It feels an appropriate time to talk about the frustrations you experience in this game and how often they are completely out of your control. This is a reference of course to last weeks NFL match between Seattle and Denver and what transpired. Lets put it into some context before we talk about it as a more general subject. So one of the biggest changes to sports in recent times is the introduction of analytics. It enables teams, players. managers and us as fans to more accurately surmise the decision making process we see.
In this game Denver were trailing Seattle 17-16 with 1 min 10 secs left in the 4th quarter. The ball was on the Sea 45 and it was 4th and 5. Denver had all 3 timeouts left. Inexplicably, Hackett the new Denver coach decided to waste timeouts before opting for a 64 yd Field Goal. He did that with 20 secs left on the clock. Only two kicks of more than 64 yards have ever been made in the NFL and the longest at Lumen Field was 56 yards. McManus missed the kick and Denver recorded the loss.
It is incredibly rare that you see utter dismay and uniform ridicule at a decision made by a coach. It was a series of incredibly poor decisions and that’s before you even include the narrative of putting the game in the hands of your new superstar QB you have just signed. Lets look at some of the numbers. According to Deckprism (one of the biggest in running market makers) they had Seattle winning at 39% had they gone for it on 4th down. Had they opted to kick a FG they had the win number as 27%. They even put out the proviso that they think that 27% is on the high side. There can often be a disconnect between the actual numbers and the gut feel of fans/commentators to certain situations. In this case it was clear to all that Hackett had made a terrible decision. He has subsequently apologised for it and said he made a mistake.
The worry with all these things is just how on earth such poor decisions can be made given the money involved in the NFL and the salary the coaches are on. (Hackett about $4m a year). Where the frustrations lie taking it back to a betting point of view is that we are constantly making decisions assuming that that the highly paid NFL coach will have a vague idea as to what he is doing. That they will make the right decision. You would price up the market in running or place bets assuming that Denver will go for it, as that is the only remotely logical play available to them. On the numbers it gives them the best chance of winning by a distance. Unfortunately, these decisions and the consequences are out of your hands as a punter.
You can only make what you think are the correct decisions at that moment. If a coach messes up you just have to live with that. It’s just part of the game. There are hugely differing levels of frustrations in this game.
A horse falling at the last. A late missed penalty. Just part of the game. A jockey stops riding a furlong out or a coach makes a ridiculously dumb decision. They frustrate far more as they just shouldn’t happen. Whatever happens you just have to move on, stay disciplined and hope that at some stage you will be the beneficiary of such outcomes/decisions. Trust me though, whoever said these things balance out, was never a punter.
ProPunting 