I'm just getting into coaching, and I don't have a single person I can count on to write the play charts in our games. Does anyone know of an app that helps automate the charting process?

We have to write down our own plays. How many assistants do you have?

There are just 6 of us total, and two are up in the booth (one is watching secondary, the other is the OC and charting their own plays). We've done the writing and had a kid writing it for us, but there's a big learning curve involved with that. If nothing exists we can keep writing it as is, but it'd be great to have a more streamlined, efficient, and cleaner way to keep track of it.

Any great nerds out there that want to make an app for it on iOS? I'd love to test drive it for you to help optimize it. I feel like the coaching community would eat it up, and they'd be willing to pay for it as well.

This is to track down & distance, a customize-able field for defense called, offensive formation, offensive play call, and result. It allows coaches to pick up on tendencies used throughout the game and can help make a good prediction on a third and short.

[This message has been edited by Bulldog73 (edited 8/31/2014 2:33p).]

I volunteer to help beta or alpha any app as well.

Y'all don't have/use film? Why have 2 guys in the booth? I'm assuming this is youth football. Our plays are numerical. We just write the number down, yardage gained and ball carrier. The key here is how you leverage the info. If you just write it down and do nothing with it post game or in prep for next week.....

[This message has been edited by Comeby! (edited 8/31/2014 5:04p).]

We absolutely utilize film in preparation for the week, and look for trends within that. We're dealing with high school football, and the variety of fronts we run along with varying blitzes, stunts, and coverages makes the numbering system difficult.

I'm new to this staff and profession in general, so I'm not calling the shots (regarding coaches upstairs), but it's our OC who is watching for subs/packages and going through his own info while communicating with us down on the field when needed, and our secondary/running backs coach watching specifically for route patterns and things in the back 7.

Our DC likes to look at the charts between defensive drives, so something down on the field is necessary. Most staffs have something of this sort, but many seem to have more manpower allowing them to have a coach dedicated to recording of plays throughout the game. I was trying to communicate that information while watching both lines for coaching points. An app would be easy to train one of our Jr. High players on, and keep the information much cleaner than scribbled on a Excel printout.

No one I've spoken to has heard of such an app, but everyone I've spoken to has said they would pay significant money for such a technology.

Jeff, do you agree with my assessment or have a better way of putting it since we've spoken about this on another thread?

[This message has been edited by Bulldog73 (edited 8/31/2014 5:25p).]

Yeah. The importance of charting plays in-game is to be able to adjust your play calling from series to series, half to half to take advantage of what the other team is giving or fix problems they are exposing.

We'll certainly use video after the fact for self-scouting, but there is a need for a faster method to chart and track in-game tendencies. It's something HUDL should get after since they already have apps and software developed to breakdown video as well as make practice and gameplans.

Finally found something similar to what I'm looking for. It's a bit overkill, and more expensive than what we'll likely be able to pay, but it has the functionality that I really want. The yearly fee just doesn't make a lot of sense to me unless there will be updates that aren't mentioned anywhere.

Anyone want to build a dumbed down knock off?

http://r2sportstech.com/gameday-scout.html

Guys, just something to help move this along for a developer. I have worked on a few web apps but never an Iphone or Android app.

I reviewed the other app that was posted and it seems to be pretty straight forward. I charted plays for the varsity when I was on JV, so I have a little experience in both realms.

It may be a good idea to come up with a simulated screen of what you are looking for.
Either a hand sketch, something drawn in a program like balsamiq, or even use the drawing capabilities of Word. At least write out some specs of what you are wanting.

I would assume:

Down: 1-4
Distance: Do you want true distance or is Long, Medium, Short okay?
Formation: How many options here?

and then continue with each item and the number of options.

Also, what buttons can be hard coded and what options need to be changeable.

Then I would do they same thing for defense and specials if you chart those.

For a web development perspective, it is not a big deal to change button text, but I imagine they are making it a 'custom' app so they can get paid in perpetuity instead of a one time sell.


Seems like a cool app and something that would make your lives easier for sure!

I agree this would be perfect for HUDL. They probably could tie it into the film somehow for help with reviewing the game afterwards.

aggiez






[This message has been edited by aggiez03 (edited 9/1/2014 8:21a).]

Yeah you would need:

Down 1-4
Distance (short, medium and long would be ok)
Formation (could be a huge list that could be pared down before the game based on scouting)
Play type: Run or pass
Play direction: Strong or weak, field or boundary
Play details: Could be another huge list pared down pregame or just left to input text
Result: First down, penalty, TD, turnover, etc.

Then you just need a screen to summarize your inputs by drive or half or game.

Don't waste your time helping out the jocks. Nerds forever.

Maybe I'm a bit lost here, what exactly does the app do or you would like the app to do?

dam

It would give you an easy way to chart (or write down) what the opposing team is doing on either offense or defense. Then you can look back at it after the drive or during the half to make your adjustments. Typically another coach will hand-write this information, but it can be tedious for someone who's never done it before. Those of us on small staffs need all the help we can get and an app might streamline the system.

I emailed HUDL about our idea this morning.

quote:

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Don't waste your time helping out the jocks. Nerds forever.

---

Oh, and the best coaches are nerds.

I'm a stats nerd who ended up coaching.

Interesting and I guess you could have them all sync so multiple people can work on the same play at once. One coach corners/WR, o/d line, running backs/back.

dam

worst forum sw ever.

dam

[This message has been edited by DAM (edited 9/1/2014 2:03p).]

When I charted it plays for the varsity it was something like this:

Down: 1st and 10
Ball : Own 30 yd line
Play Call: Sweep Right
Result: 7 yd gain

Down: 2nd and 3
Ball : Own 37 yd line
Play Call: Screen to HB
Result: 4 yd gain

Don't remember doing formation and such, but definitely see how it could be valuable.

What would be really cool would to be to build it as a service and then offer it to every subscriber.

So if you were playing Kyler and Allen, you could pull the opposing coaches play charts from the past 3 games to analyze for tendencies, etc.

Everytime they are in 3rd and long, they roll Kyler to the right, etc.

So it would be like trading film, but you would not have to break down the tendencies yourself. It would be statistically analyzed.

Maybe that is what the other part of the Gameday film analysis does, I am not sure.

It would definitely help the coaches save time in analyzing tendencies.

aggiez

Exactly, and exactly why it would be helpful if Hudl offered it since they facilitate all the film trading/break down around these parts. They'll probably offer something like it next year for an extra couple hundred bucks.

I can probably very quickly put together a simple site which allows you to create a game and then you enter all the fields manually, would this be of some help?

dam

I never tracked other teams live, I just studied opposing teams film and understood those tendencies. As far as tracking our own, our play number would designate formation, etc so I would just write that down. I would also write ball carrier number because we swapped out players a lot.

An yardage gained is vital so you can run analytics. "What do they do on 3rd and long (say 8 ytg)?"

Hudl has live stats now, and I don't see why they couldn't add in a few fields for formation and strength. I will say this...you are going to need more than one person do this because it will be impossible to do with the no-huddle teams going fast tempo.

The live tag feature being integrated with stats is an exceptional idea and it works, and I think one person can do live tag with stats fairly easily. If tempo is high, then it becomes considerably more difficult. Add three or for more fields to search, and it is next to impossible for one person to do. We have one person keep stats for district and team reporting, one person to live tag, one person charting offensive calls with D/D and opponent fronts/blitzes, and one person on the sideline charting defensive calls and the opponent offensive calls on each D/D. So that is 4 people to help deal with charting and stats. We should be able to eliminate the stat person's job, but he couldn't handle doing the live tag with stats by himself, and it was a fiasco the first time we tried it. So, to simplify, we left everything the way it was.

The biggest help in terms of video trade has been the live tag, though. That is genius.

How does live tag help with your trades?

Live tag allows you to get all the data you want AT the game. ODK, Down, Distance, yard line, gain/loss, play type, hash, play result, etc. Get it done live at the game, then sync it after the game with your video. No need to go in and add it later while watching it again. I am amazed at how many schools don't take advantage of it. We've done it since the day they made it available. Obviously, you have to commit a person to do it each game, but that completely eliminates hours of input on Friday night/sat morning.

So it helps with the breakdown, but not the trading?

That would save us a lot of time on Saturday mornings, but our staff is too small to spare a guy to keep up with it during a game.

Thanks!

Yeah, 6 man staff already having to use Jr. High kids for charting... It'd be a great luxury, but one I don't think we can use.