<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em>Drew Magary’s Thursday Afternoon NFL Dick Joke Jamboroo runs every Thursday at Defector during the NFL season. Got something you wanna contribute? </em><a href="mailto:funbag@defector.com"><em>Email the Roo</em></a><em>. You can also read Drew over at</em> <a href="https://www.sfgate.com/author/drew-magary/"><em>SFGATE</em></a><em>, and</em> <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/authors/232152/drew-magary/"><em>buy Drew’s books</em></a> <em>while</em> <a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B087HC32K2/ref=nav_timeline_asin?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1"><em>you’re at it</em></a><em>.</em></p>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">In case you missed it a week ago, The Athletic published <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/interactive/how-nfl-headsets-work-technology-coach-player-communications/">this extremely detailed</a> <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/interactive/how-nfl-headsets-work-technology-coach-player-communications/">report</a> from Jourdan Rodrigue and Mike Sando on how NFL game day communications work. I encourage you to read the entire thing in full, because it includes a lot of sweet tea, including stories about head coaches angrily firing their assistants over the headset (then changing their minds the next day) and, dearer to my heart, one assistant coach staying on the channel while he had to take a frantic piss. My kindred spirit.</p>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">As with all things NFL, these communication systems are coordinated with near-military fuss. The graphic design in the story includes multiple ornate diagrams that outline how all of this shit works. We see how dozens of coaches on the sideline are talking with one another, on the field and up in the booth, during a game. We also see all of the tech crew workers behind the bench wearing different-colored hats to signify which of them are in charge of keeping the radio channels private, which ones service the Microsoft tablets that players love to angrily smash on the ground, and such and such. All of these people are connected by a series of invisible lines so tangled, it looks like an old-timey phone switchboard when laid out on paper.</p>