High school coaches worry that fans might be eavesdropping with scanners

<p>Many high school football coaches are concerned that when they use wireless radios to talk strategy during games, fans might be eavesdropping with scanners.</p><p>NASCAR encourages its fans to use the scanner devices to listen as such drivers as Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt Jr. communicate with their pit crews during races. The scanners come complete with a list of frequencies for each racing team and have been used since the 1970s, when car owners began using two-way radios to talk with drivers.</p><p>Most high school coaches arent happy about the possibility of a similar trend on Friday nights.</p><p>The coaches worry that their strategic conversations are being heard and sometimes relayed, and they go to great pains to keep the coach-to-coach conversations private.</p><p>The scanners used by NASCAR fans cost about $200. Many football teams spend a lot more than that to ensure that theyre not being heard over the airwaves.</p><p>Schools traditionally used a hard-line cable between the coaches box and the sideline. But many coaches, growing weary of tangled and cut wires, converted to a two-way radio system during the mid-1980s.</p><p>The cable system worked fine until you had to untangle it, Parkview High School coach Cecil Flowe told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. It was always just a hassle.</p><p>In the late 1990s, many teams switched to wireless digital radios, which are more difficult to intercept because they have 256,000 frequencies, making a common scanner virtually useless.</p><p>Some coaches leave little to chance, often changing frequencies during games.</p><p>Flowe, a part-time short-track racer, says when he scrapped the hard line in favor of a two-way radio in the 1980s, he realized that someone could sit in the bleachers with a scanner and listen to every word spoken by his staff. If an opposing team listened in, he said, Youd feel violated, because youre talking strategy and theyd know what play is coming.</p><p>Commerce High School coach Steve Savage says there were rumors of eavesdropping even during the hard-line cable days.</p><p>It was always reported that when we played a certain team they were going to tap into our headphones, Savage said. What would happen, though, is about midway through the first quarter somebody would cut the line.</p><p>You always hear stories of somebody accusing someone of eavesdropping. But its usually the one who got whipped thats accusing the one who won.</p><p>Savage says an eavesdropper would need a playbook to understand the language his coaches use. With every team, its like a foreign language when you call the plays, he said.</p><p>Chattahoochee coach Bill Waters recalls the pre-digital days, when his staff used two-way radios.</p><p>We used to hear the McDonalds drive-through down the road, Waters said. Wed hear somebody place an order.</p>