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Subject: Survivor Week VIII
Posted by: Shak
- [156371210] Fri, Oct 27, 2006, 16:06
I apologize for being late, but I actually had some work that I couldn't ignore. Also, the weather has been beautiful and I couldn't see being stuck in an office all week. I hope to do the WP tomorrow.
Week 8 is the closest thing to a non-bye week as there is in the NFL. Four not so offensive teams are on a bye this week -- Det, Mia, Buff, and Wash. Sure each team has a high profile RB, but if you have very many players from these teams, you're probably already extinct.
Week 8 is also a must immunity week for the McNabb owners (Shak and Reaper). Those teams will be in serious jeopardy next week without immunity. On to the picks.
This week in the RW: predictably, no team in the RW has more than 2 players on a bye. That makes this week wide open.
Teams in Jeopardy
Mario and his 7th ranked team make an apperance because he loses Portis and L Evans this week. He may also be without Leftwich, leaving the QB points to B Johnson. He may need Droughns to produce as the Deuce may find little room to run vs. the Ravens. Since Brad doesn't play until MNF, Mario may be near the bottom after Sunday.
Harmon -- this 12th ranked team makes the list despite not having anyone on a bye. Bledsoe will be riding pine, but Favre should post decent numbers this week vs. the Cards. Two games will decide Harmon's fate: Pack/Cards and Colts/Broncos. He will have eight players in those games. The reason he will be in jeopardy is because a couple will probably get donuts (Cobb and M Bell) and the Edge has not been able to get anything going for AZ. We'll know the fate of this team after the Colt/Bronco game.
TrashHaulers -- The 3rd ranked Trashmen are in jeopardy due to losing Hasselbeck and having Chambers on a bye. He will get a donut for QB unless Griese makes a surprise appearance. RB points should be solid with LT and the Tenn twins, but WR is a question mark with Galloway, A Johnson, and Bruce. If LT doesn't hit paydirt a couple of times, Trash could be in big trouble.
RBP -- The 5th ranked RBP gets the nod for the last jeopardy slot based mainly on the probable lack of production at the RB slot for this week. He will be missing the services of McGahee and Toefield has yet to do anything. That leaves Barber; unfortunately it's Marion and not Tiki. His points will have to come from his three prima donnas: TO, Keyshawn, and A Bryant (sounds like a Mike Irvin wet dream).
Head: Tough call, but I'll go with Mario.
Heart: The three prima donnas must go.
Gut: Mr. Harmon, fear the Reaper! |
| 1 | RBP
ID: 15842222
Fri, Oct 27, 2006, 18:35
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Sorry to go off topic so quickly but this is for Tim, who CANNOT understand why ND dropped in the polls last week after beating USC Jr.
Notre Dame and the Polls
Of all the teams in college football history, Notre Dame is the last one who should ever complain about polls and rankings. Last season, though it was patently obvious to anyone with half a brain they were not that great, the Irish were placed in a BCS Bowl. Then, after watching Ohio State pound them back to the Stone Age with over 600 yards of offense, the pollsters and media went ga-ga over the supposed genius Charlie Weis in the off season. Some even ranked them No. 1 in the nation, predicting their tilt against USC would determine which team would play for the title.
Huh? What am I missing?
Two items:
The next time Notre Dame wins their bowl game, it will be their first since January 1, 1994 when they escaped 24-21 in the Cotton Bowl.
The next time Notre Dame beats a good team, it will be the first time under Weis and the first since the Lou Holtz era.
Just how ridiculous is it?
Take a gander at their schedule the last season and a half.
Wins over:
5-6 Pittsburgh
7-5 Michigan
2-9 Washington
5-6 Purdue
6-6 BYU
5-6 Tennessee
8-4 Navy
1-10 Syracuse
5-6 Stanford
5-2 Georgia Tech
5-3 Penn State
4-4 Michigan State
5-3 Purdue
0-8 Stanford
4-3 UCLA
Combined, the win/loss records of the teams they defeated have been 67-80. They lack even a single victory over a team with more than eight wins, and their lone win over one with at least that many was Navy. Aside from the Midshipmen, the Irish have notched just one win over a program with more than six wins, and that was the worst Michigan team in a generation. In fact, those two victories and their win against BYU represent the only teams that have finished at .500 or better.
Losses to:
5-6 Michigan State
11-1 USC
10-2 Ohio State
8-0 Michigan
In contrast, every time they have had an opportunity to make a statement that they are indeed a good football team, they have stumbled and fallen flat on their face. Of the three truly excellent teams they have faced in the past season and a half, they lost one close and were blown out in historic fashion (literally) in the other two.
The bottom line here is simple. Weis, if he was really as smart as the media acts like he is, would realize the rankings take care of themselves. Teams playing tough schedules with quality wins move up in the polls. Teams barely escaping week after week find themselves in a holding pattern. Teams dropping big games on a regular basis lose votes and belly flop.
What might be poetic justice is if Weis were to get what he asks for and be matched up against the loser of the Ohio State-Michigan game. After (another) shellacking of historic proportions and (another) bowl loss, he will wish he had kept his thoughts to himself. That won’t happen, but it would be wise to note that the media – whose poll and intelligence he insulted – are not likely to forget his remarks any time soon. In fact, they will happily remind him if the Irish don’t defeat USC and win their bowl.
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| 2 | RBP
ID: 15842222
Fri, Oct 27, 2006, 18:55
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More off topic but I'd like to discuss.
My 2 cents....
The next big thing will be a team that doesn't punt the football.....unless its 4th down and forever.....
Makes sense when you think about it--if you average 4-5 yards/play, why throw one away on a punt?? just go for it everytime--use all four downs to make ten yards.....
someone is going to do it.......
Article I found on the topic on google....
John T. Reed’s Football Think Tank
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Going for it on fourth down
The norm in football coaching is to punt on fourth down if you are outside of field-goal range or attempt a field goal if you are within range. About the only exceptions seen nowadays are four-down situations, that is, end-of-game situations where the team will lose the game for sure if they kick.
But is that the right course of action?
Thoughtful people who have examined it dispassionately have concluded that, other than end-of-half, clock-management situations (See my book Football Clock Management for more details on that.), you should usually go for it on fourth down regardless of field position. The basic reason is that you will succeed most of the time when the distance to go is less than four yards or at least often enough that you will score more points and win more games in the long run going for it on fourth down than kicking the ball. Even where the choice between going for it and kicking a field goal yields an equal expectation of points, the next play is better if you go for it and fail than if you kick a field goal. After kicking a field goal, you have to kick off, which usually gives the opponent a better field position than they would get if you turned the ball over on downs.
Carroll, Palmer, and Thorn in The Hidden Game of Football
In The Hidden Game of Football book, authors Bob Carroll, Pete Palmer, and John Thorn said that coaches kick too often on fourth down. Bob Carroll is the executive director of the Professional Football Researchers Association and one of the editors of Total Football, the Official Encyclopedia of the National Football League. Pete Palmer is a retired radar engineer and a baseball and football statistician. John Thorn is a writer and Palmer’s coauthor on various statistically-oriented books on baseball and football.
Chapter 10, “Kicking up a storm” in The Hidden Game of Football is where the authors discuss the excessive amount of fourth-down kicking in the NFL. One point that Carroll, Palmer, and Thorn make that the study below does not is that coaches should go for the first down or touchdown rather than the field goal even at the end of a game when the field goal would tie the game. Basically, you have a higher probability of winning by pursuing a touchdown than you do tying the game then taking your chances in overtime. A game-winning touchdown in the hand is worth more than an overtime in the bush.
Dr. David Romer, University of California Berkeley economics professor
In the summer of 2002, Dr. Romer made a research presentation called “It's Fourth Down and What Does the Bellman Equation Say?” to the National Bureau of Economic Research. He analyzed 732 games in the 1998, 1999, and 200 seasons. He said coaches should be far more “aggressive” at going for a first down on fourth down. Romer cites the Hidden Game of Football among other sources and asserts that his analysis is more detailed than theirs. I agree and I expect the Hidden Game authors would as well. So I will only discuss the Romer study in the rest of this article.
You can get a complete pdf copy of the revised 2005 version of the Romer study at www.econ.berkeley.edu/users/dromer/papers/PAPER_NFL_JULY05_FORWEB_CORRECTED.pdf.
Carter and Machol
Dr. Romer also credits a 1971 study by Virgil Carter and Robert E. Machol (“Operations Research on Football”) which appeared in the March-April, 1971 issue of Operations Research journal) in which they calculated the values of being at various yard lines and a 1978 study by the same pair which examined fourth-down decisions (“Optimal Strategies on Fourth Down”) which appeared in the December, 1978 issue of Management Science journal.
He says their studies took a somewhat different tack but arrived at essentially the same conclusions.
Bellman equation
The Bellman Equation [Ei Di(gt) Vi = Pgt + Bgt Ei Di(gt+1) Vi - egt—Don’t ask me to explain it.] is about looking at the consequences of a decision steps after that decision. That’s where the greater number of points scored and games won dominates the analysis.
It has been said that today is the first day of the rest of your life. In this context, the Bellman Equation sort of says that the next fourth-down play is the first play of the rest of the half.
Romer found 1,100 actual game situations where the coach should have gone for it on fourth down but in 992 of those actual cases, the coaches kicked.
Furthermore, the coaches virtually never went for it on fourth down in their own end of the field. Romer’s study found they should go for when the yards to go for a first down is four or fewer even in their own end of the field. Four yards was the average yards per running play in the NFL in 2004 so his rule might me stated as go for it when the yards to go for a first is the average number of yards your team gains on a running play.
Ignorance and/or moral cowardice
Much of that doing the wrong thing resulted from ignorance on the part of the coach. But once Romer’s study came out, and this Web site and other articles on the subject, the excuses for ignorance started to disappear. If the coach is not ignorant of the probabilities, and still kicks in violation of Romer’s rules, he is deliberately choosing to maximize his chances of keeping his job over his team’s chances of winning the game.
Pete Carroll, Jeff Tedford
According to an article in Washington Monthly, USC coach Pete Carroll is one of the few who do go for it on fourth down. Good for him. One such decision turned out badly in the 2006 National Championship Rose Bowl that his team lost to Texas, but that does not mean it was the wrong decision.
You must evaluate such matters based on the quality of the decision, not the result. The best example is winning lottery tickets. The decision to buy a lottery ticket is dumb because the game is rigged against the gamblers by the state. The fact that a particular lottery ticket buyer won big is irrelevant in evaluating whether his decision to buy lottery tickets was a wise one.
Another way to put it is that you evaluate the decision based on what the decision-maker knew at the time, not on the 20/20 hindsight that we all get after the events played out.
In the Daily Californian, the newspaper of the university where Dr. Romer teaches, he complimented Cal head coach Jeff Tedford for going for it four times in a game against Air Force.
Depends on field position
That Washington Monthly article has a diagram from Romer’s study showing when a coach should go for the first down rather than punt or attempt a field goal. Generally, according to the article, you always go for it when you have four or fewer yards to go. Again, I note that is the average NFL rushing-play distance which is probably a better way to state the rule. At midfield, you go for it if you have less than five yards to go. At the opponent’s 45-yard line, with 6.5 yards to go. At the opponent’s 40, you start going for it if you have less than seven yards to go. At the 35, you go for it no matter how far you have to go. And once you get within your kicker’s field-goal range, you go for it when you have than four or fewer yards to go.
These distances are based on the assumption that the team in question is an average team playing in a game against an average opponent. I would translate Dr. Romer’s rules to say that you should go for it when the yards to gain equals your average rushing gain that day. For the other field positions, express them as a multiple of your average rushing gain that day.
Also, his changed rules at the fifty-yard line appear to be based on the average NFL net punt distance. In high school and the NFL, I advocate place kicking the “punt” because the ball goes 15 yards farther when you do—among other advantages. (The “place-kick punt” is not feasible in NCAA because of their rules.) See my article on that for more detail. (“The Place-Kick ‘Punt’”) Accordingly, Dr. Romer’s elevated yards to go for the first down starting at the 50 should start in the offense’s own territory at lower levels than the NFL.
Luddite resistance from some coaches
An ESPN article (“Fourth-down analysis met with skepticism”) reports on the skeptical and chicken coaches as well as those who agree with Romer—including Steve Mariucci, Bill Belichik, and Bill Walsh. This article featured lots of coaches bad-mouthing the professor because he’s a professor, he isn’t in the stadium, and all that. They also made a number of blatantly irrelevant comments of an intellectually-dishonest nature.
The coaches need to look harder at Romer’s research and do their best to convert it rules that can be applied in the heat of battle. That is what I try to do below. Anti-intellectual wise-cracking, as Jim Fassel did to ESPN, is bogus. Fassel treated the Romer study as if it were a joke. I’ll tell you what the joke is—NFL owners paying head coaches an average of $3 million a year to win and not taking any disciplinary action when those coaches deliberately hurt their team’s chances of winning in order to preserve their jobs as is the case with regard to most fourth-down decisions..
According to the ESPN article, in 2005, the NFL teams that went for it the most were the Bengals and Titans (15 times) followed by the Rams (11) and the Vikings and Jaguars (10). Good for them, although I suspect they should have gone for it even more times. Plus, the correct way to do those stats would be as a percentage of the times when Dr. Romer’s rules said they should go for it, not just raw numbers.
A great many coaches mindlessly resist the application of probability and statistics simply because they do not understand them and do not want to bother to learn. The baseball version of these folks were rather rudely exposed in the book Moneyball which explained how the Oakland Athletics baseball team achieved the most wins per dollar of payroll for years by ignoring the tobacco-chewing, gut-feel crowd and relying on Ivy League graduates’ mathematical analysis.
Since Moneyball came out, legendary statistician Bill James has been elevated to a executive position with the Red Sox, who subsequently won their first World Series in a zillion years. James is not an Ivy League college grad, but he probably is the guy who taught the Ivy League grads more about this than anyone else. Other stats-minded folks have also been hired at high levels on other Major League Baseball teams since Moneyball came out.
Speaking of Ivy League educations, I have a Harvard MBA. My similarly logic- and statistics-oriented son graduated from Columbia where he earned three varsity letters at tailback playing in the Ivy League.
Calculated risks not ‘gut’
This Web site is the enemy of the gut feel, only-we-who-played-and-coached-know line of bull. Football coaches should have studied and mastered probability and statistics, operations research, and a number of other subjects—if not in college, then now. In fact, the vast majority had undistinguished academic careers to say the least. See my article on what subjects coaches should study belatedly if not when they were in college.
They typically chose their college based primarily on football-player considerations, not academic reputation. They chose their subjects the same way, typically majoring in the easiest possible courses and making the least possible effort to stay eligible. If they have a masters degree, it is often from a non-selective university and was chosen because it was known to be the cheapest, easiest, fastest way to get a bump in public-school teacher pay.
According to American Football Monthly, the subjects taught by 2005 high school state champion head coach/teachers were:
• PE/Health 50.4%
• History/Social Studies 17.3%
• Math 1.5%
• Science 1.5%
• Miscellaneous 29.3%
While PE and history make for a relatively easy way to maintain eligibility as a player, they ill serve the coach and his players in later years when he needs to coach smart.
Lack of hustle by coaches
To state the academic differences between Dr. Romer and the typical football head coach in terms that football coaches themselves are fond of using, Dr. Romer hustled throughout his life while the typical football coach loafed and slacked off. That is why Dr. Romer, who has never coached football, now knows more about how to make fourth-down decisions than the coaches who get paid $3 million a year, and why many of them desperately tried to discredit him. If coaches had coaches, their coaches would have them running the stadium steps for failing to study and master the academic subjects related to coaching.
One of the lessons [Ole Miss and NBA star Sean Touhy] had picked up from his own career as an NCAA student-athlete was that good enough grades were available to anyone who bothered to exploit the loopholes…the skill for avoiding books was among the last to abandon the aging athlete.
page 186 of Blind Side by Michael Lewis
The typical football coach’s undergraduate approach to academic learning is not unethical, illegal, or immoral. But it is clearly lacking when it comes to making good coaching decisions. Once they got into coaching, they should have taken and mastered the subjects listed above—the subjects they avoided or loafed through in college.
‘Not math guys’
Most coaches would say they are “not math guys” or some such. That’s like a wide receiver saying he’s not a blocking-type guy. Every coach would tell such a receiver that blocking is part of his job whether he likes it or not. Same is true of coaches learning probability and statistics and the pertinent parts of operations research.
I once attended a clinic given by Greg McMakin who was then the defensive coordinator of the Seattle Seahawks. His presentation was about analyzing opposing offenses in detail so that you could narrow down the possible plays they were going to run in any combination of down, distance, score, time, hash position, personnel, and field position. One coach in the audience balked at all the math and probability and asked some rhetorical question along the lines of, “But isn’t this really a people business, just blocking and tackling?”
McMakin was diplomatic and nice, but firm. He said something to the effect that the analysis he was presenting was necessary and part of your job as a defensive coordinator whether you liked math or not.
What is improper is trying to BS the public with intellectually-dishonest dismissals of quality analysis done by people who did study and master the subjects pertinent to good football decisionmaking, like Dr. Romer.
There is a good blog discussion about why coaches deliberately make the wrong decision in spite of Dr. Romer’s study at www.pro-football-referenc...ess/?p=40.
End of half different
I must add that that Dr. Romer’s field-position rules are an oversimplification, as he readily admits. Romer focused on first-quarter situations to avoid the complexity created by end-of-game or end-of-half situations. That’s very academic of him. Academics love to make unrealistic assumptions to simplify their task.
In the real world, you would need to modify these rules to reflect the time remaining in the half or game. For example, at the end of the first half, you should choose the course of action most likely to lead to the most points right now. Since it is the end of the half, the Bellman Equation’s focus on consequences for future downs, hence are irrelevant. As coaches sometimes say with regard to “rebuilding,” “the future is now” when there is less than a minute or so left in the half or the game.
At the end of the game, the same is true, plus there is the principle I call “enough.” Coaches generally make decisions on what will get them more. More yards, more points, more first downs, and so forth. When the field goal is enough to win the game, and the time remaining is such that the opponent is not likely to score subsequently, again, the Bellman Equation’s interest in future plays is irrelevant. Again, in such situations, the future is now.
Field position
Part of the reason going for it makes sense when the ball is deep in the defending team’s territory is that failure by the offense to got the first down or score a touchdown still leaves the opponent with lousy field position and that will likely lead to subsequent points by the team that went for it on fourth down. On the other hand, if they kick a successful field goal, the opponent will then receive a free kick which generally gives a better field position than a turnover on downs inside the 20-yard line.
Romer seems to think a “free kick” is different from a “kickoff.” It is not. Kickoffs, free kicks after safeties, and free kicks after fair catches are all types of free kicks. In a free kick, the kicker may use a tee, the receiving team has to stay at least ten yards away, and the kicking team may recover the ball after it goes at least ten yards and, in high school rules, touches the ground. A punt or place kick is called a “scrimmage kick” in the rule books. A scrimmage kick is a play that is begun with a snap and the defense can be as close as the edge of the neutral zone. The kicking team cannot recover a scrimmage kick unless it is first touched by the receiving team.
Doesn’t matter who has the ball
Another conclusion from Dr. Romer’s study that could warrant an entire report of its own is that when placing a value on field position, it doesn’t matter who has the ball. In other words, 1st and 10 on your opponent’s fifteen yard line is the equivalent situation for each team regardless of whether you have the ball or your opponent does. Of course, at the end of the half, who has the ball becomes important when the time remaining is so short that the turnover of the ball that is likely in the first quarter may now never happen. In that case, possession is crucial. In other words, as long as you are likely to get the ball back enough times to win the game, who has possession at the moment does not change the value of any given field position.
‘Behavioral economics’
Dr. Romer, an economist, justified his football coach research on the grounds that it is consistent with a new branch of economics called “behavioral economics” which is the study of people consistently making decisions that are illogical and irrational. Prior economic theory assumed people were rational and logical in their economic decision-making. Actually, when you consider how much head college and pro coaches get paid nowadays, perhaps their decisionmaking regarding fourth down is rational and logical—once you accept the fact that all they care about is keeping their six- or seven-figure paycheck coming and the ignorance of those who make head coach hiring and firing decisions.
To make Dr. Romer’s research useful in the context of a game played in front of tens of thousands of screaming fans and millions more on television, we need to reduce it down to a set of quick-reference rules. My book Football Clock Management reduces all its principles down to rules that coaches can and should follow during games. I tentatively propose the following rules regarding fourth-down decisions.
section deleted
Place-kick ‘punt’ changes the field positions
The field positions chosen by Dr. Romer are apparently based on average NFL net punts. I recommend against all punts except in college. Rather, I say you should place kick your “punt.” It will go 15 yards farther. In the NFL, you need to kick it out of bounds to make sure you do not trigger the missed-field-goal rule which would put the ball on your prior line of scrimmage. See my place-kick “punt” article for details.
Generally, in the NFL, the place-kick “punt” would push the field position at which the yards to go criterion goes above your average rushing gain back into your own territory. Since the place-kick “punt” goes 15 yards farther, I would expect that the average gain point would become your 35; the 125% point, your own 45; and so forth. At high school levels, Dr. Romer’s NFL field-position rules might be about right because the shorter punts in high school would be canceled out by the greater distance of the place-kick “punt.”
These rules are not cast in concrete—yet. I encourage readers to make suggestions to refine them.
Romer considered all sorts of criticisms before drawing his conclusions
Actually, Dr. Romer did a great job of taking all sorts of things into account. In Section IV of his study, he considers and analyzes whether his conclusions might be incorrect as a result of:
• rational risk-aversion (good reasons to avoid going for it and failing)
• sample-selection bias (the possibility that the situations he analyzed were not representative of the ones the conclusions pertain to)
• the possibility that the coaches who decided not to go for it had information not known to Dr. Romer
• concern about loss of momentum
• general equilibrium effects
No such thing as momentum
And he concludes that none of those issues would change the conclusions. One of the most interesting parts of the discussion is that there is no such thing as momentum. He could write another whole study just about that. I was inspired to write a brief article about it at www.johntreed.com/fttmomentum.html.
I would point out that even if momentum existed, it would be a wash. Going for it on fourth down and failing might give momentum to the defense. But going for it on fourth down and making the first down would be just as likely to give momentum to the offense. That means there would be no net change in the decision equation if you factored in momentum.
Lower levels of football
Romer’s research was based on NFL stats. Lower level stats, most importantly, the assumption regarding net punt distance, would be different and because punts go less far at lower levels, Romer’s conclusions would be more true at the lower levels. In other words, the lower level coaches should be even more inclined to go for it than Romer says the NFL coaches should be because punts are less beneficial than they are in the NFL. The lower the level, the more inclined the coach should be on going for it on fourth down.
I already partly incorporated the shorter distances lower-level place kickers can kick field goals into the rules above by using “your kicker’s field goal range” as the criterion for when the yards to go drops back to four or fewer.
Those interested in this may also want to read my article on whether to punt in punt situations or to use a place kick that is not a field-goal attempt. I say the punt way of kicking is dead wrong. All scrimmage kicks other than “quick kicks” should be place kicks. See “The Place-Kick ‘Punt’” to read why.
Try it in video games
In my Football Clock Management book, I strongly urge coaches to use football video games like Madden 2006 to practice clock management. Those games are literally the equivalent of the multi-million-dollar simulators used to train pilots, astronauts, submariners, and tank crews. In fact, Madden 2006 may have cost more to develop. But because it is a mass-market product, you can buy it for about $50.
When I first wrote this article, I similarly urged coaches and other interested parties to test Dr. Romer’s theories and my rules above in video football games. If you are a coach, you will not get fired for the choices you make while playing video games. You can “gamble” and see what happens without risking your career. The games are now extremely realistic and take into account virtually everything coaches would claim Dr. Romer left out. If, as expected, going for it more often works, you will see it in the video games and your backbone will thereby be strengthened for doing the right thing is actual games.
But I sent an email to Dr. Romer about this article and he wrote back saying, among other things, that people told him that Madden’s game did indeed prove Dr. Romer right—initially. But when word got back to Madden about that, Madden had the game reprogrammed so that going for it on fourth down succeeded far less often.
You gotta be kidding me! John. John. John. Say it ain’t so, John.
I do not have Madden 2007. I would appreciate if someone who does would go for it on fourth down in the game and keep track of the percentage times it works in various yards-to-go situations. Then tell me.
If it less than it should be according to Dr. Romer’s study, I will probably get the game myself and test it for any other dishonesty. If I find any, I will write an article about it here. I will also stop recommending that game, which I have recommended for years as a way to become a better football player and coach, not just in clock management.
If there is another quality football game that is honest, and Madden’s game is not, I would like to hear about it so I can recommend the honest game.
‘Conservative’ versus ‘aggressive’
Once in his report, Dr. Romer puts the word “conservative” in quotation marks. But he uses that word and its antonym “aggressive” many more times without putting them in quotation marks. Using quotation marks like that means that although others make widespread use of the word in that way, you do not believe it is an appropriate use of the word. He should have put quotation marks around both “conservative” and “aggressive” every single time he used those words in his report.
They are sports broadcaster/sportswriter words. They are inappropriate and inaccurate. Violating the rules Dr. Romer and I put forth is not “conservative.” It is either ignorant or a deliberately selfish act in which the coach is placing pandering to ignorant fans, owners, etc. for job security reasons ahead of his avowed duty to do everything in his power to win the game.
To revisit my lottery ticket analogy, buying lottery tickets to make money is not “aggressive,” it’s stupid. Refraining from buying lottery tickets is not “conservative,” it’s smart.
Is the word ‘coach’ a noun or a verb?
Such people would rather be the coach than coach. I prefer the coach version of a line I heard when I was a cadet at West Point. They told us, “When in command, command.” When you are the coach, coach.
A line in Sinclair Lewis’ book Babbitt describes sadly too many football coaches
I've never done a single thing I wanted to in my whole life! I don't know's I've accomplished anything except just get along.
I also like the coach equivalent of Kentucky Senator Henry Clay’s line, “I’d rather be right than president.” I’d rather be right than head coach.
This whole Web site is a manifestation of that. I coached fifteen football teams. I would love to coach some more, but only if I can do what I think is in the best interests of the team. I will not pander to ignorant or political superiors or to what Bill Walsh calls the “pseudo coaches:” fans, sports talk show hosts and callers, sports media, etc. who have not done their homework.
Browns-Raiders, 10/1/06
You can see the full play-by-play of this game at www.nfl.com/gamecenter/pl...1_CLE@OAK. With 3rd & 4, and trailing 21-10 with 10:00 left in the third quarter, Cleveland’s quarterback was sacked for a for-yard loss giving them 4th & 8 at the Raider 31. Browns coach Romeo Crennel decided to go for it. The media made a big deal of his guts. That is a manifestation of the ignorance of the media.
From the 31, a field goal attempt would be a 31 + 17 = 48-yard attempt. The probability of kicking a field goal at that distance is around 50-50 in the NFL. Furthermore, if the kick misses, the Raiders get the ball back at the “spot of the kick.” I believe the “spot of the kick” is the place on the field where the holder held the ball for the attempt, in other words, the 38-yard-line in this case.
In the event, the Browns were successful completing a 22-yard pass. That was improbable. The more likely outcome would have been an incompletion or completion that fell short of the first-down yardage. The most probable outcome of Crennel’s pass play would have been turning the ball over on downs around the Raiders’ 25.
On the other hand, a punt would likely end up in the end zone as a touchback and be brought back to the Raiders’ 20 for their first down.
In the actual game, the Browns scored a touchdown two plays after the successful 4th-down conversion. Subsequently, the Browns won the game 23-21. The touchdown following the 4th-down conversion provided the margin of victory.
The media also said the play gave the Browns momentum. But there is no such thing as momentum. See my article on that at www.johntreed.com/fttmomentum.html.
In terms of the rules that Dr. Romer and I have promulgated above, Browns coach Romeo Crennel simply did the correct thing. Neither Dr. Romer nor I would take credit for the victory. Rather, we both would say that over the long run in many such situations, doing what Crennel did would give better results on average.
Only ‘conservative’ if keeping your job is paramount
The word “conservative” means to choose a course of action that has fewer possible outcomes in order to avoid possible adverse or catastrophic outcomes. Kicking on fourth down in violation of the above rules is only conservative from a careerist perspective. That is, if the head coach’s true goal is above all to keep his job, and he perceives those who decide whether he keeps his job to be ignorant of correct fourth-down decisionmaking, then deliberate incorrect fourth-down decisionmaking, i.e., kicking on fourth down when you have, say, less than four yards to go, is, indeed, “conservative.”
What the coach is supposed to be doing is taking calculated risks to maximize the team’s probability of winning the game. Dr. Romer did the calculations. They say to scrimmage kick far less often. The team is more likely to win if the coach complies with the above fourth-down decision rules. There is nothing “conservative” about non-compliance and there is nothing “aggressive” about complying. Going for it on fourth down when the rules above indicate is not evidence of your manhood. It is evidence of your competence and, in the face of ignorant fans, athletic directors, owners, and so forth, evidence of your moral courage. Violating those rules is evidence of your incompetence or moral cowardice.
Conclusion
I think Dr. Romer’s conclusions are correct as far as they go. They need to be refined to cover the end-of-half situations he deliberately ignored. They need to be modified slightly for the other levels below the NFL. And they need to be reduced to a set of rules that can be used effectively by a special teams coach in the heat of battle during a game. Taking Dr. Romer’s 42-page, mathematical-formula-laden report to the sideline during a game would not be helpful.
On the other hand, those coaches who reject Romer’s study out of hand are dead wrong. Before they can reject it, they must understand it. Then they need to make a good faith effort to convert it to usable during-game rules as I have above. If, after that effort, they still find it is not workable, then Dr. Romer needs to go back to the drawing board.
What is more likely happening is that ignorant coaches who do not understand the study and do not want to make the effort to understand it will try to use intellectually-dishonest arguments to disparage it. See my article on intellectually-dishonest arguments for details on what I mean by that.
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| 3 | Ednecks
ID: 4110311923
Fri, Oct 27, 2006, 19:55
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Your killing me Scotty---I couldn't even bother finishing it..sorry
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| 4 | Shak
ID: 1911172611
Sun, Oct 29, 2006, 02:08
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Thanks for killing my thread, Scotty.
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| 5 | Superclydes
ID: 292713
Sun, Oct 29, 2006, 03:12
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Maybe a link next time?? Wow that is a lot to read.
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| 6 | SupaMario
ID: 489161313
Sun, Oct 29, 2006, 19:17
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Curses, looks like I might be gone in WP this week
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| 7 | Shak
ID: 40747240
Sun, Oct 29, 2006, 20:52
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Yup, Mario, you're done dealing. Wide open in the RW.
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| 8 | Shak
ID: 40747240
Sun, Oct 29, 2006, 20:58
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New high score for Jon -- 164. That's going to be tough to beat.
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| 9 | Ednecks
ID: 4110311923
Sun, Oct 29, 2006, 21:15
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Shak if want to join in the Pick four challenge I have no problem with you still playing. The other guys would to agree that you score the 29 low points scored by SC....I personally have no problems with it.
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| 10 | Shak
ID: 40747240
Mon, Oct 30, 2006, 00:07
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Spreadsheet is out. Let me know if you are lacking.
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| 11 | Shak
ID: 40747240
Mon, Oct 30, 2006, 00:13
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Did anyone watching the Colt/Bronco game notice that T Bell was replaced in the 2nd half by M Bell? M Bell had to come out for a blow numerous times and when Tatum came in, he ran with absolutely no heart. He was obviously not thrilled with his demotion. Question is was this a permanent demotion or will it be the Shanahan style of RBBC?
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| 12 | Ednecks
ID: 4110311923
Mon, Oct 30, 2006, 06:16
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Shanahan is a Fantasy owners nightmare. You can't trust him to do the right thing. I'll admit Mike Bell ran the ball with a purpose and that was to show the coach he made the wrong choice in the starter, he looked quick, was running down hill and Tatum looked like a spoilt brat who was going to cry and not try his hardest until you gave him his job back. I've traded for Tatum in a league and I'm still wishing MIke gets the job, I can't stand quiters....
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| 13 | Shak
ID: 156371210
Mon, Oct 30, 2006, 09:22
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What makes it even more interesting is that Tatum was leading the AFC in rushing headed into this game. It wasn't like he wasn't performing. Even if he gets his job back (which I don't think he will barring injury), he will lose goalline carries to Mike. Mike is a definite fighter and looks like he enjoyed jumping over the pile, ala Marcus Allen. I think Mike could be big in the 2nd half of the season.
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| 14 | Shak
ID: 156371210
Mon, Oct 30, 2006, 09:54
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This from the Rocky Mountain News:
Mike Bell's contribution was necessitated by Tatum Bell's recurring issues with turf toe, suffered in the game at Cleveland the previous week. Tatum Bell told Broncos coaches at halftime he was having difficulty cutting and while he could play, was unable to carry the load.
I may have been a little hasty in proclaiming a big 2nd half for MB. We have to remember that he got to play in the 2nd half due to TB's injury and they were playing a very porous run defense. Like you've said, Ed, anything can happen with Shanny.
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