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Around the country, but particularly up north, spring football teams are battling with Mother Nature as their fields aren't quite ready. In some cases, indoor facilities that are being utilized while outdoor fields thaw are collapsing from the result of our most recent April winter storm!
So what is a team to do when they're 2 weeks into a season without a field? Many coaches look for ways to stay engaged with their players and keep them focused on learning their playbook. Some search for videos online and send to their players to watch while others simply ask their team to read their playbook. But how would a coach know if they're following through and actually learning anything?
Enter SMASH Routes - The Playbook Game. By transforming your playbook into a mobile game, players are able to PLAY through their playbook at every position, learning positions, assignments and routes. As the players play, (because we all know 'players gonna play'), their performance in SMASH Routes is captured and analyzed for their coaches.
On their mobile device, coaches can easily see who on the team has been busy training their brain, while the data analysis helps them understand which areas of the playbook their team is struggling with. Imagine showing up to your first team practice as a coach and knowing exactly where you need to focus your efforts to get your team up to speed!
But it doesn't end there. Throughout the season, players continue to advance through SMASH Routes, earning achievements and ranking up along the way as they work their way up the leaderboard. Coaches continue to monitor and analyze their team's performance, using the data to support their practice plans as well as help manage their rosters. Parents have access too, allowing them to monitor their child's development while giving them a fun way to motivate and encourage their youth athlete to progress.
Keeping your players accountable is a difficult yet important task of any coach, as you want to ensure you're getting the best effort out of your team. Traditional off-field training tools lack the capabilities to track accountability which is where SMASH Routes excels. And just think how easy it will be when your challenge to the team is to play a mobile game that they enjoy doing already!
So don't let an extended off-season drag your team down as you wait for your fields to be ready. Install your playbook into SMASH Routes and watch how quickly your team starts to talk the same language and work like a well-oiled machine on the field.