

NFL Teams Should Use More Trick Plays - gusgordon
http://underamp.com/?p=78

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smky80
You need more of the probability distribution for the plays to make that
decision. Most trick plays involve a handoff deep in the backfield which can
result in large losses, which can kill drives. One reason why football teams
run the ball even though the yards per play is lower than passing is that the
lower variability of yardage gain helps to sustain drives resulting in points.

On 4th down you need to figure in the opportunity cost of the punt (~35 net
yards). There was a paper ~12 years ago that covered this in detail using a
dynamic programming approach to calculate the value of a first down at each
yard line for a team, to calculate the value of say punting. It concluded NFL
teams punt too much. Nowadays you see a lot more 4th down attempts than 10
years ago. I duplicated this approach for Division 3 college games and came up
with an even more aggressive result.

But good read, it gave me an idea for some analysis myself.

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ScottWhigham
This is a fun post. I love stuff like this. I don't think, however, that it's
a particularly good example of "good analysis" - this analysis is clearly done
either by (a) someone who isn't fully aware of all of the various strategies
and nuances of NFL football, or (b) someone who is aware of such things but
was in a rush to get this post written. There's just too much missing
information to draw any conclusions such as those drawn by OP.

A trick's play's success rate is based on many factors. Saying that the down
number is the primary factor is like rating a woman's attractiveness by how
smart she is. Such a rating would, of course, give you false positives and
negatives because it represents only part of the whole. A trick play's success
rate depends on down number, position on the field, the clock, defensive
tendencies, score, weather, field conditions, player injuries, and more. For
example, a flea flicker isn't going to be attempted as often in really bad
weather, or when you are up by four touchdowns, or when the main player who is
the ultimate receiver of the ball (the "flea", perhaps?) is out of the game
due to injury.

So I like this sort of analysis but it's completely useless due to its
incompleteness. But I still am glad OP shared because I like seeing all the
thoughts, functions, and so forth.

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cafard
The 1977 Broncos finished the regular season with one loss to the Dallas
Cowboys. It seemed a bit fragile to me, though, given the three or four games
won by trick plays. They me the Cowboys in the Super Bowl, and were soundly
beaten...

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Pinatubo
If you call more trick plays, you're less likely to trick people with them ...

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gusgordon
_Using, say, four more trick plays per season could mean the difference
between making the playoffs and not making the playoffs, and probably would
not change the way defenses behave much. There’s a sweet spot here of using
trick plays and being unpredictable that not many coaches play with. It’s also
difficult for a defense to change their play style in order to counter trick
plays without sacrificing defensive efficiency on standard plays. There are
obviously lots of points to be made here._

