The top-scorer on Harbaugh's fantasy team.

It’s become trendy in this space and many others for stats folks to rail against bad 4th down decisions. It’s even trendier to do it when those conservative decisions backfire, leading to losses. But analyzing any decision — and especially decisions about whether to go for it or kick on 4th down — should not be done with the benefit of hindsight. So today, I’m going to rail against John Harbaugh, Bill Belichick, and Mike McCoy, who made some awfully timid 4th down decisions but won on Sunday. And while one could argue that they won because of those decisions, the better argument, I believe, is that they won in spite of them.

Trailing by 4 with 5:03 remaining, the Ravens kick a Field Goal on the 3-yard line

Harbaugh is no stranger to meek 4th down decision making; in fact, he’s no stranger to this particular brand of conservative coaching. Last year, he sent out the kicker when, trailing by 6 points with just over four minutes remaining in the game, the Ravens faced a 4th and 5 from the 6 yard line. Both Jason Lisk and I wrote about the silliness of this decision, which resulted in a Buffalo 23-20 victory.

Facing similar circumstances — a 4-point lead and an extra minute remaining makes it less objectionable to kick the field goal, but being on the 3-yard line makes it even worse — Harbaugh again sent out Justin Tucker to take the points.  That decision cost the Ravens 0.22 expected wins; according to Advanced Football Analytics, the decision to kick a field goal instead of going for it dropped Baltimore’s win probability from 54% to 32%.

As Mike Tanier facetiously wrote, this just set up the ultimate Ravens end game: one bomb from Joe Flacco and one kick by Tucker is all the team would need to win.  Sure enough, Flacco hit Steve Smith for a 32-yard catch, and Tucker kicked the chip shot for the win.  The Ravens wound up having two additional possessions: after Tucker made it a 1-point game, the Browns and Ravens traded 3-and-outs, and the Browns went 3-and-out again before giving Baltimore one final possession with 1:58 remaining.

At the time of the decision to send Tucker out for a field goal, Brian Hoyer was 19 of 22 for 290 yards and a touchdown. He wound up throwing incomplete on his last three passes of the day. But if not for two Cleveland three-and-outs — the only two of the day — Harbaugh’s decision to cost his team 22 points of win probability would be generating much more backlash today.

Leading by 1 with 13:45 remaining, the Patriots kick a Field Goal on the 2-yard line

The Patriots were content to let the Raiders hang around with them all day, and it nearly cost them the game. The Raiders mounted one last drive, down by seven, which appeared to end when Darren McFadden ran for a touchdown with 60 seconds remaining. Would Oakland go for two and the win? We never found out, as a questionable holding call on Gabe Jackson nullified the penalty. Had the Raiders won the game, it would have been reasonable to question Belichick’s meek decision at the beginning of the quarter.

Early in the 4th quarter, New England had 1st and goal at the Raiders two-yard line. The first play was a Shane Vereen run for no gain. The next was an apparent touchdown pass to Rob Gronkowski, but the tight end couldn’t hold on after the ball was deflected by Charles Woodson. On third down, Brady threw a pass to Danny Amendola that should have gone for a touchdown; it was both an Amendola drop and slightly off-target.

Did those plays scare the team from making the smart decision, which would have been to go for it on 4th down? Vereen’s first down run nearly scored, and the same could have been said about the 2nd and 3rd down plays. By kicking the field goal, the Patriots sacrificed 0.7 expected points, but the team also sacrificed the chance to shut the door on the Raiders. My hunch is Oakland fans were relieved to see the Patriots sent out Stephen Gostkowski and take Brady off the field, which is a good sign that New England was making the wrong decision. Even the worst-case scenario would have left rookie Derek Carr backed against his own end zone with the Foxboro crowd behind him. That doesn’t seem like a bad consolation prize if the Patriots couldn’t come away with seven.

Chargers kick, kick, kick, and kick some more

San Diego made a series of conservative decisions in its victory against Buffalo. Against a better opponent, it could have cost the team the game.

• Facing the same 4th-and-goal from the 2 situation as Belichick, McCoy chose to kick, again sacrificing 0.7 expected points. This decision came with San Diego ahead by 7 with 10 minutes left in the second quarter; at that point in the game, maximizing points should be the team’s only goal. Teams should almost never kick a field goal from the 2 yard line in the first half, and San Diego especially should never do that.

• Later in the half, San Diego punted from its own 42 on 4th-and-1. Almost every coach will punt there, but I’m just going to list this one in the interest of putting all of McCoy’s questionable decisions on paper.

• Facing 4th-and-5 at the Buffalo 44, up by 10 at the start of the 4th quarter, the Chargers punted. Teams leading are generally not too risky, but the punt (as many punts in no man’s land often do) wound up going for a touchback, giving the team just 24 yards of field position. There are few quarterbacks you can trust to convert a 4th-and-5 more than Philip Rivers — San Diego has been outstanding on 3rd down situations since McCoy took over — and the math here says to go for it.

• Facing 4th-and-2 at the Buffalo 43 with 3:36 left, McCoy could have gone for it to ice the game. The decision was not critical — the Chargers had a 96% chance of winning if they went for it, and a 93% chance by punting — but the break-even point to going for it was 14%. And there’s a better than 50/50 chance the Chargers convert in that situation, far ahead of the break-even scenario. Up by 10 with so little time remaining, the only way to lose is if the Bills offense suddenly resembles the Broncos. In that case, the extra 30 yards of field position won’t do much to stop them, but maintaining possession would have been a way to close the door on the game.

In the abstract, McCoy’s decisions were not terrible, especially the last three. But in the aggregate, it does paint the picture of a very conservative coaching day. If this continues, it could cost the them against better competition.

Did you know these two are brothers?

1) Punting is not the way to beat Manning

Facing 4th and 5 from the Broncos 40-yard line, Harbaugh elected to punt up 14-7 with 8 minutes left in the second quarter. Last year, I highlighted one of the most difficult fourth down decisions coaches have to make: 4th-and-7 from between the 34- and 38-yard lines. In the thin air of Denver and with strong-legged Justin Tucker, we can safely include this scenario in that definition of No Man’s Land. Facing 4th-and-5 is a lot easier than 4th-and-7, so going for it would have been my preferred choice. The Ravens elected to punt, but let’s consider the other two options.

According to Advanced NFL Stats, going for it would have been the right call if the Ravens had a 30% chance of succeeding ^[1]I’m splitting the difference here, between the 25% minimum threshold needed to make going for it the correct call according to maximizing the team’s win probability and a 34% threshold … Continue reading, and Baltimore needed a ~45% chance of making the field goal to make kicking superior to punting. Even in Denver, a 57-yarder is a tough proposition ^[2]For what it’s worth, since 2000, kickers are three for five when attempting field goals at the line of scrimmage is the 39, 40, or 41-yard line., so I would have advised Harbaugh to keep his offense on the field. That’s because on average, teams convert 49% ^[3]That’s according to Burke. For what it’s worth, teams converted 42% of all 3rd-and-5 attempts last year and 46% in 2011. of all 4th-and-5 attempts, and playing aggressively is even more appropriate when you are the underdog. Of course, Wes Welker muffed the punt and the Ravens scored a touchdown, but let’s not substitute process for outcome. While we’re on the topic, John Fox made an even less defensible decision in the first quarter, punting on 4th and 4 from the Ravens 39-yard line. Whole articles could be written about poor Fox decisions, so let’s just say the bar is set higher for Harbaugh.

2) Meek as can be: 4th and 1

Failing to go for it in No Man’s Land is a forgivable error, and one not worth bagging on Harbaugh since so many other coaches would do the same. But one of his decisions in the third quarter was too embarrassing to cut him any slack. The brothers Harbaugh are famous for their competitive nature, but Harbaugh coached as conservatively as possible here. With 20 minutes left in the game, Baltimore trailed 35-17. The Ravens faced 4th and 1 from their own 29-yard line. If the Ravens punt, they have almost no chance of winning the game. But Harbaugh sent out Sam Koch, and Baltimore picked up 45 yards of field position.

That means the Broncos faced 1st-and-10 at their own 26-yard line after the punt. Do you know what a team’s odds of winning the game are when they have the ball on 1st-and-10 from their own 26, up 17, with 20 minutes left in the game? Ninety-seven percent is what Brian Burke’s data tell us. According to Pro-Football-Reference’s new Win Probability Charts, the Broncos had a 99.7% chance of winning the game after Baltimore punted. Why the difference? PFR’s graphs incorporate the point spread, which shows why Denver, as an 8-point favorite, had a 72% chance of winning before the start of the game. Take a look at PFR’s win probability chart, which shows Denver’s odds of winning the game at every second of the game:

If you punt facing 4th-and-1, down by 18 points, in a game where you’re an 8-point underdog, you might as well pull your starters. According to Burke’s model, if you punt, you have a 3% chance of winning. If you go for it and fail, your odds drop all the way to… two percent. Now, if Baltimore went for it and converted, the Ravens’ odds would have jump to five percent. Now consider that teams convert 74% of the time on 4th-and-1 (also from Burke), and that when down 18 you want to take as many risks as possible. There is simply no justification for punting, and Harbaugh should have been ashamed to have coached so meekly in that situation. ^[4]There’s maybe one justification: if you have decided that the game is lost, and you don’t want your team to get completely blown out because you think the emotional baggage would be so … Continue reading

3) Kicking a field goal down 18

Let’s move to the final fourth down error by Harbaugh. With 5:33 remaining and two timeouts, Baltimore faced a 4th-and-4 from the Denver 12-yard line, trailing by 18 points. Theoretically, the Ravens could kick a field goal, and hope to score two more touchdowns, convert on a two-point attempt, and then win in overtime. But keep in mind both how difficult that would be and the hidden coin-flip scenarios that quarter their likelihood of winning. The odds are low that Baltimore would (1) make the field goal and then, in the course of five minutes, (2) stop Denver from scoring and score a touchdown, and (3) stop Denver again from scoring and score another touchdown. But whatever the odds of that happening are, you need to divide that number by four to represent Baltimore’s probability of winning the game the moment Harbaugh sent out Tucker. That’s because even after doing 1, 2, and 3, Baltimore still needs to convert a two-point conversion and win in overtime, and there’s only a 25% chance the Ravens would do both of those things.

The smart decision would have been to go for the touchdown. We can’t even use Burke’s model here, because the odds of the Ravens winning the game down by 18 with 5:33 to go are simply too low. But this is the same issue that a team down by 11 with 5:33 would have to consider — except in that case, it makes slightly more sense to kick the field goal.

For Burke, the break-even success rate to make going for it the correct decision when down 11 with 5:33 left at your opponent’s 12-yard line is 29%. That’s because a field goal gives you a 7% win probability, a successful conversion gives you a 20% win probability, and a miss gives you a 1% win probability. Since the success rate on 4th-and-4 is 48%, going for it is the easy and obvious call. The win probabilities are all adjusted downwards when trailing by 18 instead of 11, but the same principles apply (except logic would even more strongly favor going for it when down by 18 instead of 11). You simply are asking your team to do too many things in too short of a time period by attempting a field goal. Joe Flacco isn’t Peyton Manning, but if you don’t have faith in him to convert a 4th-and-4, (1) why give him $120M, and (2) how much faith do you have in him leading two touchdown drives in about three minutes of game time (at best)? Harbaugh coached as if he didn’t want the game to end instead of trying to maximize his team’s odds of winning.

The way Manning and the Broncos offense was playing, no team would have beaten them on Thursday Night, and Harbaugh’s decisions certainly didn’t cost Baltimore the game. But punting on 4th-and-1 when trailing by 18 is never acceptable, and coaching to keep hope alive should never be more important than coaching to maximize your team’s odds of winning.