Remember when Dick Vermeil and Jon Gruden showed some stones this year and went for game winners this year? Turns out they not only did the ballsy thing, they made the statistically correct call.
A study by David Romer at Berkeley found that coaches were too conservative and “choosing to go for a first down or a touchdown would up the odds of winning by 3 percent.”
Romer did some complex math involving 700 NFL games and found that whenever the chance of a touchdown is statistically 18 percent, coaches should go for it. Of course, Vince Young didn’t need some high-falutin guy from Berkeley to tell him this. He knows you gotta scramble for a touchdown.
[MSNBC]: Scientist debunks football strategy
