More Banjo: Week 3 vs Lions

[pbmax]

MM on second half: Important to run football because defense played so many snaps.

How many snaps did they play in first half?

Helps more if you get first downs.

[Maxie the Taxi]

MM on second half: Important to run football because defense played so many snaps.

How many snaps did they play in first half?

Helps more if you get first downs.

Every time Stubby makes a statement like this he exposes his old school, two dimensional bias: run the ball, time moves off the clock; pass the ball, bad things happen.

[vince]

Every time Stubby makes a statement like this he exposes his old school, two dimensional bias: run the ball, time moves off the clock; pass the ball, bad things happen.

Perhaps you might take a look at the 2nd half play-by-play that Bossman posted and see what actually happened. Stubby didn't espouse what you're accusing him of. He threw it on 1st, 2nd and 3rd down - every 3rd down in fact. The "old school, two dimensional bias" you're so anxious to ridicule as outdated and unrealistic is exactly what happened. That dropped pass by Davis on the first down throw with 6:35 to go was very significant.

If they run the ball in that situation it would have given them a lot more options on 2nd down particularly if they would have had even a modest gain. As it was with the clock stopped with the incomplete pass they had zero option but to run on 2nd and the Lions knew it. Three passes running zero time off the clock could have been completely disastrous in that situation.

3:34 to win the game up by 7 was tough enough. 4:40 forces at least another first down to win at a ton of time for Stafford to continue carving up the defense.

I know I know, if they'd just throw it they'd score and the game would be over already. They had just enough ball control to overcome the significant faults in that new school 3-D strategy. Davis just needs to catch it and all is good. They always catch it in new world 3-D - well hypothetically anyway, at least with Rodgers throwing it.

[Maxie the Taxi]

Perhaps you might take a look at the 2nd half play-by-play that Bossman posted and see what actually happened. Stubby didn't espouse what you're accusing him of. He threw it on 1st, 2nd and 3rd down - every 3rd down in fact. The "old school, two dimensional bias" you're so anxious to ridicule as outdated and unrealistic is exactly what happened. That dropped pass by Davis on the first down throw with 6:35 to go was very significant.

If they run the ball in that situation it would have given them a lot more options on 2nd down particularly if they would have had even a modest gain. As it was with the clock stopped with the incomplete pass they had zero option but to run on 2nd and the Lions knew it. Three passes running zero time off the clock could have been completely disastrous in that situation.

3:34 to win the game up by 7 was tough enough. 4:40 forces at least another first down to win at a ton of time for Stafford to continue carving up the defense.

I know I know, if they'd just throw it they'd score and the game would be over already. They had just enough ball control to overcome the significant faults in that new school 3-D strategy. Davis just needs to catch it and all is good. They always catch it in new world 3-D - well hypothetically anyway, at least with Rodgers throwing it.

First of all, my comment you posted was an observation of a bias that Stubby has demonstrated over 11 years. I think I could produce a whole bunch of specific examples to justify my point of view. I certainly am not arguing that Stubby acts on that bias in each and every specific case, last Sunday's game included.

Second of all, I am not arguing that Stubby should pass on any particular down all the time and that that would prove Stubby's bias does not exist. Nor am I arguing that he should pass all the time. Nor am I arguing that a rush-heavy offense (as we saw early in the second half Sunday) is necessarily always ill-advised. What I am arguing is that in today's game a bias for the run and against the pass in time-critical situations exists, that it is old school, that Stubby has it and, frankly, so do you. (Not that there's anything wrong with that. )

You demonstrate that bias when you write:

If they run the ball in that situation it would have given them a lot more options on 2nd down particularly if they would have had even a modest gain. As it was with the clock stopped with the incomplete pass they had zero option but to run on 2nd and the Lions knew it. Three passes running zero time off the clock could have been completely disastrous in that situation.

You say Stubby had "zero option" but to run the ball on 2nd. Why? Because, according to your bias, when you pass the ball bad things happen (an incomplete pass, a stopped clock and "disaster"). You say the Lions "knew" Stubby had to run the ball. I say they "knew" it because either they have the same old school bias against passing in that situation or they "knew" Stubby has that bias. I would think, with everyone expecting a run, a pass in this situation would have a higher chance to succeed. But Stubby does as expected, rushes the ball up the middle and Starks loses a yard. Then, on third down, Stubby does as expected again and passes to Starks who runs out of bounds after a 9 yard gain.

You contend passing incomplete on 2nd down would probably be "disastrous." I say if Arod would have thrown that 3rd down pass to Starks on 2nd down it would have resulted in 3rd and one, a very favorable position from which to make a 1st down (by the run, or, god forbid, another pass). Plus, if Starks stays in bounds, the clock keeps running. Hardly a disaster.

You contend "Davis just needs to catch it and all is good." True. But failure to execute is not a one-way street. You old school guys ( ) never take into account failure to execute on the part of the rushing game. With regard to Stubby's 2nd down play, I could just as well contend "the O-line just needs to block and Starks just needs to hit the hole and all is good."

Failure to execute is, IMO, a simple fact of life. It happens on pass plays, on rush plays and on onsides kick plays. As such, it shouldn't be used to justify one strategy to the exclusion of another.

After a failure to execute causes a disaster, a coach can either insist that the play would have succeeded if only the player would have executed, or the coach can go back and take critical look at the play called in the context of time, down and distance, and see if he really put his players in the best position to succeed.

[vince]

What I am arguing is that in today's game a bias for the run and against the pass in time-critical situations exists, that it is old school, that Stubby has it and, frankly, so do you. (Not that there's anything wrong with that. )

That bias exists when teams are winning late in games because it best serves the goal of winning the game - or not losing whichever you prefer.

That's the crux of the disagreement so let's look at McCarthy's career record throughout his biased tenure. As you say it's his body of work, which has resulted in a record of 114-63-1 including postseason. As we know, few of his wins are of the come-from-behind variety - 10 or so. I know it's been posted here not too long ago and he has about a .333 record when there's a lead change in the 4th quarter. So that's in the neighborhood of 25 times his team has given up the lead in the 4th quarter due to his old school Stubbyness. I'm sure those numbers aren't right but they're close enough to look at. So that means his old school 2d outdated Stubbyville strategy has failed 25 times. Given the numbers which are admittedly estimates, he has NOT LOST with the lead in the 4th Quarter 104 times.

Are you suggesting that he adopted the old-school 2d philosophy in those 25 games, but changed his approach to new-school 3d in the 104 instances where it worked? Of course not - given your proclaimed 10-year overall body of Stubbyness. We all know he emphasizes the 4-minute drill to close out games all the time. He talks like it makes his stubby chubby!

Even for super tight-sphinctered McCarthy, old school has resulted in NOT LOSING 4 out of 5 times! Your argument that if he'd just gone new-school it would have been even higher just isn't plausible. Let's say we hypothetically shift half the losses to the win column if he would just get with the times according to Maxie. Assuming you're argument holds any water, that would push him into the echelon of Lombardi and Madden, well ahead of every coach in modern times including Bellichick by a longshot. I think McCarthy's pretty good, and very underrated, but I'd say it's a serious stretch to elevate him to the greatest of all-time status - regardless of school or how many dimensions he can visualize/process in that Stubby melon of his.

You old school guys ( ) never take into account failure to execute on the part of the rushing game. With regard to Stubby's 2nd down play, I could just as well contend "the O-line just needs to block and Starks just needs to hit the hole and all is good."

Failure to execute is, IMO, a simple fact of life. It happens on pass plays, on rush plays and on onsides kick plays. As such, it shouldn't be used to justify one strategy to the exclusion of another.

Actually I'd say it's the other way around. New schoolers don't consider impact of the 40% passing failures. And should a couple of those 40%ers get strung together, the damages magnify. This is the difference between your argument from your living room and that of the coaches at the pinnacle of the sport who you actually believe the game has passed by.

The basis of your argument is that all "failures" are equal - and you equate a no-gain running play late in the game with a game-changing on-side kick doink off the head?
Ignoring the game-changing magnitude of a successfully recovered on-side kick, there is a tremendous difference between "failing" on a pass play late in a game with the lead and "failing" on a running play in the same circumstance. One plays into the hand of the opponent by giving them added time when it fails and the other continues to shorten the game in spite of failure. One strategy entails a strategic benefit even in the event of failure. The other requires success or it imposes punitive damages - potentially of the immediate game changing variety.

If you don't want to accept the dominant logic overwhelmingly espoused by the foremost experts in the game - yesterday, today, tomorrow, or as long as the clock stops late in the game on errant throws, when guys drop balls, defenses retain the ball for their offenses on interceptions and/or score touchdowns on pick sixes when passes "fail", at least look at the actual results of 10 year's worth of Stub.

Those rules haven't changed yet as far as I know, passing era or not. But as you say the game has passed us old school 2d guys by so catch me up if that's wrong.

[Maxie the Taxi]

Those rules haven't changed yet as far as I know, passing era or not. But as you say the game has passed us old school 2d guys by so catch me up if that's wrong.

Vince, I applaud your creative use of statistics to verify what my eyes have seen and my ears have heard over the last 10 years: Stubby is old school and a damned good head coach. Whether or not your statistics prove whether or not the "New School" passing strategy to get 1st downs and points in the fourth quarter is inferior to the Old School strategy of literally running down the clock, and whether or not Stubby would be the greatest coach in NFL history if he was "New School," IMO, is still an open question. But why beat this dead horse?

You write: "The basis of your argument is that all 'failures' are equal - and you equate a no-gain running play late in the game with a game-changing on-side kick doink off the head?"

No, in fact, this is not the basis of my argument. All I said was that failure to execute is a "simple fact of life." Failures can happen anytime on any play and that they shouldn't be used to "justify one strategy to the exclusion of another." Yes, Davis dropped a 1st down pass. But that failure doesn't make passing again on 2nd down a foolish play.

On the play immediately prior Davis returned a punt 50 yards to the Lions' 30 yard line -- FG scoring position and a possible game clincher. Packer special teams penalties resulted in a minus 50 yards in field position and loss of scoring position. If the Packers had gone on to lose, which failure would have had "game-changing magnitude?" You can't control when and where a failure will occur, which is another reason, I would argue, that you shouldn't "sit on a lead."

Now, after all the discussion in this thread, maybe someone can explain to me what Stubby accomplished by running Starks into the teeth of eight Lions in the box on 2nd down with 6:31 to go in the game other than running 38 seconds off the clock and making 3rd down way more difficult to convert? If Arod can complete a 9 yard pass to Starks on 3rd down with the Lions defense playing back, why couldn't he have completed it on 2nd down? And wouldn't that have put the players in a better position to succeed on 3rd down?

[vince]

Whether or not your statistics prove whether or not the "New School" passing strategy to get 1st downs and points in the fourth quarter is inferior to the Old School strategy of literally running down the clock, and whether or not Stubby would be the greatest coach in NFL history if he was "New School," IMO, is still an open question. But why beat this dead horse?

Old school/new school is completely irrelevant terminology and accurately describes nothing with respect to the question at hand, but I get that you're equating old school with ineffective running strategy, an overemphasis (by your opinion) on the game clock, and going "conservative" which you understand to be self-definingly negative. By your perspective, old school is no longer relevant in today's game that emphasizes passing. You've loaded the term so heavily in the negative that it can't possibly be effective.

Taking this definition and your identification of McCarthy with these negative traits, I've researched the reality of the situation, and it turns out that there are extensive, incontrovertable facts about the reality of McCarthy's level of effectiveness in closing games iwth the lead -without regard to any labels applied. Once the negative labels are applied, the facts of the situation prove the negative connotations to be not merely inappropriate but completely and entirely wrong.

I've seen zero evidence, much less a hint of factual results, that even suggest that "New school" approach carries any level of success in closing out leads whatsoever. Your "proof" I'm assuming is your mind's reference to 1 ihighly emotional failure of the "old school" approach. No matter how emotional, one lone exception in the face of 10 times as many proof points doesn't disprove the rule. "Man it felt like it could have failed if the opponent wouldn't have run out of time" doesn't disprove the rule. "if this hypothetical would have happened it would have failed" doesn't disprove the rule. "Man they almost lost." doesn't disprove the rule. "I tell you what if there would have been a fifth quarter in that game, the Packers would have been beat by 2 touchdowns" doesn't disprove the rule. "They blew them out in the first half. McCarthy took his foot off the gas and they ALMOST lost." doesn't disprove the rule. "It worked in the first half" doesn't disprove the rule.

The second half becomes increasingly different situation than the first have as the end of the game nears. That factor, combined with how the point differential is working for or against you and other trends (defensive energy for example comes to mind) potentially change the "winning" strategy. Denying the wisdom of whether and how the "winning" strategy might change as the game ending nears flies directly in the face of two facts. 1) It's pretty much universally accepted that McCarthy changes his approach based on point differential and time remaining, and 2) McCarthy has a 10 year proven track record of elite level success when leading and as the time remaining gets increasingly closer to the end than the beginning.

Your opinion to your "open question" has no basis whatsoever at this point, while you characterize the successful strategy as stupid, out-dated and irrelevant there is extensive and overwhelming factual results over the last 10 years and including the present that prove both its relevance and effectiveness.

Doesn't that at least give you some pause? The approach you're deeming as wrong is in fact, highly successful, while the approach you're deeming as correct has no evidence of success whatsoever, at least that's been offered here. I'd love to see it. I'd say any objective observer would either do more than pause or try to find some evidence of its relevance to the conversation much less limited positive results.

Failures can happen anytime on any play and that they shouldn't be used to "justify one strategy to the exclusion of another." Yes, Davis dropped a 1st down pass. But that failure doesn't make passing again on 2nd down a foolish play.
...
If the Packers had gone on to lose, which failure would have had "game-changing magnitude?" You can't control when and where a failure will occur, which is another reason, I would argue, that you shouldn't "sit on a lead."

It could be argued that throwing on first down was indeed foolish. However, the punitive negative impact of the incompletion on first down (as compared to a run for no gain) absolutely impacts the wisdom of passing again on 2nd down. McCarthy can't control the success or failure of any play as we agree, but his failure to control the negative impact of failure a second time after failing to take that control the play prior would indeed by a foolish decision.

The fact that a coach has very limited control of when and where a failure will occur (he can draw on experience to estimate its chances of happening and to what extent) is EXACTLY the reason they do control what they can - and that is the IMPACT of failure if/when it occurs - late in games with the lead are the instances where doing so is most successful - and failing to do so carries the greatest risk. By minimizing the potential impacts of failure through risk averse decisions, coaches can help position their team to close the game successfully, not in spite of the uncrontrollable factors but by minimizing their negative impacts to the goal of winning the game.

[Pugger]

Every time Stubby makes a statement like this he exposes his old school, two dimensional bias: run the ball, time moves off the clock; pass the ball, bad things happen.

With a big lead and so many defensive starters missing I can understand MM's thinking. He didn't abandon the pass in the second half really. Both Davis and Cobb had drive killing drops. We never had that many offensive possessions in the second half either.

[ThunderDan]

Every time Stubby makes a statement like this he exposes his old school, two dimensional bias: run the ball, time moves off the clock; pass the ball, bad things happen.

Maxie-

I think this is completely wrong regarding last weeks game. We threw the ball a lot in the 1st half and put up 31 points. Yet, even with all of that success we only possessed the ball for 11:31 in the first half because of our quick strikes. Our drives were 3:38, 1:44, :47, :59, 3:53 and :32. Detroit's scoring drives in the 3rd Q and start of the 4th Q were exact opposites - 6:37, 5:42. Those two drives represented more possession than the Packers had the whole 1st half.

[Maxie the Taxi]

Maxie-

I think this is completely wrong regarding last weeks game. We threw the ball a lot in the 1st half and put up 31 points. Yet, even with all of that success we only possessed the ball for 11:31 in the first half because of our quick strikes. Our drives were 3:38, 1:44, :47, :59, 3:53 and :32. Detroit's scoring drives in the 3rd Q and start of the 4th Q were exact opposites - 6:37, 5:42. Those two drives represented more possession than the Packers had the whole 1st half.

I don't disagree with you. See my post to Vince above. The comment you quote was not aimed at last weeks game, but at Stubby's body of work in general.

[vince]

MM on second half: Important to run football because defense played so many snaps.

How many snaps did they play in first half?

Helps more if you get first downs.

37 vs. 27 ToP was even more tilted against GB defense in the first half. It could be argued that a couple of GB's quick scores in the first half contributed to the defense getting exposed. The defense did that pretty well on its own I'd say, but it's easy to see the 2nd half concern.

..............1.................2...............3. ...............4................T
Snaps (ToP)
Det........18 (9:05)....19 (9:22)....12 (9:51)....21 (6:49)....70 (35:07)
GB.........12 (5:55)....15 (5:38).....9 (5:09).....16 (8:11)....52 (24:53)

In the 2nd half the Packers rushed for 5 first downs and passed for 1 on 11 runs and 10 passes up until the victory formations.

4 rushing and 2 passing if you want to count Rodgers' late scramble as a pass play, which would be more accurate.

4 of the pass plays were on 1st or 2nd down, and every third down play in the 2nd half up until the clock-killing drive was a pass.

Get first downs indeed. And protect your weary D that's lite on pass rush and defensive backfield leaders - and bleeding like a sieve. And keep the clock running.