'The field is a canvas': Jaguars wide receivers open up about the art of running routes

With the game tied late in the fourth quarter, Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence signaled to wide receiver Christian Kirk.

As the ball was snapped, Kirk ran off the line of scrimmage before hesitating, freezing veteran defensive back Tyrann Mathieu in his tracks and blowing past him across the middle of the field.

Lawrence fired a bullet to Kirk, who caught the ball in stride and went 44 yards, scoring the go-ahead touchdown against New Orleans on Oct. 19. After the game, it was Kirk’s speed that was lauded, but it should’ve been his route running abilities.

He turned a simple choice route — a play that failed when the Jaguars attempted to run it against Buffalo — into a pivotal score on the road.

“So many people say it's an art because it is an art,” Kirk said when asked about route running. “Every artist has their own style. Every artist likes to express how they see certain things in different ways.”

Art comes in many forms: Route running is one of the most pure

A sculptor molding wet clay into a solid figure. A painter stroking their brush across a blank surface. A wide receiver using a move to get past a defender?

Art comes in different forms.

For pass catchers of the Jaguars, their favorite form of art is route running. You won’t find it in a museum, but more likely, on a short clip from social media.

But there’s a seriousness to the craft of running a route. From the approach to the execution, and finally, the result.

Then wash, rinse and repeat over and over in an endless cycle for 60 minutes of game clock spread across 17 games every season.

“I see route running as an opportunity to master art,” tight end Evan Engram said. “I think there's just so many avenues or different ways to approach it. I look at it as art. I look at it as, the field is a canvas. We get a free canvas to go paint a picture.

“Every passing play, whether you get the ball or not, you have [the] opportunity to run a route, create separation. And how do you do that? How do you put that on film? It's a quest of mastery, too. It's an opportunity to master that craft.”

Sometimes, a great route is just a decoy for a teammate to get a better look against a defense. A prime example of this was running back Travis Etienne’s touchdown catch against the Pittsburgh Steelers on Oct. 29.

Etienne was lined up outside against cornerback Joey Porter Jr. with Calvin Ridley lined up in the slot. Etienne ran a go route while Ridley curled outside and stayed underneath.

It confused the Steelers' defense as two players accounted for Ridley and allowed Lawrence to find Etienne 20 yards downfield with no one covering him.

It’s something that happens frequently for Jacksonville, using the threat of Ridley’s playmaking ability to their advantage to create mismatches for other skill players.

“I could run a deep route and we could have a route that’s underneath that we want to hit. And I can pull three [defenders] out of there,” Ridley said. “I mean, we've done it before.”

Styles of art: Lebron James versus saucy, the Jaguars have both

A lot of route running is predicated on what the defense does. What is the primary coverage you’ll see in a given week? What style routes work against which defenders?

What’s the go-to route when your team needs a big play? And how can you beat a defender for the timely play?

“A lot of it can dictate on who you're playing or the type of defense, whether it’s zone or man,” Kirk said. “But it's, to me, just having a diverse, almost like rolodex of things that you can just get to at any time.”

“They watch the film, and they can probably get a guess on what you're running,” Ridley added. “So, you try to do a couple of moves. Play with your feet, switch your alignment a little bit. Just add little wrinkles in on the way to the route and sometimes it helps.”

Another main factor of route running is simply the style of route runner you are. There are players who like being physical against defenders. They use their strength to create separation off the line of scrimmage.

Then there are players who are savvier with their routes. They use their speed to their advantage to get the needed separation.

Jacksonville has good examples of both styles in Engram and Kirk.

“Guys have more, physical, violent [styles]; I like to call it LeBron James, getting-to-the-hole approach,” Engram said. “Then you got guys that are real saucy and shifty, like [Christian Kirk]. I mean, he barely gets touched. And he just sends guys all over the place.

“There's just so many different ways to create that art.”

The game within the game: It's chess, not checkers

A route doesn’t just end. You have to finish it.

“You ever played Madden?” Zay Jones asks. “You know when they show the curl on Madden — it has that little piece of it at the end coming back to the ball? That's part of the route. It’s completing that part. It’s not just the end, you have to finish it.”

Mastering the art of route running is the goal of any pass-catcher. Having the ability to contort your body and be physical — or agile — against your opponent to give a quarterback an easy target to hit takes work.

But for Jacksonville, they have some of the best route runners in the National Football League.

There's a variety of players on the roster who use all of their skill sets to find and create advantages in the game within the game.

"It's truly chess, not checkers," Kirk said. "You can be setting up stuff for a route that's coming later in the game. It’s all piecing things together.

"For me, what I like to do is make everything look the same. Show you one thing and give you the other and maybe show you what you think you're gonna see and then actually do it, just to set it up for something later."

Juston Lewis is a sports reporter for the Florida Times-Union. You can follow him on the website formerly known as Twitter at @JustonLewis_.

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Christian Kirk, Calvin Ridley, Jags receivers talk NFL route running