A rebuttal/analysis from Phil Birnbaum, who is really smart in all things probability.

http://sabermetricresearch.blogspot....ing-study.html

Advanced NFL Stats Brian Burke ****s on one study:

I did find it interesting that PATs are much more likely to be made than FGs from the same distance. The link in post #2776 suggests maybe teams behave differently in those two situations because of concerns about getting a penalty on an FG and not on a PAT.

Could the fact that PAT is always centered and FG attempts could be from one of the hashmarks affect it? Seems plausible there could be an effect, but I've never kicked a field goal in my life.

on PATs the defense hardly ever tries to block it

on a FG youll see them put forth more effort


and im sure that being center plays a part as well

anyone interested in the dallas vs arizona coaching decisions pre OT?

Seems like there is an interesting dynamic when Dallas elects not to TO with ~55 seconds left in said game, lots of timeouts for both sides with I believe 3rd and 12 at about the 45 or so

just saw sportcenter
best part about the dallas game is the announcers say "i cant believe he iced his own kicker" and mention nothing about the clock management

What's crazy is that the 31 other coaches aren't copying BB.

To his credit - although I don't know how much is him and how much is the producers telling him what to say - Scott Hanson on Red Zone ran through the whole sequence afterward and did point out how ridiculous the clock management was pre-icing. Pretty sure Hanson played football himself and knows a thing or two about the game so he's not just casualfan.

Also, iirc the second field goal missed short, which made the decision to stop where they did all the more ridiculous. From the camera view from the opposite end zone it looked like it was going to creep in on the left side but it wasn't long enough.

I think it might work in the lower levels, but not with the pros. These guys are the 30 best people in the world at what they do.

If the Packers have a 4th and goal from the nine with no time on the clock, the other coach would be laughed out of the league if he took a time out to "ice" Aaron Rodgers. I understand that there are other factors that make giving the offense an extra timeout LOL, but Mason Crosby is as unlikely to get iced as Aaron Rodgers is.

Different question:

Is it possible that teams call a timeout just to give the special teams coach time to go over what he wants done on the block attempt? I usually just see everyone standing around during the timeout, but there may be something going on that I don't know about.

it's hard to do much more to block a kick than just stacking a side.

Agreed. I just keep giving pro coaches the benefit of the doubt in assuming that there is more to the timeout before a kick than icing the kicker.

I would imagine it's partly to prevent substitution infractions/too many men on the field (still not sure if these are the same thing or just similarly penalized/signaled after reading the wiki).

always being in the center has to be the most important factor (if its actually true over a large sample...how often are <20 yard FGs kicked? the article said they just looked at one season). I highly doubt its because the offense is worried about committing a penalty to take them out of FG range from the 2.

I would call a timeout to give my kicker more time every time

I would occasionally ice other kickers just to balance my range, but really just fake ice them so they think they're gonna get iced and then times running down

Did no NFL coaches catch on after the tuck rule game where the patriots had time to clean the snow off the ground whilemvinatieri was getting iced

It's gotta be combo of centered and defense not really trying for a block

Also more time (icedlol) after the TD then a failed 3rd down attempt

I'm just going to drop this off here real fast for future reference

This. Go stand by the ref like you're going to call TO every time. Only call TO every once in a while.

Rex Ryan was mic'd up in a game a year or so ago against the Bills iirc and on a final FG attempt by the Bills they show him next to the ref saying "I'm going to pretend to call a TO I'm going to pretend to call a TO but DON'T call it" while holding his hands up like a TO and then the Bills missed and he's like "ahahahaha got em ****ers!" and goes crazy.

It was awesome, <3 Rex

Another sporting section of a forum that I frequent has a popular thread called the garbage coordinator meme

There are quite a few gems such as these





I think there's some potential for this thread (in terms of Norv, Fox, Reid, and co.)

HAHA

I'm surprised coaches don't do this more often tbh

They can call it the reverse-ice

From everything I have ever read about kickers they say that they prefer to be iced because it gives them time to think stuff over. I believe this is true and making the kicker kick it under limited time and also not knowing if you are going to "ice" him is the optimal play.

Icing your own kicker though I could see easily having negative effects. This is just going to throw off his entire mind set.

This is not too smart:

Kicking conditions deteriorate significantly later in the game.

Comparing PATs with FGs is just dumb.

The whole point of "icing" the kicker is to somehow convince the kicker that he needs to make the FG twice. If the kicker realizes that is not the case, then it should have no effect. The kicker may benefit from a second kick to compensate for wind or other factors not discovered with the first kick.

statistically and anecdotally, icing doesn't work. but imo if anyone can be iced, it's got to be a rookie trying a 50-yarder in a tie game in which he already missed a field goal.

as for blocking kicks, there are things a team can do but they are already identified by coaches during that week's film study -- a weak blocker, a weak scheme, or a tendency to always react a certain way when facing a given defensive formation or stunt.

Why is it correct, acceptable and widely practiced basketball strategy to foul at end of games and "LET THE OTHER TEAM SCORE" to get more possessions considered standard, but in football, its considered against some code of "cant let them score grrrrrrrrrrr?"

basketball coaches do dumb stuff too, but are so much >>>>> football coaches wrt to status quo for end of game management

Not necessarily yesterday though because the Cardinals had at least one timeout so the kicker should have already been expecting one to be taken. Now, it may have been a bit of a surprise that it was his own team that called it but nonetheless a timeout was likely there.

I heard this morning on the radio that the reason cited for calling that timeout was to avoid a delay of game penalty (which apparently wasn't necessary as evidenced by the successful kick that didn't count). There had to be some reason he called it so that makes sense. That is certainly preferable to backing up another five yards from that distance.

The Chilly 2.0 vs John Fox battle of dimwits was unbearable . Tie game. Minuteish left. Minnesota has no timeout.

John Fox calls for multiple running plays rather than taking a knee and kicking a field goal with no time left. Chilly 2.0 calls for the goal-line stand. Jarred Allen makes 2 tackles on the goal-line, pads his stats and Minnesota loses the game when Denver kicks the game winning field goal with no time left.

Giving up at it's finest.