Teaching your squad how to hit a curveball. Breaking down your point guard's jump shot. Streaming your team's game stats in real-time on the internet.
Yeah, they've got an app for that.
Technology has changed sports in many ways. But tools like the iPhone and iPad can do more than just plaster your Little League team's game-winning hit on YouTube. They can actually make instructing young athletes more effective and incredibly high-tech.
But with so many apps to choose from, it can be difficult to decide which will suit your needs. So to help you in your search here is our (mostly) official top-five list of iPhone apps every team sport coach should consider adding to their arsenal.
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iPhone Team Sport App No.1: Ubersense ($1.99)
The Ubersense app is a great way to analyze body movement. Video slow motion playback allows coaches to analyze the techniques and skills of athletes, frame by frame. Video recording options allow for self-recording and move-by-move analysis.
A text and audio notes feature makes it easy to add notes and commentary to recordings. (This app also makes it possible for users to compare their sports performance with that of others by using the integrated side-by-side analysis.)
iPhone Team Sport App No.2: Baseball Gameplan With Jason Giambi (free)
Parents, coaches and players of baseball will find the Baseball Gameplan With Jason Giambi app quite helpful for improving play. This step-by-step instructional app provides users with hitting tips and drills, stretching routines and customized goal monitoring.
More: Set Sports Goals You'll Actually AchieveIt also provides workouts for younger players and indoor drills for inclement weather. Available upgrades include position-specific training and high-definition video quality (for iPad only).
iPhone Team Sport App No.3: Assistant Coach ($.99)
The Assistant Coach app is designed to help basketball coaches manage players, teams, games and practices. It will automatically calculate game statistics for each player that a coach enters.
Coaches can also use it to create and monitor practice plans, including exercise descriptions, notes and videos. Game statistics can be easily calculated and exported to PDF or email, or imported to iTunes file sharing. (The app also makes it easy for coaches to keep track of practice attendance and total game stats for each athlete.)
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iPhone Team Sport App No.4: ChalkTalk ($4.99)
With ChalkTalk, coaches can use their fingers to draw directly onto pre-programed field diagrams to devise plays for baseball, basketball, hockey, soccer and volleyball, making it easy to communicate gameplans to athletes and fellow coaches.
iPhone Team Sport App No.5 : Game Changer (free)
Game Changer is a great app that allows scorekeeping, stat management and play-by-play updates to be sent directly to the internet for live, streaming game follow.
Once a team is set up on the website, the team scorekeeper downloads the mobile app and records all game actions. As each play is recorded, the information is automatically updated to the team's website so that friends and family can follow along with each play of a game. After the game, over 140 statistics are made available online.
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