Receive or defer to the second half?

tydog;556508 said:

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Receive or defer to the second half?

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..PO's the most cybers works fine with me.

#ANothingBurger


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Non-Premium Siggy: So called Illegals embody the Great American Dream.

Take the ball. Try and get your new QB as comfortable as possible as soon as possible.

take that ball and score 6....put them on their heels first

If you have a good defense...defer.

MinotStateBeav;556615 said:

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If you have a good defense...defer.

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I'm with MSB....but I always want the ball first in the 2nd half

DOES NOT MATTER



GO BEARS!

Still funny a second time on a different thread :p

Cal_Fan2;556593 said:

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LOL...check this one out...if has been already posted, sorry..but this gay guy does a great honey badger... by the way, a Wolverine would kick the $hit out of a honey badger, but they come in 2nd

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liverflukes;556637 said:

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Still funny a second time on a different thread :p

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LOL...he has equally funny ones on the "stiffy goat"



....and Water Chevrotains

so much for bedtime sweetie...

liverflukes;556643 said:

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so much for bedtime sweetie...

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Funny youtubes are easier to find then 1000s of Cal pics....I needed a reprieve, besides L.F., between that and the FSU look alike thread, my head was hurting..haha

Cal_Fan2;556642 said:

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LOL...he has equally funny ones

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another classic CF2

:rollinglaugh:

run2win;556610 said:

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Take the ball. Try and get your new QB as comfortable as possible as soon as possible.

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I think the opposite since I expect our D to be better than our O. They have a new QB who will be uncomfortable as well. defer, kick to FSU, watch the D smash their QB's confidence, then the pressure is off Maynard a little.

MinotStateBeav;556615 said:

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If you have a good defense...defer.

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Agreed. Defer, Let the other QB deal with opening game jitters right off the bat. Get the ball to start and set the tone for the second half.

I think it's a no-brainer - you take the ball. Try and put this game out of reach so that by the time you get to the second half kickoff the game is no longer in doubt. If we expected to be in a dogfight, I would be inclined to defer.

[quote=]For supporters of the deferred kickoffs, 55.8 percent of the teams that deferred the kickoff won games. Many were good teams with defensive head coaches. The Jets and Dolphins were among the more active of the deferring teams. Both teams, though, complained at times of slow offensive starts.

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http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/columns/story?columnist=clayton_john&id=6322587

It's funny that Clayton argues against deferring, but the only stat he uses to support receiving the kick is that the team that receives more often than not scores first. no kidding?

ColoradoBear1;556959 said:

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http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/columns/story?columnist=clayton_john&id=6322587

It's funny that Clayton argues against deferring, but the only stat he uses to support receiving the kick is that the team that receives more often than not scores first. no kidding?

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You're presenting these stats in a vacuum and you've left some critical information out. The most important one is that in the NFL 70% of teams elected to receive the ball in 2010. That should tell you all you need to hear about what the best coaches in football think you should do.

Also, he doesn't just say "more often than not scores first" - he says that teams receiving the ball score 34.8% of the time on that first possession and 59% of the time score first in the game. He attributes that to offensive scripting which won't be applicable in the second half.

I think there is some missing data here that would be helpful. What percentage of the time do teams score on the first possession of the 2nd half? For teams that defer and win 55.8% of their games, what percentage do they win when they receive first?

This comes up once per year ...

Do you all remember the game in the 2007 when Cal chose to kick-off in the first half instead of deferring ? The opponent then chose to receive the ball in the second half.

We kicked off to start the first half, and then kicked-off to start the second half. The slow mumbling started in the stands as people realized that something looked wrong.

http://clog.dailycal.org/2007/11/17/sleepless-in-seattle-golden-bears-kickoff-to-start-both-halves/

Unit2Sucks;556983 said:

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You're presenting these stats in a vacuum and you've left some critical information out. The most important one is that in the NFL 70% of teams elected to receive the ball in 2010. That should tell you all you need to hear about what the best coaches in football think you should do.

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Stats are better than a wishy washy no proof statement like " Try and put this game out of reach so that by the time you get to the second half kickoff the game is no longer in doubt. If we expected to be in a dogfight, I would be inclined to defer. " Sorry, isn't it always the proper strategy to put the game out of reach? (On the flip side, I'll admit my saying that our d is better than our O as a justification to kick is just as off the cuff... which is why I tried to look for some stats).

Unit2Sucks;556983 said:

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Also, he doesn't just say "more often than not scores first" - he says that teams receiving the ball score 34.8% of the time on that first possession and 59% of the time score first in the game. He attributes that to offensive scripting which won't be applicable in the second half.

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Teams don't script in the second half because they think they know more about the opponent and game situation that they did opening the game. If scripting makes the offense harder to stop, maybe teams should do it in the second half. But you can script your first drive after the defense was on the field. So the stat that the team receiving the kick scores 34.8% of the time is also presented 'in a vacuum'. One needs to know if the kicking team scores just as often on their first possession.

Here's something interesting though using just those stats presented above- If Team A is the receiving team, they score 34.8% of the time on the first possession. So 65.2% of the time they don't score on their possession. Team B scores first 41% of the time. So from the point team B gets the ball from team A in a scoreless game, there is a 41/65.2= 62.9% chance Team B will score first. So the kicking team's offense is slight more effective is scoring (compare to 59% of team A). There could be a lot of reasons for this and it's not a huge statistical difference, but it could be because team B is likely to have better field position.

Unit2Sucks;556983 said:

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I think there is some missing data here that would be helpful. What percentage of the time do teams score on the first possession of the 2nd half? For teams that defer and win 55.8% of their games, what percentage do they win when they receive first?

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Yes there are a lot of stats that would be more useful. And I'm thinking that most of them won't be immediately applicable to out situation on whether to kick or receive with a fresh QB.

I am still thinking that in general a defense will stop the opponents and force them to punt (they only score 35% of the time remember) and yield better field possession. That could be more pronounced if the D is better than the O. (there has to be a stat on average starting position that applies here, but I can't find it).

But a lot also depends on the individual QB's psychology. Maybe Maynard is a cool customer so it won't affect him mentally if we kick or receive, if they score first or we do. Maybe there will be jitters at the kickoff that would be calmed down if the D goes out first, but would affect him if he runs out first thing.

ColoradoBear1;557012 said:

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Stats are better than a wishy washy no proof statement like " Try and put this game out of reach so that by the time you get to the second half kickoff the game is no longer in doubt. If we expected to be in a dogfight, I would be inclined to defer. " Sorry, isn't it always the proper strategy to put the game out of reach? (On the flip side, I'll admit my saying that our d is better than our O as a justification to kick is just as off the cuff... which is why I tried to look for some stats).

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Nice try but no cigar. I wasn't being wishy washy here - I don't think this game will be a dogfight. Who cares who gets the ball in the second half if the game is out of reach. Do you remember who got the ball in the 2nd half of the Wisky UNLV game last night? I do agree with you that stats are better but stats re when to defer are inapplicable in blowouts.

ColoradoBear1;557012 said:

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Teams don't script in the second half because they think they know more about the opponent and game situation that they did opening the game. If scripting makes the offense harder to stop, maybe teams should do it in the second half. But you can script your first drive after the defense was on the field. So the stat that the team receiving the kick scores 34.8% of the time is also presented 'in a vacuum'. One needs to know if the kicking team scores just as often on their first possession.

Here's something interesting though using just those stats presented above- If Team A is the receiving team, they score 34.8% of the time on the first possession. So 65.2% of the time they don't score on their possession. Team B scores first 41% of the time. So from the point team B gets the ball from team A in a scoreless game, there is a 41/65.2= 62.9% chance Team B will score first. So the kicking team's offense is slight more effective is scoring (compare to 59% of team A). There could be a lot of reasons for this and it's not a huge statistical difference, but it could be because team B is likely to have better field position.

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Sounds plausible. We still don't know if that first score comes on the 2nd drive or much later in the game. NFL has a lot more parity than college, so whether to kick or defer could be a lot more meaningful to the outcome of the game. I find it most interesting that 70% of the time, NFL coaches go for the ball.

One more datapoint - in 7 of our 12 games in 2010, the second half began with one team leading by at least 3 TDs. I guess you could argue that we would have blown out teams or been blown out regardless of who starts with the ball, but I'd still rather have the ball, particularly against Fresno St. Even if our offense will start off sputtering, let's get it out of the way while it's still a tie game.

Unit2Sucks;556983 said:

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You're presenting these stats in a vacuum and you've left some critical information out. The most important one is that in the NFL 70% of teams elected to receive the ball in 2010. That should tell you all you need to hear about what the best coaches in football think you should do.

Also, he doesn't just say "more often than not scores first" - he says that teams receiving the ball score 34.8% of the time on that first possession and 59% of the time score first in the game. He attributes that to offensive scripting which won't be applicable in the second half.

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You presented these facts: if you take the ball there is a 35% chance you will score on that drive and a 59% chance you will be the first to score.

Mathematically that means that in the 65% of the times you do not score on that opening drive, there is a 63% chance the other team will then be the first to score [U]and[/U] they will also get the ball first to start the second half.

If you take the ball, you had better score. I say defer, unless you are a high powered offense (and suspect defense).

With our defense, with a new QB and offense, with defense usually being ahead of the offense early, we should definitely defer. Plus, if a "home" game, being on defense gives the crowd a chance to get into it from the get go.

defer. I think it would be easier to play defense rather than offense with the first tee jitters. besides our D > our O.

We should defer -

1. Defense is probably the strength of our team.
2. The extra offensive possesion comes in the second half when you know a little more about your opponent and how the game is going.