4 ms·
This does not take into account an important factor that is somewhat intangible, but real to the psychology of the game: point swings. If you go for it on 4th
by timfrietas 13y ago
This does not take into account an important factor that is somewhat intangible, but real to the psychology of the game: point swings. If you go for it on 4th and 1 at your own 1 and lose you are definitely down 3 points and probably 7. This puts pressure on your offense--which just failed on a 4th and 1--to somehow make it all the way down the field next time. That can be demoralizing for that offense, paralyzing in fact. That is much harder to model, but an important part of a correct model, I believe.
- aero142 13y agoThis actually seems measurable. Do teams that are behind perform worse on average? Do teams perform worse than normal after failing a 4th down attempt?
- twoodfin 13y agoThe same statistics wonk has done a lot of work on "momentum" in games. His conclusion is that there is no such thing: http://www.advancednflstats.com/2013/11/momentum-1.html http://www.advancednflstats.com/2013/11/momentum-1.html That jibes with my own anecdotal experience watching a lot of football, despite how often announcers like to cite it as a factor.