Quote:
Originally Posted by KCChiefsFan88
(Post 16052054)
Or if the Chiefs get called for a defensive penalty... which is exactly what happened and was not exactly a surprising outcome given how tightly the refs were calling defensive penalties.
That needed to be part of the decision making calculus.
Also according to analytics, if the Bengals had scored a TD when it was first and goal after the two minute warning, their win probability would have dropped slightly.
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Did it at that point in time? Ancient Alien Astronaut Theorists say No.
Let's look at the big picture.
The Chiefs have committed 43 defensive penalties in 1,006 defensive snaps through the Bengals game. Of those, 4 have been offsetting, 13 have been declined, and 26 have been accepted. So, through the season you have a 4.3% chance (rounding up) of getting called for a defensive penalty) on any given play during the game. That's a rate of about 23 plays per penalty.
I don't have total snap data by quarter and phase but let's assume that, at this point, those numbers are relatively evenly distributed. The Chiefs have committed 16 penalties on defense in the 4th quarter in what we'll call 252 plays, which means that the likelihood of being penalized at some point in the 4th quarter is 6.3%. That's a rate of about 16 plays per penalty. This is being generous to your cause and saying KC is more likely to commit a defensive penalty in the 4th quarter than in any other quarter (they are, to date).
If we're being real about it, the squalor over the "let them score" mantra truly started at the 3:14 mark with the 1st and 10 at the 11, where the Bengals went on to run 11 plays. I'll be overly generous at this point and discount the fact that KC had already been flagged for their 4th quarter penalty per game when Jones got flagged for encroachment. If we discount the kneel, spike, and field goal, that's 8 actual plays. So it should be a coin flip on whether or not KC would commit 1 penalty defensively at that point.
The Chiefs were called for 2 penalties with one having less than 1% chance of happening (the offsetting penalty). You can't reasonably assume that your team will get called for 2 penalties in the final 8 plays when it's doubtful they'd even get one after the Jones' call.
And the funny thing? Cincinnati has committed 14 offensive penalties in the 4th quarter. They've played 995 snaps on offense this year, so roughly 249 snaps in the 4th. So the likelihood they get a penalty? 5.6% or 1 in 18 plays. They had the same likelihood, for the most part, and committed 1 penalty.
In either case, I'd much rather take a chance a penalty could be called on my defense and the 55% chance the Bengals score a TD from the 11 than hope I can get the game to overtime. The most OTs in a season, ever, was 25 which means over a season only 4.9% of games go to overtime (and usually less). I don't have the numbers readily findable, but I have to imagine the chance of a game going to overtime with one team down 7 with 2 minutes or so to go is really, really low. Almost assuredly it's far less than 1%. The likelihood of winning in overtime is a 50/50 proposition that compounds your already insanely narrow odds of coming back to begin with. The odds, most definitely, are far higher if only down 3 (even if they remain low overall).
I can't find anything fallible in the decision metric.
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