The Kansas City Chiefs and Los Angeles Chargers squared off Thursday night in a game that could determine the fate of the AFC West. The Chargers played like a team without a division championship since 2009; they ran each drive into Kansas City territory as deep as they could, knowing full well the offensive firepower on the other sideline.
For head coach Brandon Staley, that meant going for it on fourth and short in Chiefs territory five different times. It also meant two goal-to-go drives that ended with zero points and another that ventured inside the enemy 30-yard line without even a field goal attempt. From a pessimistic standpoint, LA left nine points on the field in a game Kansas City stormed back into to win in overtime.
But from an analytics standpoint, every one of the six fourth down calls was the correct one — even the four that didn’t work. And they only got more impactful as the game went on. Let’s take a deeper look at each one.