You Probably Forgot About… When NFL Teams Used Fax Machines on the Sideline

There was a time when an NFL coach could look at a photograph of the previous play…

and it had to be faxed to him.

Seriously.

Before tablets.

Before Microsoft Surface.

Before coaches could pull out an iPad and watch an instant replay from 17 different camera angles…

NFL teams were using fax machines.

And somehow, this was considered cutting-edge technology.

📠 Welcome to the NFL Sideline, circa the 1990s

Imagine being an NFL coach.

It’s third quarter.

Your team just got flagged.

You want to see exactly what happened.

Today, you’d tap a screen.

Back then?

Somebody might be standing on the sideline waiting for a photograph of the play to come rolling out of a fax machine.

Yes.

A fax machine.

Photographers and team personnel could transmit images from the game to coaches and staff, allowing them to examine plays that had just happened.

It sounds ridiculous now.

At the time, it was revolutionary.

Because coaches had finally found a way to get something they desperately wanted:

Information.

And in football, information is everything.

🏈 Before the Tablet Took Over

Modern NFL sidelines look like technology conferences.

Coaches have tablets.

Players have tablets.

Analysts have computers.

There are video feeds, communications systems, analytics and enough electronic equipment to make you wonder if someone is going to start checking Bitcoin prices during a two-minute warning.

But it wasn’t always that way.

For decades, coaches relied heavily on handwritten notes, printed photographs, film and whatever information they could gather during the game.

The fax machine represented a huge leap forward.

Instead of waiting until after the game to study photographs, teams could get visual information while the game was still happening.

Think about that.

A blurry black-and-white image arriving on a fax machine could actually help a coaching staff make a decision.

Today, that sounds like something from the Stone Age.

In the 1990s?

It was pretty darn cool.

📸 The Ultimate “Old Sports” Image

There’s something wonderfully perfect about the visual.

A coach standing on the sideline.

Headset on.

Play sheet in hand.

Players running around him.

And sitting nearby…

a fax machine.

The machine starts making that horrible electronic screeching noise.

BEEEEEEP…KRRRRRRR…CHHHHHHHH.

And out comes a picture of the previous play.

Somewhere, a coach probably looks at it and says:

“Yep. That’s holding.”

Technology has officially done its job.

📱 Imagine Explaining This to an NFL Player Today

“Back in my day, we had to wait for a photograph to come through a machine before we could look at the last play.”

A current player would probably stare at you like you just explained how to hunt woolly mammoths.

“You mean you couldn’t just rewind it?”

No.

“You couldn’t zoom in?”

No.

“You couldn’t watch it from another angle?”

No.

“So…you had to wait for a piece of paper?”

Yes.

And somehow, these guys played professional football that way.

The Funny Part?

It wasn’t even that long ago.

That’s what makes this one so great.

The NFL’s technological evolution has happened incredibly quickly.

We’ve gone from fax machines and photographs…

to coaches carrying tablets and having instant access to an almost unlimited amount of information.

The game hasn’t just gotten faster.

The information surrounding the game has gotten faster, too.

And somewhere in a box in someone’s attic is probably an old piece of fax paper showing a grainy photograph of an NFL running back getting tackled.

At one point…

That was the future.