I had this very argument the other day. The point is that no matter how good a returner is, he's gonna need a couple of things to go his way to break it. The last couple of years were just Hester running good.

There should be a consolidation of these moves and then everyone votes on the dumbest coaching decision of the year.

Kurt Warner was the best yards/game of any quarterback. Yet every coach seems to be trying to find some one to replace him. Warner has barely played over 100 games in his career. All his coaches keep benching him.

I don't know how people can knock Marvin Lewis's decision to kick a field goal. I respect a coach who has faith in his players to get down the field for two scores like that. A bad coach would be afraid to put the game in his players hands and force them to take irrational risks like going for on fourth down. Getting the points instills faith in his team and gives them the momentum to get those two touchdowns to win the game.

Fact is that Marvin Lewis is an elite coach. He is where he is because he knows more than you do. Unlike Herman Edwards, Lewis prides himself on building a winning team and believes that his team can do it all. Herman Edwards was ashamed to let his team play the right way and went for two. He was afraid of overtime and not having faith in your team reflects poorly on yourself. It was clearly correct to go for the XP and fight it out in overtime but people simply don't understand the sport as well as I do.

skip you are on a roll baby

That is what happens when you have had 87 fumbles in 103 games, lol.

C-

I thought it was in the B/B+ range. You're just bitter cause the Browns and Bengals both suck.

Down 3, 3rd down is a pass in bounds for a 4th & 2 at the opponent 28 with 1:40 left. San Diego takes the timeout immediately after the play instead of waiting for the playclock to hit 1 second.

Damn that was fast.

Norv Turner is bad at coaching football.

I don't think I was the only one hoping he would make the field goal just so that the **** up would be punished, even though that would slightly hurt my team.

According to the post game crew, Turner did not call the TO. Supposedly, he was visibly upset that someone else called it.

He was definitely pissed. I remember the camera had a shot of him on the sideline after Kaeding made the FG and he didn't look happy at all. Though I just assumed he realized he was an idiot.

It has become painfully obvious that you can't rely on all players to be smart enough to understand timeout theory in even its most basic forms.

I think it might make sense to spend a good deal of time focusing on a handful of offensive and defensive players to make sure they understand everything the way you want it, and then tell everyone else that they will face a stiff fine if they call a timeout without prior authorization.

I'm going to go the other way. I haven't looked too far into it and didn't watch the game but when they showed the highlights of the game I thought it was a fairly obvious kick it siuation:

Jets up 14 with 3:49 to play. 4th and 4 on the Tennessee 30.

It seems to me like if you get the first down or the field goal, you have the game won with close enough probability to 1 that neither is really preferable. So basically it comes down to whether you're more likely to get the first down or make the field goal and I think you're significantly more likely to get the field goal than the first. While kicking is actually slightly riskier in that it's a lot more likely that the other team will have a huge play (block and return vs INT/fumble that gets returned past the LOS) but I think the difference in likelihood of success for a 47 yard FG than 4th and 4 is pretty large and easily enough to offset this risk.

question:

in the NYG @ ARI game ARI scored a TD to go down by 9 with (i think) just under 4 minutes to go. they kicked the extra point.

i thought this would be a go for 2 situation because if you dont get the 2 at this point you can know you need 2 more scores and plan accordingly (in terms of time management). by kicking the one you are forcing yourself to get the 2 the next time and wont be worried about the clock.

idk if im right though.

I agree with you.

Mainly I don't see any benefit to waiting. Strategically there is no reason whatsoever that going for it later as opposed to now will help. On the other hand, you are correct that if you go for it now you have the benefit of knowing what you need to do and will be able to do things like kick a field goal on fourth and 7 because you will know you need two scores.

So basically the only way you are wrong is if you believe that Arizona is more likely to get it later than now (momentum I guess). This argument is valid if you accept the assumption, though I personally don't and I don't think most people posting examples in this thread would either. The other argument that people make is that it will be emotionally devastating making them far less likely to keep the comeback alive if they fail to get 2. This argument isn't even valid if you accept the if side because it would hold if your team were to score again and fail with some time left for an onside kick. I guess one could really stretch and say that the team is on a bigger high after the second TD and therefore less likely to be devastated. Meh.

In any case, even if you accept the arguments in the previous paragraph, it seems unlikely that these psychological effects will be larger than the strategic advantage that you pointed out in your post.

Mangini puts in enough prep time that he probably knows the statistical success rate of both fairly well. So my guess is that both are fairly close together and he went for it because Favre was having a high percentage day/the kicker wasn't confident about the wind or something/etc. Just looking at Favre's 25/32 game, going for it couldn't have been awful.

I also agree with you and have to add I was puzzled about the one at the end of the game, too. AZ was down 11 with 42 seconds left, had a 1st and 10 at the NYG ~26 with no timeouts, and...kicked a field goal? If Warner just throws into the endzone from 1 to 4 times and they score, on a good onside kick they have the ball one 20 yard pass away from a long FG, ie, they need two plays and maybe 8-9 seconds for both. If they make the FG and recover the kick, they have the ball around their own 40 with 30 seconds and no timeouts. The first option has got to be better, right?

It depends on how close you are to the end zone but I think kicking it here right away is generally considered to be correct. However, most of the time it's because a team will run plays that aren't throwing it to the end zone and then they score with no time left.

Basically if you are going to get the touchdown first you need to have enough time to get into FG range or your difference will be a hail mary to win vs some time to drive down the field for tying touchdown.

Also, the only argument against going for 2 earlier is the other team would be able to play more optimally. I doubt this info is as valuable to the team winning tho.

Not going for two down by 9 there is mind numbingly bad. I was just shocked, yet I shouldn't be because coaches make this mistake often.

If you don't go for two (I'm assuming that means you're down by 8). It puts pressure on the other team's defense to play honest. Where they might actually throw a pass. Yeah it sucks to have to get 8 on your last drive. But it's better than the other team knowing you need two scores. Or having to try an onside kick. 4 minutes really isn't enough time to get the ball back twice and score twice.

This is the reason hardly anyone ever goes for two when they're down by 15 late and score a TD. It's not because every coach is an idiot.

I would rather miss a 2 point attempt early and know I need two scores than miss my two point at the end and have no time left since I was playing for just one score.

We've gone over this before. Coaches and many, many fans apparently derive utility from the game "being in doubt" or whatever, even if it hurts your chance of victory by a few percentage points.

don't forget that if you do score the 2 TDs necessary, you'll have momentum on your side so the 2 point conversion is more likely.