The Air Raid — Kansas City Chiefs Madden Guide

Six plays, the whole field, and a quarterback throwing to grass.

The Air Raid is the most influential offense in modern football, built by Hal Mumme and Mike Leach on a heretical idea: you don't need a big playbook, you need a small one your players can run in their sleep. Its NFL descendant runs Kansas City's offense — and our scheme engine grades the Chiefs the #1 Air Raid fit in Madden 27 (87.2, A−). This guide breaks down how the real thing works and exactly how to run it with Kansas City's playbook.

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Quick reference — the mini schemes

The whole offense on one screen, organized the way you will actually use it: by formation, not by coverage. Every home below is a complete mini scheme — its own base call, man answer, zone answer, blitz answer, shot, and run, all from the same picture. That is not an aesthetic choice. The moment your answer lives in a different formation, the formation becomes a tell: change pictures and a good opponent knows the family before the snap. So you pick a picture and live in it, and the defense has to defend everything from everywhere.

Formation	Identity	Base call
Gun Bunch X Nasty	The mesh home — rubs from a bunch picture	Mesh Spot
Gun Tight Y Off	The Y attached — mesh in motion, flood, the cross	Mtn Mesh Spot
Gun Tight Open	The quick-game home — Stick and Mesh Spot side by side	Stick
Gun Bunch Y-Flex	The spacing home — grass, digs, and verticals	Spacing
Gun Trey Y-Flex	The shot home — verticals and the deep cross	Dagger

Hold the distribution. If one receiver has eight targets at halftime and two others have none, you're not running the Air Raid — you're running a star offense with Air Raid plays, and the defense has already tilted. The full mini schemes, with audibles, are below.

Running it in Madden 27

Base setup

Use Kansas City's offensive playbook. Pick one of the five homes and build your game inside it — the audibles, the answers, and the shots below never ask you to change formations, so your picture never tips your play. Flip homes between drives, not between snaps: a new picture is a new game for the defense to solve, on your schedule, not theirs.

The inputs — fix it at the line

Strategy is useless if your fingers can't cash it before the rush arrives. The three adjustments this offense lives on, exactly as your hands do them:

Adjustment	PlayStation	Xbox	When
Hot route to a drag	Triangle → receiver's icon → Right Stick ↓	Y → receiver's icon → Right Stick ↓	Your called answer is covered — put the Volume Man on a drag and let him run away from man coverage.
Smart route to the sticks	Triangle → receiver's icon → R1	Y → receiver's icon → RB	3rd down: the route re-stems itself to the first-down marker.
Send him in motion	Circle to cycle to the receiver → Left Stick ← / →	B to cycle to the receiver → Left Stick ← / →	A running start for the Volume Man — and motion makes the defense declare man or zone before the snap.

The mini schemes — every answer inside the picture

Each scheme below is self-contained: every call is a stock play in that formation in Kansas City's Madden 27 playbook. The audible line under each one is the Can-Can — Leach's check-with-me system, four slots loaded in that formation's Audibles tab before the game, called at the line with Square / X.

Gun Bunch X Nasty — the mesh home

Situation	Call	Why
Base	Mesh Spot	The heartbeat: rubs beat man, the sit beats zone, the wheel punishes both. Call it until they prove they can stop it — then call it once more.
vs. man	Bounce Mesh Drive · Y Option Pivot	The mesh with a head of steam, and the pivot that breaks wherever leverage says. Man coverage has to run through its own traffic.
vs. zone	Spacing Switch · Corner Out Dig	Spacing punishes cushions; the dig settles behind linebackers who chased the crossers.
vs. blitz	Flanker Drive	The fastest-developing answer in the formation — out before the rush arrives, Drive HB Under as the checkdown.
The shot	Bounce PA Double Post · Post Wheel Shallow	Once a quarter, when the safeties start squatting on the crossers. Scarcity is what keeps it open.
Red zone	Z Mesh Goalline · Y Flat Goalline	The goal-line versions of the same rubs — the field shrinks, the picks don't.
Run tax / two-minute	Inside Zone · Counter Y · DBL Outs	Inside Zone and Counter Y tax a light box; DBL Outs is the sideline answer when the clock is the defense.

Audibles: 1 Mesh Spot · 2 Flanker Drive · 3 Bounce PA Double Post · 4 Inside Zone.

Gun Tight Y Off — the Y attached

Situation	Call	Why
Base	Mtn Mesh Spot	The mesh concept with the Y attached and set in motion — the crossers arrive with a running start.
vs. man	Cheat Slash Wheel Cross	The wheel and the cross cross each other — man defenders trade problems at full speed.
vs. zone	Flood Drive	Three levels at one flat defender. He chooses wrong; they all do.
vs. blitz	Mtn Slot Choice · HB Slip Screen	The choice route breaks on leverage before the rush lands; the screen punishes the send itself.
The shot	PA Go Slot Cross · Fake Jet HB Seam · TE Corner	The slot cross behind the fake, the seam off the jet picture, and the Y's own corner — three shots, one picture.
Red zone	Mtn Y-Corner · Wheel Spot	The Y in the corner and the spot route under it — leverage scores, not grass.
Run tax	Duo · 0 1 Trap · Read Option	Downhill answers that keep a four-man rush from teeing off.

Audibles: 1 Mtn Slot Choice · 2 Mtn Mesh Spot · 3 PA Go Slot Cross · 4 Duo.

Gun Tight Open — the quick-game home

Situation	Call	Why
Base	Stick	The blitz answer and the base call in one: stick, flat, and a clear-out — ball out before anything develops.
vs. man	Mesh Spot	The same formation's mesh: crossers at five yards, rub included, no picture change to tip it.
vs. zone	Bench Z Spot · Spot X Option	The spot family punishes zone cushions — the spot route sits, the dig settles behind it.
vs. blitz	Drive Stutter Flat	Stick is already the hot; the stutter flat is the second one when they mug and jump the stick.
The shot	Verticals HB Burst · Slot Post	Four seams with the back bursting through, and the post when a safety creeps.
Red zone	Shallow Corner Stop · Bench Dig Pivot	Stops and pivots at the goal line — routes that win in a phone booth.
Run tax	Inside Zone · HB Draw · Speed Option	The draw is the pressure tax: send the rush, and the back is past it.

Audibles: 1 Stick · 2 Mesh Spot · 3 Verticals HB Burst · 4 Inside Zone.

Gun Bunch Y-Flex — the spacing home

Situation	Call	Why
Base	Spacing	Throw to grass: spacing concepts punish zone cushions without a single adjustment.
vs. man	Jet Pull Shallow · 83 HB Choice	The shallow off the jet picture, and the back's choice route against a linebacker — a mismatch the formation manufactures.
vs. zone	Dagger · Speed Dig Out · Spacing Switch	Dagger clears a safety for the dig; the switch release scrambles zone passing-off rules.
vs. blitz	L Spot · HB Slip Screen	The spot is out immediately; the screen answers the send when they keep coming.
The shot	Verticals · PA Post Y-Corner	Four seams against either shell, and the post-corner behind the fake when they squat.
Red zone	Smash Return	The smash with a return — the red zone's favorite high-low, built for shrunk fields.
Run tax	Inside Zone · HB Power	Two runs, both directions of tax: the zone for light boxes, the power for walked-up ones.

Audibles: 1 L Spot · 2 Spacing · 3 Verticals · 4 Inside Zone.

Gun Trey Y-Flex — the shot home

Situation	Call	Why
Base	Dagger	The clear-out and the dig: the shot home's base call still moves the chains.
vs. man	PA Crossers · Mtn Wheels Slot Choice	Crossers behind the fake, and motion wheels that make man defenders run the long way around.
vs. zone	Levels Y Corner · Post Y Dig	Levels layering at the flat defender, and the post-dig combination behind sinking linebackers.
vs. blitz	Scat · Empty Slot Under	Scat is the five-out answer — somebody is uncovered by arithmetic. The slot under is the hot behind it.
The shot	Verticals · Empty Y Cross · Empty Vertical	The whole point of the picture: four verts, and the Y crossing the entire field behind the shallow look — the shot that looks like Mesh until it's too late.
Red zone	SE Corner · Mtn Whip Y-Shake	The corner and the whip-shake: separation routes that don't need grass.
Run tax	Inside Zone · HB Draw · Read Option	The draw punishes the rush the shots create; the read option taxes a crashing end.

Audibles: 1 Scat · 2 Dagger · 3 Verticals · 4 Inside Zone.

The change-up pictures — small schemes, same rule

Gun Bunch Str Nasty: Mesh Flat Spot — the bunch's other mesh, with Dagger and Bunch Smash in the same picture when X Nasty has been shown too often.
Gun Tight Y Off Wk: Shallow Cross — the drag-and-dig with Flanker Spot as its partner: a two-play mini scheme for soft zones.
Gun Trio Y-Flex: Mesh Whips — mesh with whip returns, Mtn Stick as its quick answer, RPO Alert Bubble as the run-pass tax.

The core concepts

Mesh — two shallow crossers rub past each other at five yards with a sit route behind them. The rub beats man coverage; if the defense zones it off, the sit and the wheel behind the crossers are the answers. The most-repped play in the offense's history.

Orange is the first read, black the complementary routes, blue the checkdown. The two crossers pass close enough to rub a trailing defender off — against zone, the sit route (blue) settles behind them.

Y-Cross — the tight end (the Y) crosses the whole formation deep while a shallow drags underneath him. It's the shot play that looks like Mesh until it's too late — the defense that steps up on the shallow gives up the cross behind it.

The shot play disguised as Mesh: same shallow action underneath, but the Y keeps going across the field, over the linebackers the drag just held.

Four Verticals (Leach's "6") — four receivers up the seams. Against two-high, the inside verticals attack the space between the safeties; against one-high, the outside receivers win their one-on-ones. The inside men read the safeties and bend to grass.

Four seams stretch the field to its limit. Against two-high safeties (grey), the inside verticals bend into the grass between them — the defense has four deep threats and two deep defenders.

Shallow Cross (Leach's "91") — a receiver drags across at linebacker depth with a dig settling behind him. Catch-and-run against soft zones, and the dig punishes linebackers who chase the drag.

A high-low on the linebackers (grey): chase the drag and the dig settles behind you; sink on the dig and the shallow catches it underneath with room to run.

Stick (Leach's "618") — the quick-game staple: a stick route, a flat, and a vertical clearing space. It's the offense's hot answer — if they blitz, Stick is already out of the quarterback's hand.

The hot answer: the stick breaks outside at five yards, the flat stretches the same defender, and the vertical clears the corner. Three routes, one read, ball out.

Smash — a short hitch in front of a corner route. It high-lows the flat defender, and in the red zone — where this offense's space shrinks — it becomes a featured call. The read moves with the coverage: against Cover 2 you're high-lowing the outside corner — if he sinks with the corner route, throw the hitch under him; if he bites on the hitch, the corner is open behind him. Against Cover 3, Cover 4, or match, the corner isn't the conflict defender anymore — the read moves one man inside, to the apex (the nickel or linebacker over the slot), and he gets the same treatment: jumps the hitch, the corner goes behind him; sinks to the corner, the hitch is free underneath.

Against Cover 2 the read is the outside corner: he sinks, the hitch (1) is yours; he bites, the corner (2) is behind him. Against Cover 3/4 the same picture high-lows the apex inside — the read just moves one man in. The back (3) is the checkdown.

The formations — what to call, and why

The Air Raid runs about six concepts, but it runs them from a handful of formations — and the formation is never decoration. Each one moves a defender, forces a declaration, or manufactures the matchup the concept needs. Same plays, different problems. Here is the menu, in the order you will actually live in it.

Doubles is the default picture: balanced 2x2 with maximum splits. Nothing about it threatens the defense except everything — every concept in the offense is available, and no defender gets to cheat toward help.

Doubles (2x2) — the home base

Why you call it: balance and width. Two receivers each side with the widest splits the formation allows means the defense cannot overload a side, shade a safety, or hide a blitz — the field is simply too wide to defend with a plan. Every concept in the offense works from Doubles, which makes it the formation of the tempo game: you can run Mesh, Verts, Stick, and Shallow on consecutive snaps without a single substitution or a new picture for the defense to read.

Call it: as your default, on early downs and whenever you are speeding up. If you do not have a specific reason to be somewhere else, be here.

Trips (3x1) — make them declare

Why you call it: three receivers to one side is a question the defense must answer out loud. Rotate a safety down, slide the linebackers, or leave three defenders on three receivers and pray. Any answer tells you the coverage — and every answer strands the single receiver (the X) on the backside against one corner with no help, which is where the glance, the fade, and the backside dig live. To the strong side, Trips is where Stick, Flood-style layering, and the Mesh family overload zone defenders who cannot pass off three routes.

Call it: when you want information, when their best corner travels and you want him isolated on the weak side — or when the defense refuses to adjust and you can flood the strong side all afternoon.

Empty (3x2, no back) — the honest picture

Why you call it: with the back split out, there is no run fake left to respect, so the defense shows you the truth: five or six rush threats walk up, coverage declares itself, and the quarterback gets the cleanest pre-snap read in football. Empty is also the blitz's worst enemy — five receivers out means at least two built-in hots, and a defense that sends six is throwing into grass. The cost is real: five-man protection with no back to clean up, so the ball lives on quick game and the concepts that are already out before the rush.

Call it: against blitz-happy defenses, in the two-minute drill, and any time you trust your quarterback's reads more than their disguise.

Bunch (compressed trips) — built-in rubs

Why you call it: three receivers stacked tight does mechanically what Mesh does with motion — defenders in man coverage have to fight through traffic and each other, and press coverage becomes nearly impossible to play cleanly. Bunch also scrambles zone assignments, because three releases from one point stress the passing-off rules of any coverage. It is the red zone's favorite picture: the field shrinks, but the rubs do not.

Call it: against press man, in the red zone, and on the money downs where one rub is the whole play.

Y attached vs Y flexed — two different offenses

Why you call it: the tight end's alignment changes the defense's arithmetic. Attached (on the line, next to the tackle), the Y sells run, adds a gap the defense must honor, and becomes the crosser on Y-Cross and the play-action family — linebackers who step up for the run fit are behind him forever. Flexed (split into the slot), he is a fourth receiver: the defense must decide whether a linebacker, a nickel, or a safety owns a 250-pound matchup problem, and the formation becomes a 4-strong passing set.

Call it: attached when you want play-action and the cross to bite; flexed when you want the matchup — their worst coverage defender on your Y, declared before the snap.

Singleback / Ace — the change-up that protects everything else

Why you call it: under center with two tight ends or a fullback look, the defense must honor the run with real numbers — and every safety step toward the line is a step away from Four Verticals. The Air Raid's passing game is defended honestly only while the run is a rumor; Ace is how you keep it credible. It is also the home of the play-action shot, the one call that punishes a defense for solving your quick game.

Call it: a handful of times a game, on early downs — enough that play-action stays a threat and the safeties can never fully commit to the pass.

Formation by situation — the cheat sheet

Default / tempo: Doubles. No subs, no tells, every concept available.
You need the coverage identified: Trips — their adjustment is the tell.
They blitz to survive: Empty — built-in hots and an honest picture.
Press man or red zone: Bunch — the rubs are the play.
You want the shot: Y attached, play-action, Y-Cross behind the linebackers.
They have stopped respecting the run: Ace, two or three snaps, until the safeties remember.

The personnel guide — who plays what, and what to shop for

Every role below is a job in the system, with the Chief who holds it in Madden 27, the ratings that make him work, and the floors to shop for in franchise mode.

The Trigger — quarterback: Patrick Mahomes (93 OVR)

The Air Raid quarterback doesn't need the strongest arm in football — he needs the calmest one, because five-man protections mean pressure arrives on schedule. Mahomes: 97 THP, 94 SAC, 89 MAC, 86 DAC, and the stat this offense lives on, 90 TUP (throw under pressure), with 85 SPD to punish defenses that turn their backs in man. Shop for: TUP and short accuracy before raw power. The ball comes out in under three seconds; a quarterback who needs a clean pocket needs a different offense.

The Y — tight end: Travis Kelce (93 OVR)

Y-Cross is named for this man. Kelce: 85 SRR, 77 MRR, 71 DRR, 87 CIT, 94 CTH, and 78 RLS to beat press at the line. He is simultaneously the deep-cross shot and the third-down security blanket. Shop for: route running and hands over size — your Y is a big receiver, not a sixth lineman. Noah Gray (73 OVR, 87 SPD, 89 CTH) is the developmental understudy.

The Volume Man — slot/possession receiver: Rashee Rice (85 OVR)

Mesh and Stick run through him: 89 SRR, 88 MRR, 92 CTH, 82 CIT, with 90 SPD so his catches become yards. Shop for: short route running and acceleration — this is your most-targeted player, and he has to win in a phone booth, twice a drive.

The Eraser — vertical receiver: Xavier Worthy (79 OVR)

79 overall and completely essential: 99 SPD, 98 ACC, 82 DRR. His job on most snaps is not to catch the ball — it's to delete the safety's help from every other route on the field. One deep completion a game keeps that deletion permanent. Shop for: pure speed. Nothing else on his line matters as much as the number that makes a safety back up.

The Valve — running back: Kenneth Walker III (95 OVR)

The most underrated job in the offense. Walker (93 SPD, 98 BTK, 93 BCV, 67 CTH) is the checkdown when the coverage wins, the RPO mesh threat that punishes light boxes, and the last blocker when the protection is outnumbered. Shop for: vision and break-tackle first — his catches are short, but what he does after them is the offense's hidden yardage.

The Wall — offensive line: Creed Humphrey (96) and Trey Smith (93)

You will pass-set forty times a game with five blockers, so pass blocking is your run game, your screen game, and your survival. Humphrey anchors it (93 PBK) with Smith (85 PBK) beside him, and left tackle Josh Simmons (81 OVR, 84 PBK) protects the blind side. Shop for: PBK across all five spots before you upgrade a single skill player. An Air Raid with a leaking line is just a sack drill.

Know the weaknesses — your opponent will

Five-man protection has a math problem against a defense willing to send six — which is why the Flores defense is this offense's natural predator, and why your hot answers have to be reflexes, not decisions. Press man coverage disrupts the timing the whole system runs on. The red zone compresses the spacing that makes everything work. And a patient user defender sitting on Mesh will take your favorite play away — which is the test of whether you actually installed the counters or just memorized a favorite.

If they're beating it, answer like this

They're blitzing six: stop calling downfield concepts. Stick, Bench Z Spot, and the HB Slip Screen until the blitz count drops — the offense's answer to pressure is speed of release, not more blockers.
Press man is jamming your crossers: move into the bunch formations (X Nasty, Y-Flex) where rubs are structural and releases are free, and motion the Volume Man to give him a running start.
The user is camping on Mesh: he's guarding five yards of grass with his best defender. The sit route, the wheel, and Y Option Pivot all exist because of him — and the Shot is now open, because a user who sits that low has told you the safeties are alone.
They're dropping eight: that's the defense conceding. RPO Alert Bubble, Inside Zone, and the quarterback's legs until they walk back down. Distribution includes the run column.
Red zone stalls: stop calling field plays in a phone booth. Scissors, Smash, and the fade — rubs and leverage score down there, grass doesn't exist.

Quick answers

Do I need the Chiefs? No — any spread book with Mesh, Verticals, and Stick can run the system. Kansas City's is just the best marriage of concepts and personnel in the game, which is why our engine ranks it first.
My quarterback doesn't have a cannon. Good news: this offense was built for him. Timing and short accuracy beat arm strength here — the deepest regular throw is a seam read, not a 60-yard heave.
I keep getting sacked. You're reading the play like a pro-style offense — first read downfield, check down last. Flip it: the shallow and the stick ARE the play. The deep stuff is what happens when the defense takes the quick answers away.

Want the other side of this war? The Flores Defense guide is the pressure system built to hunt this offense — and the Air Raid scheme page has the full formation-by-formation breakdown.

Watch it on film

The concepts, drawn up on film. The Weekly Spiral's Football 101 breakdown walks through how the Air Raid actually works — the spacing, the distribution, and the core concepts this guide installs — which makes it the perfect companion before you lab it. Prefer the philosophy straight from the source? The Air Raid Academy's Legends session with Hal Mumme, Mike Leach, Lincoln Riley, and Dana Holgorsen is on YouTube here (their channel only allows playback on YouTube itself, so it can't be embedded).

Video: The Weekly Spiral — "Football 101: Air Raid Offense"

The identity: distribution, not balance

Leach used to say a 50/50 run-pass split was "50% stupid." Balance in the Air Raid doesn't mean equal runs and passes — it means the ball gets distributed to every eligible receiver, across every part of the field, so the defense can never tilt toward the thing you love most. The playbook fits on an index card. The defense still can't stop it, because the plays were never the point. The spacing is.

Why it works: the spacing math

A football field is 53⅓ yards wide, and no defense can cover all of it plus 30 yards deep. The Air Raid stretches five eligible receivers across that entire width with wide splits, which turns every coverage into a math problem with no right answer: double one receiver and the grass somewhere else gets bigger. The quarterback's job is not to outsmart the coverage before the snap. It's to find the grass after it — every concept below has a man answer and a zone answer built into the same play, so the call is never wrong. Only the read can be.

The five pillars

1. Few plays, endless reps

The core menu is about six pass concepts. That's not a limitation, it's the engine: when your quarterback and receivers have run Mesh five hundred times, the adjustments that beat each coverage stop being reads and become reflexes. A small menu executed perfectly beats a big menu executed approximately.

2. Throw to grass

Receivers aren't running to a spot on a diagram — they're running to open space, and the key routes carry built-in conversions: a vertical that bends away from a safety, a cross that settles in a void. The quarterback throws to the grass and trusts the receiver to be standing in it.

3. Every concept answers every coverage

Mesh beats man with the rub and beats zone with the sit route underneath it. Four Verticals stresses two-high seams and converts against one-high. There is no coverage the defense can call that one of your six plays doesn't have an answer for — which means you never need to check at the line. You call your game and let the concepts sort it out.

4. Distribution is the run game's best friend

When all five eligibles are live, defenses defend the pass with numbers — and that's when the Air Raid runs it, into the lightest boxes in football. The run isn't a change of philosophy. It's what the defense gets punished with for respecting pillar one through three.

5. Tempo is a weapon

Line up fast and the defense can't substitute, can't disguise, and can't breathe. In Madden terms: no-huddle after completions isn't a gimmick in this offense, it's a pillar. Every rushed defensive call is a simpler picture for your quarterback.

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