Cheese Curds - 2020 - News Around The League

[go pak go]

I don't know if I like the 4th and 15 thing. I like they are limiting the amount of tries in a game.

But what happens if the defense is called for illegal contact or hold? Is that just an automatic first down at the 30 for the offense then?

[NCF]

I don't know if I like the 4th and 15 thing. I like they are limiting the amount of tries in a game.

But what happens if the defense is called for illegal contact or hold? Is that just an automatic first down at the 30 for the offense then?

That's an interesting question. Normally a penalty by the receiving team would result in a re-try, but this is obviously a pretty different situation.

[Pckfn23]

I don't know if I like the 4th and 15 thing. I like they are limiting the amount of tries in a game.

But what happens if the defense is called for illegal contact or hold? Is that just an automatic first down at the 30 for the offense then?

That's an interesting question. Normally a penalty by the receiving team would result in a re-try, but this is obviously a pretty different situation.

I like retry.

[go pak go]

I think this is helpful.

https://operations.nfl.com/stats-centra ... ternative/

Kicking teams historically recovered onside kicks between 15% and 20% of the time in a given season. In 2018, in part to changes on the kickoff play, that number dropped below 10%.

Here are graphs of converting 3rd and 4th downs by distance. I tried to put a black pen mark so we can extend the line for better viewing analysis.

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image.png (57.98 KiB) Viewed 608 times

[BF004]

I actually just typed a long response and lost it

Long story short, I said I like the the 4th down try, but remove automatic first penalties for that first series.

Then went on to say they could do away with all automatic first down penalties.

[BF004]

Third and 15 is not the same as 4th and 15.


No one is gunna run a draw for 3 yards on 4th and 15.

[go pak go]

Third and 15 is not the same as 4th and 15.


No one is gunna run a draw for 3 yards on 4th and 15.

I'm so sorry I couldn't provide better data for you. I think it would be nearly impossible to do a success rate of 4th and 15 plus because of just how little it happens.

I would venture to guess though you are right that 4th and 15 would be a higher success rate since teams know they must go for it. Which is why I am not sure how much I like this. Comebacks are fun. But ridiculous comebacks are not fun if they happen all the time and I fear this may open the door to more ridiculous comebacks.

I mean honestly a hot quarterback defeating an exhausted defense going into the 4th quarter down 21 to 24 points could tie a game up without the opposing quarterback ever even touching the ball.

[Drj820]

4th and 15 is just one nice completion to a nice WR. Seems way easier than converting the onside even before the rule changes. I would try to make it about as successful as that was, I would look at maybe a 4th and 25. 15 seems too doable in today’s passing league.

[lupedafiasco]

Third and 15 is not the same as 4th and 15.


No one is gunna run a draw for 3 yards on 4th and 15.

I'm so sorry I couldn't provide better data for you. I think it would be nearly impossible to do a success rate of 4th and 15 plus because of just how little it happens.

I would venture to guess though you are right that 4th and 15 would be a higher success rate since teams know they must go for it. Which is why I am not sure how much I like this. Comebacks are fun. But ridiculous comebacks are not fun if they happen all the time and I fear this may open the door to more ridiculous comebacks.

I mean honestly a hot quarterback defeating an exhausted defense going into the 4th quarter down 21 to 24 points could tie a game up without the opposing quarterback ever even touching the ball.

This was the first thing I thought. I think it’s a horrible rule change. Revert all the kicking &%$@ back the way it was.

[BF004]

Third and 15 is not the same as 4th and 15.


No one is gunna run a draw for 3 yards on 4th and 15.

I'm so sorry I couldn't provide better data for you. I think it would be nearly impossible to do a success rate of 4th and 15 plus because of just how little it happens.

Wasn't so much directing that at you for incomplete data, just adding in a comment.

However I can get the 4th and 15 play data for you. Will need a few free minutes today and I can get on it.

[Scott4Pack]

I'm just curious about doing the 4th and 15 from the 25. Why did they pick the 25? Why not the same yard line as where we would kick from?

I suppose it's just as good there as anyplace else. But I'd like to be in the room when they were discussing their reasoning anyhow.

I'd imagine if a team fails on that "onside play" that it won't matter, 9 times out of 10, where the ball is spotted, because the game will effectively be over.

And then when teams do succeed, they're probably on around the 45 yard line. They aren't in figgy range yet, but they might be one or two more plays away from it.

[BF004]

I'm just curious about doing the 4th and 15 from the 25. Why did they pick the 25? Why not the same yard line as where we would kick from?

I suppose it's just as good there as anyplace else. But I'd like to be in the room when they were discussing their reasoning anyhow.

I'd imagine if a team fails on that "onside play" that it won't matter, 9 times out of 10, where the ball is spotted, because the game will effectively be over.

And then when teams do succeed, they're probably on around the 45 yard line. They aren't in figgy range yet, but they might be one or two more plays away from it.

Because the line you need to cross an onside kick is the 40, so the yard line you need to get to get a first down is the 40.

[YoHoChecko]

image.png (1.57 MiB) Viewed 547 times

[BF004]

I don't get it. The NFL's explanation for wanting their version of OT is to keep special teams relevant and not use the college football system. A system that cuts out a stupid special teams play and gives the offenses and defenses a chance to decide the game. Everyone knows how much better college football is, more fair, more exciting, cuts out the stupid special teams plays. Everyone wants the NFL to use the college football version.

But now the NFL is actually taking this and beating college football to the punch. Getting rid of a really stupid special teams play and putting the ball back in the hands of the O and the D and letting the highest paid, most watchable, most exciting players in the league decide the outcome. And people don't like it.


Don't be averse to change just because it is change.

[YoHoChecko]

I just don't think it should be made any easier to come back from a 2-score deficit in the final 2 minutes. And I think that as long as kickoffs follow scores, that should be the method used to attempt such a comeback.

If you replace the kickoff with 4th and 15 in ALL cases, and the normal response is to punt, but occasionally you go for it, then maybe that's a thing. But punting from the 25 would be terrible for field position.

I just don't think it makes any sense. And I don't think it has anything to do with overtime, but I also hate the college OT system and think "everyone knows" it's better is a vast misrepresentation of public opinion. I never want to see an hour-long OT period with 4 OTs and more points scored in OT than the actual game come to the NFL.

[BF004]

Third and 15 is not the same as 4th and 15.


No one is gunna run a draw for 3 yards on 4th and 15.

I'm so sorry I couldn't provide better data for you. I think it would be nearly impossible to do a success rate of 4th and 15 plus because of just how little it happens.

Wasn't so much directing that at you for incomplete data, just adding in a comment.

However I can get the 4th and 15 play data for you. Will need a few free minutes today and I can get on it.

I think the onside kick success rate that should be mimmicked is the 2016-2017 success rate before the rule change about not being able to line up behind the 30. Which is 19.3% or roughly ~20%.

image.png (97.86 KiB) Viewed 530 times

Here is the data pull for all 4th downs from the 2017, 2018 and 2019 seasons. There was only 19 instances of 4th and 15 during that time, which resulted in 14 fails and 5 successes.

Code: Select all

Yards	First	Count
1	NO	309
1	YES	284
2	NO	102
2	YES	93
3	NO	73
3	YES	59
4	NO	84
4	YES	49
5	NO	54
5	YES	33
6	NO	51
6	YES	34
7	NO	42
7	YES	29
8	NO	23
8	YES	13
9	NO	21
9	YES	4
10	NO	65
10	YES	25
11	NO	16
11	YES	7
12	NO	14
12	YES	5
13	NO	11
13	YES	5
14	NO	19
14	YES	3
15	NO	14
15	YES	5
16	NO	6
16	YES	1
17	NO	4
18	NO	5
18	YES	3
19	NO	5
19	YES	1
20	NO	5
21	NO	2
21	YES	1
22	NO	6
22	YES	1
23	NO	3
24	NO	1
25	NO	1
26	NO	1
28	NO	1
29	NO	1
30	NO	1

Since that number is too low, I decided to fit a curve to the data instead of picking just the 15 yards. I could probably pick something a bit more accurate than a simple logarithmic regression curve, but it should get you close enough in the middle of the data.

4th and 15 should have roughly about a 17.3% chance for success. Solving exactly for a 19.3% chance, it should be 4th and 13.3 yards to go.

image.png (18.2 KiB) Viewed 530 times

Could probably find a way to slightly improve this, take away hail mary's as the game clock expires before half or game etc. etc. etc., but didn't think of any other factors relevant enough that might move the needle significantly.


For anyone want to play along at home:

Code: Select all

library(dplyr)

pbp2019 <- read.csv("https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ryurko/nflscrapR-data/master/play_by_play_data/regular_season/reg_pbp_2019.csv")
pbp2018 <- read.csv("https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ryurko/nflscrapR-data/master/play_by_play_data/regular_season/reg_pbp_2018.csv")
pbp2017 <- read.csv("https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ryurko/nflscrapR-data/master/play_by_play_data/regular_season/reg_pbp_2017.csv")


df <- rbind(pbp2017, pbp2018, pbp2019) %>%
  filter(down == 4,
         play_type == "pass" | play_type == "run") %>%
  select(ydstogo, yards_gained) %>% 
  mutate("First" = ifelse(yards_gained > ydstogo, "YES", "NO")) 

df2 <- df %>%
  group_by(ydstogo) %>%
  count(First)

#Took the df2 table (which was posted above, to Excel)

If anyone wants to run their own stuff and love doing everything in Excel, let me know and I can help get you set up in R to do data pulls and some simple filtering to get the data small enough, if necessary, and help you get it into Excel. Would love if a few more people would get on this so we can bounce some idea back and forth and have more reasons to use this data.

[YoHoChecko]

Great data, BF.

I'm wondering why you picked just the two years before the rule change rather than, say, 5 years or so. I think increasing success of onside kicks was a problem the league wanted to push back against, not something to necessarily emulate.

I'd greatly prefer 10-15% success rate. 4th & 20 seems good to me if we're going to do this. Still not my cup of tea.

[BF004]

Great data, BF.

I'm wondering why you picked just the two years before the rule change rather than, say, 5 years or so. I think increasing success of onside kicks was a problem the league wanted to push back against, not something to necessarily emulate.

I'd greatly prefer 10-15% success rate. 4th & 20 seems good to me if we're going to do this. Still not my cup of tea.

It's a table I already made a while ago, so the decision was made back then. Since there was only two years since the rule change, I thought it was fair to use the two years before.

[go pak go]

Third and 15 is not the same as 4th and 15.


No one is gunna run a draw for 3 yards on 4th and 15.

I'm so sorry I couldn't provide better data for you. I think it would be nearly impossible to do a success rate of 4th and 15 plus because of just how little it happens.

Wasn't so much directing that at you for incomplete data, just adding in a comment.

However I can get the 4th and 15 play data for you. Will need a few free minutes today and I can get on it.

Oops. I meant to put an emoji after that comment. Boy that makes it sound so much different without one huh?

[go pak go]

I haven't used R since econometrics in college. I have completely forgotten how to use it. I also don't use statistics and reliance of its methods and definitions like I did in college when helped tutor stats and run a stats lab so I am behind others in this area. It's already been 7 to 8 years since I have done this work.

CPA and CMA (accounting work) uses statistics but not to the level of say economic research and modeling.

Where do you get your actual raw data from BF?