How to Read Signal Wristbands

Every once in a while a new customer will email me and say something like this…

I was excited to use Never Miss A Sign this weekend but none of the signals matched up…the software must be broken!

When I read that statement I see two problems:

  1. You should never try something in a game that you haven’t done in practice before.  Yes, that includes using Never Miss A Sign!  Spend a few minutes with your players so that they’re comfortable and they aren’t surprised.
  2. The software works.  It has always worked.  It will always work.  The problem is a little something we like to call “user error,” ha!

Every time I receive an email like that I have to explain to the coach that, yes, the software does work correctly but they were probably reading the card incorrectly.

The correct way to read a signal wristband is…

Locate the first two numbers going across one of the top rows, and then go down the column until you get to the correct number.

As you can see in the example above, to find the number 155, you would locate “15” first, and then locate the second “5.”

Once I explain this to coaches they usually reply with something like “Well, now I feel silly…I should have known that!”

It’s a super simple system, and players pick it up extremely quickly, but as a coach we still need to spend a little time in practice going over the signs and the signal wristbands so that our players will feel comfortable using it in a game.