Official Week 3 Lions at Packers Game Day Thread

[Maxie the Taxi]

I am not sure conservative versus aggressive would show up in the percentage of first downs on any given down by pass or run.

Where it does show up is in yardage gained and points scored. When you combine the yardage from the play and the rate of success, to get a likely yardage for a choice run v pass, passing comes out ahead. More so when you track the points gained.

There are downsides to choosing passing and not all game situations are alike. But in the first and third quarters, passing is more productive.

You can see some of this here: http://archive.advancedfootballanaly...cess-rate.html

Burke is saying coaches think in a one step, success or no, proposition. Their success rate is whether or not the play achieved its goal. It correlates well with actual game choices and play calling. Generally, teams look to get halfway to the first down first and second down. Third down success is to convert. But those calculations ignore the unequal payoffs of passing versus running regarding keeping drives alive and scoring.

Basically, the coach cannot have a calculator or computer on the sideline telling them when they have maximized their payoffs. But they can, through institutional memory, training and observation (film review and live game setting) see what plays worked and what didn't.

They are literally counting (or stacking) success, not assessing probability.

I usually am not a fan of such articles, but this one made sense to me. I've often thought that a lot of coaches can't see the forest for the trees. They examine plays in isolation rather than in context. From the coach's point of view every well-designed play should go for that necessary 1st down or that winning TD if the players just "execute."

After a loss coaches AND players will often say that the players just didn't "execute." What's virtually never said is that the coach didn't put his players in a position to succeed often enough, regardless of execution. And this has to do with game planning and the things the article talks about.

In fact, I think sometimes fans and reporters are in a better position to judge than the coach, purely because most fans see the big picture of the game rather than getting caught up in the x's and o's of each play.

The article concludes:

The prescriptive analysis remains the same. Generally, teams should be passing more often on 1st and 2nd down, and running more often on 3rd down and in the red zone.

Question: Is "Burke" Tex?

[pbmax]

I usually am not a fan of such articles, but this one made sense to me. I've often thought that a lot of coaches can't see the forest for the trees. They examine plays in isolation rather than in context. From the coach's point of view every well-designed play should go for that necessary 1st down or that winning TD if the players just "execute."

After a loss coaches AND players will often say that the players just didn't "execute." What's virtually never said is that the coach didn't put his players in a position to succeed often enough, regardless of execution. And this has to do with game planning and the things the article talks about.

In fact, I think sometimes fans and reporters are in a better position to judge than the coach, purely because most fans see the big picture of the game rather than getting caught up in the x's and o's of each play.

The article concludes:


Question: Is "Burke" Tex?

He is ex-Air Force and working for ESPN now. He might be Tex

I think coaches go beyond the single factor success-or-not when they are designing an offense and game planning. If they thought solely about success rate, the run/pass ratios never would have changed.

But they don't ALL have to be thinking big picture. There is a lot of monkey see monkey do. I think McCarthy is in between, he reviews from 10,000 feet but I am not sure he thinks in terms of probabilities. I do give him credit for being willing to try things. He could be Jeff Fisher and do it by the book. You don't get second guessed as hard that way.