ASU football coach Kenny Dillingham acknowledges challenges with sign-stealing amid Michigan scandal

Michigan football and its alleged sign-stealing scandal have become the talk of the college football world.

With Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh suspended for the rest of the regular season, the topic has even extended to Arizona State football coach Kenny Dillingham, who was asked about sign-stealing on his weekly visit with Arizona Sports’ Bickley & Marotta.

“Obviously in the spread era of offense, you have to communicate via hand signals if you choose to do that,” Dillingham said. “The negative of that is people can try to get your hand signals throughout the game and try to call plays based off of it.”

He noted the importance of fail-safes such as being able to change which assistant is giving the calls in-game when an opposing team figures out your system.

Bickley & Marotta co-host Vince Marotta likened Michigan’s situation to the Houston Astros sign-stealing scandal during their 2017 World Series run, bringing up the technology changes that came to Major League Baseball afterwards.

Electronic pitch calling was introduced in 2022, eliminating the need for catchers to give hand signals to pitchers, which could sometimes be seen by baserunners and bullpens.

Dillingham suggested bringing NFL-style radio communication between coaches and quarterbacks, but acknowledged the difficulty that may come up with offenses that like to play faster.

“I don’t know if there’s a perfect answer to that, I think that’s just part of the game,” Dillingham, an offensive guru, explained. “If your advantage is going fast, you have to prevent a team from understanding what you’re gonna do.”