I'm taking the Over. LOL!

the jets beat the titans
the titans beat the bills

JETS GOAT

Belichick at home shaking his head..."shoulda punted"

That was easy. (lol)

Similar to playing against an inferior poker player, going for 4th down there is pretty dumb.

Never saw the alleged hold on the kick return

I'm almost ready to admit that Simmons has been rehabilitated from when he kicked that woman in the head while he was a senior in HS. Almost ...

bleh...bad execution by the Bills all night. they deserved to lose. Josh is still amazing.

Loser gif

Tennessee are gonna beat the chiefs ass next week

Hard to argue with this PURE LOGIC!

LOLLLLLLLL

That 2 pt conversion was nice.

Looking forward to BAL-BUF AFC chp game.

FYP

so make -ev plays vs worse poker opponents?

What's Titans record when Henry has 125+ yards?

If you have a greater EV play later, of course.

Reducing variance has value when you are the better team/player

they showed it on replay, it was very obv a hold

Has anyone heard any official stat nerds take on the Bills decision to go for it on 4th at the end of the game? My gut tells me it was correct but I'm not sure.

Need % chance of Bills to convert on 4th plus the odds of winning or tying in OT. I'm going to assume make the FG from the 2 is almost 100%

My guess:

4th Down conversion - 60%
Winning or tying in OT - 52%

Converting 4th down doesn't mean a TD though so it's kinda close if playing for OT gives you a better outcome then going for it on 4th. If you don't make it on 4th it's a loss.

I'm pretty sure the 4th and inches conversion rate is like 75% on average. With a QB like Josh, it should be even higher.

I'd then say their chance of scoring a TD first and goal from the 2 is usually 75-80%, maybe more, but since they didn't have any time outs, the playbook is a little more limited so I'd maybe say 70%.

Conservatively, let's say 75% conversion rate on 4th and 70% TD rate on 1st and goal puts them at 52.5% chance to get a TD and win in regulation.

If they convert on 4th down and don't get the TD, FG is still an option, so that has to be factored in too.

The 4th down call does seem correct.

Also, ignoring the possession that ended the first half, Tenn had scored on 6 straight possessions. Sean probably didn't want to leave it up to his defense to have to stop Derrick Henry in OT if Tenn wins the flip.

Next gen stats had win percentage at 42% if they kicked the fg and 63% going for it on 4th down

If I'm Vrabel, and I know I'm a fairly big dog in OT, I certainly want BUF to go for 4th down there.

EDIT: I think NextGen is actually not accounting for a tie here

Go for it win chance: 63%

FG: 42% win, 16% tie - Win or Tie: 68%

So there is a 37% % chance of a loss by going for it and a 32% chance of a loss kicking the FG.

Kicking the FG seems to give you a better overall outcome when you factor in ties.

Someone correct my math if that's wrong but a Win or Tie is better than a loss and going for is more likely to end in a loss

42+16=58 not 68

Doh!

So it's 37% Loss vs 42% Loss

Still go for it but closer than they imply.

Where do you get a 16% tie rate? Assuming that Ten also has a 42% win probability? I don’t think they automatically get the same win %, but maybe I’m wrong. 16% tie rate seems high, which is why I also thought the Bills win probability rate of 42% with FG was low.

I guess that 42% also accounts for possible FG misses along with Ten pulling a miracle and finding a score within the last 20 seconds.

From 1974-2011, 17/494 tied.

From 2012-2016, 5/83 tied.

From 2017- present, 4/59 tied. So even using this as the base since it’s the current format, that’s around 7%.

I'm not sure a tie should be counted as a non-loss. Seems it should be factored as a half-win & half-loss.

You can't know or assume that you're going to have a greater EV play later. I think an MTT analogy is better than cash game for our purposes. Sometimes you get dealt 82o for 3 rotations of blinds and blind out, no matter how good you are. Just like sometimes you get to OT and lose the coin flip and automatically lose a good amount of WP%. This is all accounted for in an EV calculation. You're not going to reach anything approaching "the long run" in one NFL game. So you gotta take the EV whenever it's there, variance be damned.

How would the Titans be "a fairly big dog" in OT? It's a less-than-one quarter sample size. Tennessee is a pretty good team playing at home. Buffalo is the better team, obviously, but they really have no time to show it here.

If I'm MIKE I'm rooting for them to kick.

I imagine that, in the NBA, teams converge pretty closely to .500 in their 5 minute overtimes. When the best team plays the worst in OT I'd guess they only win ... 66.6%?