The first thing that came to my mind when I read your question was a post of mine from about 9 months ago when I had a question about proper snatch form. At the time, James Smith got to asking questions about my training overall and he had some excellent advice about training for younger athletes. I took the liberty of going back and copying some of what he wrote so you can see what he recommends about young athletes and OL and how they should be training. Personally, I find his recommendations to be excellent and highly germane to your situation in training a 14 year old for football.
Have your S and C coach email me so I can explain to him/her why the VAST MAJORITY of high school athletes (especially freshmen and sophomores) lack the physical preparedness in order to safely, effectively, and efficiently perform cleans and snatches.
Here is where the distinction must be made; the VAST MAJORITY of high school athletes (who are not part of an OL club) do not have an adequate amount of time in weight training classes to adequately spend on the proper instruction of the OL’s. Alternatively, if the coach opts to instruct/employ the OL’s than valuable training time is lost which could otherwise be more effectively utilized to learn much simpler lifts, yet just as, if not more, effective at building functional/structural adaptations and muscular coordination (e.g., all major compound lifts and medicine ball throws)
I speak from experience, when I took of the S and C position at my school all of the PE classes and sport teams utilized cleans, and about 99% of all the students exhibited SHIT form. The same is true amongst schools across the US.
These S and C coaches get excited because they either seem some fourteen year old Chinese phenom on an Iron Mind training hall tape, or get brainwashed by the NSCA and then proceed to have entirely ill prepared young boys/girls start performing OL’s.
Moving on, at six feet/one hundred fifty lbs the last thing you need to focus on is building a big snatch. You need to pack some muscle mass on your tall frame and work on increasing your relative and core strength. Leave your speed/RFD training to the field/track and med ball work.
In order to yield any appreciable athletic carryover from the snatch, in my view, the trainee must have already developed certain levels of GPP (e.g., muscle cross-section, inter/intra muscular coordination, relative strength, core strength, dynamic flexibility, mobility, etc.)
The snatch, is inherently speed strength dominant and certainly demands many of the above listed qualities. However, it is not a lift, in my view, which is optimal to teach these qualities, as the risk of injury is to great for trainees with low levels of the abilities listed above.
And speed strength and absolute strength are highly interrelated. And as you must know, very view young athletes possess high degrees of absolute strength. Thus, as max strength increases, so will speed strength, so long as a certain volume of speed/RFD work is being performed (on the track/med ball, etc).
To throw in the OL’s before certain levels of GPP are obtained, is a HUGE mistake in my view.
People in the west must realize that most of the OL lifters from eastern Europe, Russia, and Asia spend years developing GPP before any significant loads are used in the OL’s.
Alternatively, in the west, we like to get our 14 and 15 year olds performing OL variations when there pre-existing levels of GPP are complete SHIT! Subsequently, we are left to observe an exhibition of horrible and dangerous technique in school gyms all across America.
If I can single arm dumbbell curl more than a trainee is capable of 1RMing a snatch, then I have news for you, that trainee is exercising futility by attempting to raise his/her 1RM in the snatch. He/she should instead be focusing on raising the motor abilities which I listed at the beginning of this post.
If you have the opportunity to perform other lifts, than I strongly encourage you to focus on the more simplistic yet effective lifts.
Squat (front, back, high bar, low bar, box, etc)
DL (RDL, SLDL, Conv, Sumo, Dimmel)
GM
Pulls (high, low, snatch grip, clean grip)
Back Extensions
Step ups
Lunges
Presses
Rows
Pull Ups/Chin ups
Dips
Push Ups
Shrugs
Tons and Tons of abdominal work
As far as sets and reps I recommend that you switch up the parameters so as to create a constant influx of new training stimuli.
Emphasize perfect form and prioritize this ahead of how much weight you are lifting.
For the most part I would advise you to stay within the 6-15RM range (except for abdominals) and maintain an inverse relationship between sets and repetitions.
Eat every meal like it is your last and keep it clean. Eat every 2-3 hours. You can lift all the weights in the world, but if you don’t up the caloric intake you won’t put on any appreciable amount of muscle mass.
