My Mind's Telling Me No, But the Math's Telling Me Yes

At first I was against Bill Belichick's decision to go for it on 4th and 2 against the Colts, a decision that failed, and led directly to the Patriots losing the game.
But as a poker player you learn to judge decisions on something other than the outcome. You evaluate decision based on how likely you were to be right. Face it, nothing is 100% so your goal, as a poker player, football coach or nearly anything else is to give yourself the best chance to be successful.
In poker, the thinking is you get into certain situations thousands of times, so being right 52% of the time is a major advantage but you will still lose 480 times out of 1000.
In football, situations are more unique so Belichick likely won't face that scenario again but if he does I'm sure he would go for it again, and he'd have these numbers from the New York Times 5th Down Blogto back him up.

With 2:08 left and the Colts with only one timeout, a successful 4th-and-2 conversion wins the game for all practical purposes. A conversion on 4th-and-2 would be successful 60 percent of the time. Historically, in a situation with 2:00 left and needing a TD to either win or tie, teams get the TD 53 percent of the time from that field position. The total win probability for the 4th-down conversion attempt would therefore be:

(0.60 * 1) + (0.40 * (1-0.53)) = 0.79 WP (WP stands for win probability)

A punt from the 28 typically nets 38 yards, starting the Colts at their 34. Teams historically get the TD 30 percent of the time in that situation. So the punt gives the Pats about a 0.70 WP.

Statistically, the better decision would be to go for it, and by a good amount. However, these numbers are baselines for the league as a whole. You’d have to expect the Colts had a better than 30 percent chance of scoring from their 34, and an accordingly higher chance to score from the Pats’ 28. But any adjustment in their likelihood of scoring from either field position increases the advantage of going for it. You can play with the numbers any way you like, but it’s pretty hard to come up with a realistic combination of numbers that makes punting the better option. At best, you could make it a wash.

And if you consider the Patriots have Tom Brady (making the 4th down more likely) and the Colts have Peyton Manning (driving up the Colts chances) there is really no argument at all.

I never want to be one of those stubborn people who sticks to his argument despite all the evidence showing he’s wrong. I also hate people who reject numbers in sports, instead choosing to rely on feel.

This reminds me of my stance on the Mets signing of Pedro Martinez. I claim the deal was an awful failure because he basically missed three years, and the Mets never won anything (other than a division title which he wasn’t around for) during his tenure. The benefits of his signing are perceived to be his supposed on influence on recruiting other players to the Mets.

Think of it this way, if there are two arguments, one is supported by numbers, evidence and history. The other is a bunch of people bloviating loudly with no proof to support their argument, I’ll take the former.


As for the other (overshadowed) decision of the weekend, Maurice Jones-Drew absolutely did the right thing by delaying gratification and kneeling on the one. The chances of making a field goal from there have to be 95% or higher. You'd have to think the Jets have a better than 5% chance to score a TD in that situation.