There were a lot of questionable decisions made by both the Los Angeles Rams and San Francisco 49ers in Sunday’s NFC title game, but none bigger than Kyle Shanahan’s call to punt with about 10 minutes left in the fourth quarter. The 49ers had fourth-and-2 from the Rams’ 45-yard line, but rather than going for it, they tried to draw the defense offsides, which didn’t work.
After taking the 5-yard penalty, Shanahan sent out the punting unit and Mitch Wishnowsky booted it to the Rams’ 15-yard line. At the time, the 49ers were up 17-14, but they never scored another point – and they never even ran another play that gained positive yardage.
Sean McVay was asked if he uses decisions like that by other teams as a learning experience, which he admitted he does. But he wouldn’t have done anything differently than Shanahan. He would’ve punted it away, too.
“There’s no question. You use the other 31 – the teams, the inventory, all the information that you have at your disposal – because they’re still playing the same game,” he said. “These are all applicable situations. If the roles were reversed, I would’ve done the same thing Kyle did. It was a 17-14 game, but they had good momentum. They had been playing well. It was a hard-fought game. Where you’re at in that situation when you’re up three – and it wasn’t like it was a one (yard), this was a long two. We had done a good job defensively and felt like that was what they were going to try to do. I probably would’ve done the same thing if I was in Kyle’s role. But you definitely want to use the other examples as learning opps without a doubt.”
It’s disappointing to hear McVay would’ve taken a similarly conservative approach, especially considering the analytics suggest going for it was the right call. According to Next Gen Stats, the 49ers had a 54% chance to convert on fourth down. If they went for it, their win probability would’ve been 64% compared to 61% by punting it away.
The #49ers decision to take a delay of game (and punt) on 4th-and-2 from the Rams 45 was the suboptimal call according to the NGS Decision Guide:
🔹 Win % if GO: 64% (54% conversion rate)
🔹 Win % if Punt: 61%
🔹 Recommendation: GO FOR IT (by 3.1%) ❌#SFvsLAR | #FTTB— Next Gen Stats (@NextGenStats) January 31, 2022
This also would’ve been a golden opportunity for McVay to take a veiled shot at his buddy Shanahan for playing it safe when it would’ve been better to stay aggressive. McVay is rarely aggressive on fourth-down situations and in the red zone, which makes his quote unsurprising.
That decision to punt may have been the difference in the game for San Francisco.