Sideline SideKick Tracker
What a fan sees
If a coach forwarded you an invite code, that code makes you a Fan. You get the game as it happens — the score, every play in plain English, and your kid’s stat line updating while he plays. You do not get the playbook, and that is on purpose.
Joining a team is always free, forever. There is no trial and nothing to buy. Only the coach who creates the team pays anything; everyone he lets in joins for nothing.
What you get during a game
The score, live
The score, the quarter and the drive that is happening right now, updating on your phone as the staff logs it on theirs. If you are stuck at work, this is the game.
Every play, in English
The whole play-by-play, written as sentences rather than coaching shorthand — Trey Halloran ran for 8 yards. You do not need to know what a formation is to follow it.
Player stats, as they happen
Carries, yards, catches, touchdowns, per player, updating through the game. This is the part most parents actually open it for, and it is there the whole time rather than the next morning.
The drives
How each possession went and how it ended. Enough to answer “what happened on that last series” without anyone having to explain it to you afterwards.
Why the play-by-play reads differently for you
A coach and a parent are reading the same play for different reasons, so the app writes it two ways. A coach is scanning twenty plays looking for a pattern, so he gets shorthand. You are looking for one kid, so you get a sentence.
The same play, twice.
A coach sees: Gun Right Power right 22: Trey Halloran — +8 yds
You see: Trey Halloran ran for 8 yards
The fan version is not the coach version with the words painted out. It is built separately, from a different set of facts, so a formation or a play name has no route into it even by accident.
What you don’t see, and why
A staff’s formation names and play calls are the one genuinely proprietary thing in this app. A rival coach who reads them learns the offense — and an invite code travels, because it gets forwarded into group chats. So the code hands out the least it can while still giving you the game.
- The playbook. Formation names and play names, anywhere they would otherwise appear.
- Key players. Which handful of players the staff builds around is a read on the team that belongs to the staff. It is also a conversation no coach needs to have about whose kid is not on the list.
- The coaching stat tables. Formations, play calls and penalties — the tables a coordinator uses to judge his own calling. Players and drives, which are the game as it happened, you do get.
- The Booth and Coach’s Read. The staff’s own notes and tendency screens. What those are, if you are curious.
This is enforced on the server, not just hidden on your screen. The playbook is not sitting in your copy of the app behind a switch — the database refuses to hand it to a fan account at all. That matters to the coach who gave you the code, and it is the reason he can hand it out freely.
Getting in
1. Get the code
The team’s owner has a six-character invite code in the app. Most staffs paste it once into a team group chat.
2. Install and sign in
Download Sideline SideKick Tracker from the App Store — it is free — make an account, and enter the code. You land in the team as a Fan.
3. Open it on Friday
The game shows up on your home screen while it is being played. Nothing to set up, nothing to pay.
A coach can promote you. If you are actually on the staff and got in with the code, the owner can move you up to Coach from the staff list, which is what unlocks the playbook and play entry. Everything above Fan is handed out deliberately, one person at a time.
About your information
Roster information about a minor is visible only to people the team’s owner has let in. It is never sold, never shared with other companies, never used for advertising, and never used to track anyone across other apps or websites. There are no ads. The privacy policy is the full version, in plain language.
If you would rather not be in it at all, tell your coach — the owner can remove you, and the deleting data section covers the rest.
Got a code? That is the whole setup.
Joining is free and always will be. If your coach hasn’t sent one out yet, point him at this page.