NFL RECAP – DIVISION ROUND - SUNDAY
The More things Change
The NFL divisional round is
over and it is on to the conference championships. The NFL had many intriguing new story lines
this year:
Ø RG3, Russell Wilson, Adrian Peterson and Andrew Luck
lead their teams into the playoffs
Ø The 49ers make a mid season QB shift at a time when
they were leading their division
Ø The defending SB champion Giants start strong, slump
and miss the playoffs
Ø Peyton Manning leads Broncos to #1 AFC seed only to
lose in playoffs - again.
Ø Chargers and Cowboys continue to disappoint and miss
the playoffs
Ø The Detroit Lions and New Orleans Saints take huge
steps - backwards
I could go on and on. Much happened in the NFL this year. Yet when all the dust has settled the
remaining combatants have a familiar look:
New England will once again
host Baltimore in the AFC Championship game.
San Francisco again makes the conference finals and will face the
Falcons in Atlanta for the NFC crown.
The NFL season grinds down the pretenders and the playoffs punish those
who were not quite ready (Seattle, Indy) sloppy (Denver, Green Bay), have
injuries at QB (Washington, Minnesota) or just overmatched (Houston, Cincy).
The Ravens may be the
sentimental favorite as Ray Lewis makes his last stand. The Patriots appear to be playing the best
and we hate them because they always are playing the best. The Falcons we keep counting out and they are
still here. The Niners intrigue us
because we see Kaepernick emerging. Me,
I am rooting for a Pats/Niners cage match.
Prospect Theory and the NFL
There is a concept in
prospect theory that says people value avoiding loss more than making
gains. A person who views a potential
action as exposing himself to risk is less likely to take that action than is a
person that sees that action as only creating a gain opportunity.
A simple example of this
concept played out at the end of the Ravens/Broncos game and the Hawks/Falcons game. In Denver the Ravens had just tied
the game at 35. The Broncos had
possession at their 20-yard line with two timeouts and 31 seconds
remaining. Peyton Manning took a knee
and the Broncos headed to OT where they lost to the Ravens 38-35.
In Atlanta, the Seahawks had
just scored to take a 28-27 lead.
Atlanta took possession with 31 seconds to go and two timeouts near
their 30-yard line. Matt Ryan completes
two passes and the Falcons use 23 seconds to kick the game-winning 49-yard
field goal.
So why didn't the Broncos try
to win the game in regulation? Like the
Falcons the Broncos had an all-pro QB capable of moving a team 40 yards in 31
seconds with two timeouts. The Broncos
kicker Matt Praeter is one of the game's best kickers from 50 yards and
beyond. So why did the Broncos settle for
overtime?
I submit that the Broncos
were more concerned with what could go wrong (loss) in this scenario than they
were with gain (winning the game in regulation and avoiding the serendipity of
OT). The Falcons, conversely, had
nothing to lose since they were trailing.
They could afford to throw caution to the wind and use the remaining
time since they could only gain from this risk.
I don't know what the odds
are in these types of situations. I do
wish that NFL coaches made more a study of the statistics of their decisions
and stopped old schooling it all the time.
The Broncos liked their odds better in OT than playing for the
moment. On this day, being risk adverse
did not do them any favors.
The games
I predicted that the Falcons
would get out on the Hawks and that Seattle would rally but fall short. In actuality Atlanta got out bigger than I
expected and the Seattle rally did not fall short as the Hawks actually took a
lead with 34 seconds to go. Where
Atlanta used a dominant run game to take a 20-0 halftime lead, Seattle
controlled the second half with Wilson finding open spaces in the mid range
passing game.
In the end the Hawks will
regret a couple of things all the way to next season. First they were inside the Atlanta ten-yard
line twice in the first half and came away with zero points (stopped once on
fourth down and ran out of time with poor game management at the end of the
first half). Second, sometimes teams
score too fast. Seattle had timeouts in
their pocket when they scored the go-ahead TD.
I know you score when you can - -but scoring on second down rather than
first down might have chewed up enough time to negate a Falcon end of game opportunity. That is what makes hindsight the national
pass time of a losing team's fans.
A great game - a classic
ending - Grade A
Texans/Patriots
Houston played a game first
half and trailed by just 17-13 at intermission.
Then the Patriots took the ball right down the field on the first drive
of the second half and laid down the law.
Matt Schaub started a drive and had the Texans inside the Patriot
35-yard line when they smartly picked him off.
Of course they turned the turnover into a quick six and presto it is
31-13 - game over. New England is so
efficient on offense that they didn't even seem to sweat in running up 41
points. They did lose the Gronk for the
rest of the playoffs and that can hurt them.
Plus, the Ravens seem to play the Pats better than any other team does
on a consistent basis. Still, I hope to
see them in the Big Game (again)
Only because New England
makes it look so easy do I downgrade the game to a Grade B
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