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Punting inside the 40 - BostonCard - 09-07-2014

OK, I generally give the coaching staff wide latitude in terms of play calling.  We all our subject to lots of cognitive biases that make criticism of playcalling really easy (for example, when we hate a play-call and it goes badly, we remember and attribute the poor outcome to the playcalling, but when we like a play-call and it goes badly, we don't).  Plus, Shaw and company have forgotten more football than I will ever know.

However there is one place where I think there is room for fair criticism, because the math has been done on it.  And that is punting within the opponent's 40 yard line.  The reason is that the value of a possession far exceeds the value of field position on the opponent's half of the field.  It doesn't matter too much on the expected number of points whether USC has the ball at their own 7 yard line or their own 32 (or worse, whether they have the ball at their own 20 or their own 29).

Now, in both situations we were at a bit of a quandry.  We were facing fourth and long (4th and 22 in the second quarter; 4th and 13 in the fourth), and the field position was such that it might have been a stretch for Williamson to hit, especially if something is going on with either his health, his confidence, or his mechanics that we aren't privy to).  Still, there was some finite probability that he would make the field goal, and some finite probability that we could convert a fourth and long (on a small sample size, we were 3/5 throwing on third down and 10+ to go, with 2 first downs, good for a 40% conversion rate; last year we got 11 first downs in 27 chances on 3rd and 10+ to go).

In contrast, the value of 25 and 9 yards of field position was dubious, to say nothing of the psychological benefit to our opponents of knowing they only have to stop us for three downs, rather than four.  All in all, I probably would have kicked the field goal from the 29 yard line on 4th and 22, and gone for it on fourth and 13 from the 32.

BC

Re: Punting inside the 40 - dabigv13 - 09-08-2014

Also worth considering that Williamson's first miss had the distance, even though an SC lineman got a hand on the ball. The second miss was purely due to the tight angle from the college wide splits. Still should've been made, but it wasn't a gimme necessarily. In any case we kick both those balls, and I think the odds are good we make at least one of em. He certainly has the leg to do it.

Re: Punting inside the 40 - 81alum - 09-08-2014

(09-08-2014, 05:50 AM)garvin link Wrote:I think too much has been made of the 49-yard miss. That's a lonnnng kick. We had no right to presume it was an automatic three points.
No such assumption was made.  Williamson is about 50/50 on his career on kicks of 40-49 yards.  We passed up two such tries and missed one. 

I am bothered not just by the punts, but by the decision to go on 4th down at the 3.  It is a bit of stubbornness and reflects Shaw's philosophy that we should always be able to gain one yard even when the opponent expects it.  Yes, we had made 1 yard on the TD but barely, and this was shaping up to be a low scoring game.  But we are also not as well equipped at short yardage as we once were, and the SC defensive line is not a pushover.  Was it worth giving up  3 nearly certain points for the chance at 7?  I thought it was a bad trade when Shaw decided to go for it, although I recognize that it was a close call.   

Re: Punting inside the 40 - StanFan88 - 09-08-2014

(09-08-2014, 04:10 AM)dabigv link Wrote:Also worth considering that Williamson's first miss had the distance, even though an SC lineman got a hand on the ball. The second miss was purely due to the tight angle from the college wide splits. Still should've been made, but it wasn't a gimme necessarily. In any case we kick both those balls, and I think the odds are good we make at least one of em. He certainly has the leg to do it.

BS on the 26-yarder.  D1 kickers need to make EVERYTHING inside 30 yards - ALL THE TIME.  He pushed it big time.

Re: Punting inside the 40 - stupac2 - 09-08-2014

(09-08-2014, 05:59 AM)81alum link Wrote:I am bothered not just by the punts, but by the decision to go on 4th down at the 3.  It is a bit of stubbornness and reflects Shaw's philosophy that we should always be able to gain one yard even when the opponent expects it.  Yes, we had made 1 yard on the TD but barely, and this was shaping up to be a low scoring game.  But we are also not as well equipped at short yardage as we once were, and the SC defensive line is not a pushover.  Was it worth giving up  3 nearly certain points for the chance at 7?  I thought it was a bad trade when Shaw decided to go for it, although I recognize that it was a close call.

I would've been more angry had we kicked there. 4th and 1 inside the opponents 5 should really be a no-brainer, because you convert those some large percentage of the time, way more than the ~50% you need for it to be a smart choice. That we failed sucks, but I think Shaw made the right call for sure.

Re: Punting inside the 40 - Roberton3 - 09-08-2014

(09-08-2014, 06:12 AM)StanFan88 link Wrote:[quote author=dabigv link=topic=10584.msg97373#msg97373 date=1410174657]
Also worth considering that Williamson's first miss had the distance, even though an SC lineman got a hand on the ball. The second miss was purely due to the tight angle from the college wide splits. Still should've been made, but it wasn't a gimme necessarily. In any case we kick both those balls, and I think the odds are good we make at least one of em. He certainly has the leg to do it.

BS on the 26-yarder.  D1 kickers need to make EVERYTHING inside 30 yards - ALL THE TIME.
[/quote]

Well, regardless of what you think, kickers don't make everything inside 30 yards.

In the 2012 season (the most recent statistics I could easily find online), FBS kickers made roughly 89% of their kicks from 20-29 yards.  Williamson's career record (including the SC game) from 20-29 yards is 16/19, or roughly 84%.  That's slightly worse than the average FBS kicker, but the difference isn't even close to being statistically significant.

Re: Punting inside the 40 - Farm93 - 09-08-2014

Odd to think about missed kicks or conservative calls IMHO.

At home, with that defense, Stanford should have won by a comfortable margin.  Stanford did not win by that margin because of a lot of different elements.  Certainly, these higher profile items are in that mix, but I am certain the staff has identified more than just the few noted on our board.

Bottom line - Team did not go 1-0 this past weekend

I am a bit concerned that the team's desired identity of power, smash-mouth football does not align with the ~200 lb RBs, but I hope that SC is unique in their ability to reveal that misalignment.

Re: Punting inside the 40 - washingtonismoney - 09-08-2014

(09-08-2014, 10:01 AM)Farm93 link Wrote:Odd to think about missed kicks or conservative calls IMHO.

Not odd at all. If your question is, "what maximizes points?" well, punting inside your own 40 has been repeatedly shown to not do that. So anytime that happens, you're going to get questions.

Of course those are just averages. I suppose you could argue that 4th-and-13 with a shaky FG kicker is exactly the kind of weird scenario that those numbers do not envision, but it's still very worth questioning. Especially in a game you lose by 3 points.

Re: Punting inside the 40 - BostonCard - 09-08-2014

(09-08-2014, 05:59 AM)81alum link Wrote:[quote author=garvin link=topic=10584.msg97379#msg97379 date=1410180604]
I think too much has been made of the 49-yard miss. That's a lonnnng kick. We had no right to presume it was an automatic three points.
No such assumption was made.  Williamson is about 50/50 on his career on kicks of 40-49 yards.  We passed up two such tries and missed one. 

I am bothered not just by the punts, but by the decision to go on 4th down at the 3.  It is a bit of stubbornness and reflects Shaw's philosophy that we should always be able to gain one yard even when the opponent expects it.  Yes, we had made 1 yard on the TD but barely, and this was shaping up to be a low scoring game.  But we are also not as well equipped at short yardage as we once were, and the SC defensive line is not a pushover.  Was it worth giving up  3 nearly certain points for the chance at 7?  I thought it was a bad trade when Shaw decided to go for it, although I recognize that it was a close call. 
[/quote]

I'm not bothered at all to go for it on 4th and 1 at the 3.  The expected value of kicking a field goal from there is about 2.7 points (90% chance of making it x 3 points).  On third down and 1-3 yards to go (this would be a proxy for fourth and short), we've had a 75% conversion rate this year (4 rushes, 11 yards, and 3 first down).  Last year, to give us a better sample size, we had 52 attempts, and 32 first downs for a 61.5% conversion rates.  Assuming that we have a 65% touchdown rate on first and goal from the 4 yard line, and a 25% field goal rate (and 10% failure to get points), the expected value is 3.26 points 0.615 x (0.65 x 7 + 0.25 x 3), which is a bit better than the expected value of attempting the field goal.

There's enough uncertainty around the numbers that you can make a credible case for either from that distance, but it certainly shouldn't be something to chap your hide.

BC 

Re: Punting inside the 40 - Spiny_Norman - 09-08-2014

I read game reports that referenced a "stiff wind" blowing towards the student end of the stadium (to the right on your tv screen).  Sarkisian said one reason he put Heidari out to try the 53 yard kick was that the kicker would have the wind behind him.

I looked at the flag on the upright as Heidari prepared to kick.  It was barely moving.  For those who were at the game, what was the situation with the wind?  I wonder if that may have affected Shaw's decision to punt inside the 40 since FGs would have been into the wind (such as it was).

Re: Punting inside the 40 - OutsiderFan - 09-08-2014

(09-08-2014, 05:50 AM)garvin link Wrote:I think too much has been made of the 49-yard miss. That's a lonnnng kick. We had no right to presume it was an automatic three points.

Keep in mind the ball was slightly tipped, just enough to send it wide.  The missed 26 yarder has no excuses.

Re: Punting inside the 40 - BostonCard - 09-08-2014

I was sitting in the stands above the south end zone.  No, there was not a stiff wind.  The wind was indeed at Heidari's back, but it was barely noticeable.

BC

Re: Punting inside the 40 - stupac2 - 09-08-2014

(09-08-2014, 11:00 AM)Boston Card link Wrote:I was sitting in the stands above the south end zone.  No, there was not a stiff wind.  The wind was indeed at Heidari's back, but it was barely noticeable.

It came and went. I'm pretty close to field level in the end zone and there was some gusting right before they called that time out and sent out the FG unit. My brother and I were trying to figure out if they were just trying to get us to jump, or if they changed their minds about going for it because of the wind.

I wouldn't call it stiff either way, but given the way it seemed to pick up just then I could see that influencing the decision.

Re: Punting inside the 40 - TreeWeird - 09-08-2014

I was up high just under the skybox.  It was breezy from time to time, but I'm not sure if was "stiff".  It was swirling where we were, but every time I checked the flags at the top of the stadium above the endzones, the wind was consistently blowing left to right as you saw it on TV.  I assumed at the time it contributed to Shaw's decision not to go for FG's in second half.

Re: Punting inside the 40 - TreeWeird - 09-08-2014

Did Pat Haden move from the sidelines?  Maybe he created the "stiff breeze" by continuing to yell at the refs from the visitor's corner.

Re: Punting inside the 40 - martyup - 09-08-2014

Our D has and will continue to hold opponents to low scores.  With that in mind, I think we should always take advantage to scoring opportunities.  That means not punting inside the 40 and taking the field goal when a red zone drive stalls.

Re: Punting inside the 40 - Roberton3 - 09-08-2014

(09-08-2014, 01:18 PM)garvin link Wrote:
Quote:In the 2012 season (the most recent statistics I could easily find online), FBS kickers made roughly 89% of their kicks from 20-29 yards.  Williamson's career record (including the SC game) from 20-29 yards is 16/19, or roughly 84%.  That's slightly worse than the average FBS kicker, but the difference isn't even close to being statistically significant.

Roberton, I think you are confusing length with yard line. A kick from the 29 yard line is a 46-yard kick. I can't believe college kickers hit 89 percent of those. A kick of 29 yards -- that is, the 12 yard line -- should be pretty close to automatic, which 84 percent is.

I wasn't confused, but I did phrase it in a less-than-clear way.  What I meant was 20-29 yard kicks, definitely not kicks from between the 20 and 29 yard lines.

In my defense, I copied that less-than-clear phrasing from StanFan88's post.  And I assume he meant that kickers should never miss 20-29 yard kicks.  If he meant they should never miss kicks between the 20 and 29 yard lines, then he's even more out of touch with reality than I had thought.