Atlanta Falcons coach Mike Smith can take solace in this fact: The last time a coach went for it on fourth-and-inches in this type of situation and failed, his team won the Super Bowl. Then again, Barry Switzer was coaching Troy Aikman, Emmitt Smith, and Michael Irvin, and that edition of the Dallas Cowboys had already established themselves as a power by 1995.
Late that season on a bitterly cold and windy day in Philadelphia, Switzer famously ran Smith one too many times into the breach, coming up short on fourth-and-inches from Dallas’ 29-yard line. Much like Sunday, when the New Orleans Saints won a field goal in overtime after stopping the Falcons, the Eagles prevailed on a game-winning kick.
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In the aftermath, Switzer was viewed as a village idiot who had been hired more for owner Jerry Jones to prove a point – that previous coach Jimmy Johnson wasn’t the mastermind behind the team’s previous two championships &nbasp; than really provide guidance to that stacked squad. Regardless of how you view Switzer, the fact is that the Cowboys didn’t lose again that season is notable.
Atlanta running the table the rest of the way is unlikely, but it’s not completely out of the realm of possibilities. This is a good team in the middle of the playoff hunt. If Atlanta does make the playoffs, Smith’s failed gamble will likely be forgotten.
If not, however …
This is where people who do statistical analysis and study game theory miss the point when coming out in defense of such gambles. Brian Burke, an extremely bright and well-researched former Navy man who runs the website AdvancedNFLStats.com, calculated that Smith increased Atlanta’s chances of winning by 5 percent by choosing to go for it. Burke knows his stuff, having logged information from some 2,700 games played since the start of the 2000 season, and his site is well worth perusing.
Likewise, I enjoy doing my own statistical analysis. The problem is that athletes are not dice. Nor are they decks of cards with a completely definable set of odds. In other words, it’s easy to define a situation where it’s good to play a 4 or 5 of diamonds in Texas Hold ‘em.
The only person you have to answer to in those situations is generally yourself. It’s a lot harder to play those cards when you’re gambling somebody else’s money – and that somebody else is looking over your shoulder.
In the case of Smith, he had his entire team watching as he vacillated between punting and going for it (he initially sent in the punt team and then called it back to send in the offense for the short-yardage play). His indecisiveness was part of the equation.
Again, Burke understands this to an extent. As he noted during an interesting 20-minute discussion, studies by psychologists indicate people are far more unhappy when they lose $20 than when they find that same $20 in their pants pocket a week later after the laundry is done.
As was pointed out, Atlanta twice went for it – and converted – on earlier fourth downs in the same game. However, those situations were not in Atlanta’s territory with the game on the line. In the aftermath of this call, Smith has to manage a team of 53 players, not to mention deal with the front office, the rest of the coaching staff, the fans and, to a certain extent, the owner.
And he has to do that without the championship players Switzer had in 1995, or the personnel and reputation Bill Belichick had in 2009, when he famously went for it on fourth-and-2 against Indianapolis. Sure, Smith did an extraordinary job last season when Atlanta went 13-3 and had the No. 1 seed in the NFC playoffs. Unfortunately, the season ended with an ugly, lopsided home loss to Green Bay in the playoffs.
Hopefully, this all works out for Smith, who is one of the good guys in the coaching ranks. His endless optimism and joy for his job are infectious, the kind of stuff that can carry any group through the toughest of times.
[ Related: Mike Smith takes blame for OT loss ]
However, as Smith once readily admitted during a conversation, NFL players view coaches with decided ambivalence. If players think the coach can help them win, they’ll listen. If they don’t – and that faith is precarious – they tune you out in a hurry.
“No question,” Smith said. “We all know that’s how it works.”
