REGRETABLE: Dan Campbell has chosen to…
The San Francisco 49ers pulled off a remarkable comeback in the NFC Championship Game on Sunday night, defeating the Detroit Lions by 17 points to secure their trip to Las Vegas for Super Bowl 58 and a rematch with the Kansas City Chiefs.
Of course, Brock Purdy and the 49ers deserve a great deal of credit for pulling off a season-saving victory, but anyone who watched the game knows the Lions left the door ajar for a similar comeback.
If you were on social media at all on Sunday, you undoubtedly saw some arguments concerning Lions coach Dan Campbell’s decisions on fourth downs. Although the Lions lead the league in fourth-down attempts this season, Campbell is well-known for being aggressive when playing on fourth downs. However, I believe there is need to investigate his true level of aggression. While two of his choices on Sunday night were the talk of the town, I believe that three additional choices—two of which seemed to be more significant mistakes in judgment than the other—aren’t receiving the attention they deserve.
But first, let’s briefly go over the two plays that are being scrutinized the most: first, at 7:03 in the third quarter, with the Lions ahead 24-10, he decided to go for it on fourth-and-2 at the 49ers’ 28-yard line. With 7:32 remaining in the fourth quarter and the Lions down 27–24, the second was a fourth-and–three at the 49ers’ 30-yard line. On downs, both plays ended in turnovers.
Was going all in in both cases the appropriate decision? It’s undeniable that Campbell thought he was positioning his side for victory, but can we really measure how right or wrong he was? Yes, of course. Sort of, anyway.
While certain fourth-down decision statistical models have been developed for public use in recent years, teams undoubtedly have their own internal methods for making decisions during games. In essence, the models forecast a team’s victory probability based on whether it chooses to punt or kick on fourth down. To increase a team’s chances of winning the game, the option with the highest probability is considered the best one.
I’m going to use the rbsdm.com model for this exercise to see if Campbell provided the Lions a greater chance to win.
The Lions were predicted to increase their win probability by 2.2 and 2.0 percent, respectively, if they took a risk in those two closely watched scenarios, according to rbsdm. Regretfully, the 49ers took over on downs as a result of a poor pass to Josh Reynolds by Jared Goff in the third quarter and a difficult throw on the run in the fourth quarter.
Thus, the computer undoubtedly believed that Campbell had made the appropriate choices under such circumstances. The results just weren’t in his favor.
But you do recall that I said there were three additional plays that I felt deserved greater consideration? Though they received less media attention, two of the plays did in fact earn points. One was the choice, with 56 seconds left in the fourth quarter and down by 10, to go for it on fourth-and-goal from the 49ers’ 3-yard line. Finally, Goff scored a touchdown pass to Jameson Williams, allowing the Lions to trim the 49ers’ lead to three points. The Lions’ choice to go for it instead than kick a field goal increased their chances of winning by 1.7 percent. Even though it doesn’t seem like much, the two highly analyzed decisions from earlier in the game and this one fell into a similar victory probability area.
It’s clear to argue that Campbell made the appropriate choices for his squad because his team produced three good expected outcomes from his three fourth-down options. I’m sure that the head coach of the Lions wouldn’t be receiving as much flak if one of the first two plays had been converted.
But I believe there are two choices that should be questioned. The first occurred when, with seven seconds remaining in the second quarter and the Lions ahead 21-7, the decision was made to attempt a field goal on fourth and 3 from the 49ers’ 3-yard line. Although Campbell said he was on the verge of going all in, he finally opted to make the game a three-score affair instead of a two-score contest. Sadly for Campbell, the Lions’ win probability dropped by 4.4 percent as a result of this choice. To put things in perspective, Campbell’s choice to punt up 24–23 against the Los Angeles Rams in the fourth quarter of the wild-card round was the second-worst fourth-down decision of the playoffs this year.
The play that preceded Williams’ touchdown in the latter part of the fourth quarter, a David Montgomery third-and-goal run with 1:05 remaining in the game, was Campbell’s other miss. Both Campbell and offensive coordinator Ben Johnson will likely have to make this choice. Whichever one is more at fault, it was a grave error.
Earlier in the game, the Lions had had some success surprising the 49ers with runs in passing situations; but, now was not the time to take a chance on using up a timeout. And that’s precisely what took place. After sacking Montgomery for a 2-yard loss, Detroit was forced to use one of its three timeouts. Detroit might have been able to regain possession after forcing the 49ers to punt on the following play if they had retained all three.
The choice cost the Lions 4.7 percent of their chance to win, according to rbsdm.com. It might not have mattered in the end—the Lions had a mere 9% chance of winning the game before the third down, after all—but you can’t give up more than half of your win probability on a single play. Although Campbell may not be sorry about the other choices he made on Sunday night, I have no doubt that he regrets rushing the ball there.
Therefore, even while I believe Campbell should be held accountable for his judgments during the NFC Championship Game, I believe the criticism should be directed at his choices to run the ball when maximizing time on the clock was crucial and to accept the points before the half.
Through my research, I became interested in finding out which coaches made the best decisions on fourth down, best plays to make, and worst kicks throughout the 2023–24 playoffs to put their teams in the best possible position to win. It’s what I discovered:
Leave a Reply