would not have eyes on the back of his head.
With good knowledge of the playbook, you can tell where your teammates are going and when they will cut. Playing a game set to arcade mode will help you see the running lines too.
It will still be tough as you have to vary the risk vs reward of the play. If you are on a 3rd down with a lot of coverage to push for, it will be even riskier so it is best to just run the ball in those situations.
