It was 2nd and goal from the 1 with 26 seconds at the snap. SEA had 1 timeout. If SEA runs the ball on 2nd down and fails to score, that means they must call their final timeout to save time for 3rd and 4th down. And that means they must pass on 3rd down for there to be time for a 4th down.
Passing on 2nd down allows SEA the option of running on 3rd down if necessary, and forces the NE defense to respect both options on all potential remaining downs.
Lynch is a beast, no doubt. He was born for that moment. And he would make a great decoy on 2nd down. It was simply an excellent play by NE’s Malcolm Butler, and it was the one outcome that could backfire on SEA’s decision to pass.
The play call itself, I can't account for that. Perhaps it was a go-to play that they felt confident about.
Addendum:
WOPR sim disagrees with its creator. Says SEA should have run. Risk of sack, turnover, & pen outweighs risk of not having time for 4th down.
— Brian Burke (@Adv_NFL_Stats) February 2, 2015
Brian Burke is back for the final AFA podcast of the 2014-15 NFL season. Brian and Dave discuss the Patriots deflated ball controversy with a quick recap of high school physics before analyzing the key analytical storylines of Super Bowl XLIX. They look at the potential role of football analytics in television broadcasts, break down the key matchups on both sides of the ball, beg listeners to go read some other website and not crash the AFA server, and finish up the show by predicting which team will be crowned the 2015 Super Bowl champion.
Subscribe on iTunes, on Stitcher or via RSS. Don't…
For whatever reason, the Patriots do have exceptional ball security, especially for an outdoors team. And I mean exceptional.
I was intrigued by a link sent to me via Twitter at Sharp Football Analysis, a handicapping site. The article demonstrated that NE's ball security was an outlier to the tune of several standard deviations. The charts are convincing, and the implication is that NE benefitted from under-inflated balls is unmistakable. But I wasn't sure how much stock to put in the numbers for a couple reasons. One is that they were so extraordinary they seemed unlikely to be true. And…
Search here for over 1,500 research and analysis articles at AFA and the AFA Archives.
Brian Burke is back for the final AFA podcast of the 2014-15 NFL season. Brian and Dave discuss the Patriots deflated ball controversy with a quick recap of high school physics before analyzing the key analytical storylines of Super Bowl XLIX.