Tag: fourth down

Dennis Allen explains questionable 4th down decisions vs. Rams

New Orleans went for 0-3 on 4th down against the Rams. Dennis Allen says the aggression was the plan against a high-powered offense:

The New Orleans Saints went for it on fourth down three times against the Los Angeles Rams, twice in the first half. But they failed to convert on any of their three attempts, and the first-half tries are what’s being criticized by fans and analysts alike. It showcased an aggressive nature that has been rare over the last two years. Saints head coach Dennis Allen explained the decision was spurred by the need to score touchdowns, not field goals against the Rams offense.

This was a pregame attitude and was likely further cemented by Los Angeles driving 95 yards for a touchdown on their opening drive. New Orleans went for it on 4th-and-5 on the ensuing possession, but protection broke down and Derek Carr was sacked before he could throw the ball away. The Saints went for it on another 4th-and-5 in Rams territory right before halftime but Carr was pressured again and threw a bad ball too far in front of Juwan Johnson for the tight end to try and secure it. The second attempt in particular stood out. The offense wasn’t rolling at the time which made the decision a bit questionable. Punting may have set the Rams offense up further inside their own territory, but Los Angeles still had all three of their timeouts and they already marched downfield once earlier. Maybe they would have played that situation more conservatively if they’d had to cover 80 or 90 yards instead of 60.

New Orleans needed this victory and approaching it aggressively was logical. Allen also mentioned wanting to avoid being reckless. Granted, no one is talking about this strategy if it works. Calculated aggression is appreciated.  However, the decision right before halftime felt like a miscalculation even at the moment. If Allen wants to get more aggressive, he needs to put more thought into when and where to do it.

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Dennis Allen addresses questionable fourth-down decisions vs. Bears

Dennis Allen addressed some questionable fourth-down decisions from Sunday’s game with the Bears:

There haven’t been a shortage of criticisms for New Orleans Saints head coach Dennis Allen during his stewardship of the team, but one recurring issue has been his decision-making on fourth down. Allen was lambasted for punting deep inside Chicago Bears territory on Sunday, but he also caught flak for going for a conversion instead of what was perceived to be an easy field goal kick.

But it’s tough to see any field goal try as a sure thing when rookie kicker Blake Grupe ranks third in missed kicks (5) through Week 9, from distances of 52, 51, 47, 46, and 29 yards. He isn’t someone the Saints can rely on right now, though Allen gave him a shot at a 55-yard field goal early in the third quarter (with 11:43 remaining). And to his credit, Grupe connected on his new career-long field goal to give the Saints the lead at 17-14.

Later, though, stuck at the Chicago 39-yard line on 4th-and-5 late in the third quarter (with 1:12 remaining), Allen elected to punt instead of trying a 56-yard field goal or a conversion attempt. The Bears took over at their own 9-yard line with the game tied at 17-17. Allen shared his thought process on that decision after the game.

“All those options go through your mind,” Allen said, “But I felt like trying to pin him down. Obviously, that’s a long field goal and the percentages of making those aren’t necessarily great and so, the thought process was, let’s pin them down there in that situation and see if we can create some field position, get the ball back in good field position for the offense.”

When Grupe’s earlier successful field goal try was brought up, Allen responded, “Every minute of the game changes the thought process in terms of what you’re thinking, in terms of your aggressiveness, whether you’re going to go for it, kick the field goal, or try to plot them and pin them deep. Those are your three options and we chose to try to pin him down there.”

Fans have turned on Grupe, but for good reason: Allen had seen him push kicks wide of the uprights from lesser distances before. Outside a long catch-and-go pickup by Kendre Miller, the offense hadn’t shown anything on that drive. With the fourth quarter ahead punting felt like his best path forward. Fortunately the defense forced a quick three-and-out and Rashid Shaheed returned the punt back inside Bears territory.

That brings us to the next fourth down decision in Chicago territory. Facing 4th-and-1 from the Bears’ 17-yard line and protecting a 24-17 lead midway through the fourth quarter (with 7:52 remaining), Allen gave the offense the green light to go for a conversion rather than try a 34-yard field goal to go up two scores. But their execution was off. Derek Carr didn’t reach the line of scrimmage on the quarterback sneak and the offense turned the ball over on downs. It may have been a good opportunity to send Taysom Hill into the game given his greater success as a runner. Grupe has missed shorter kicks before, and at the end of the day the offense should expect to get a yard when they need it.

Still, Allen called Grupe’s number later in the game. He chose to try a field goal from the Chicago 29-yard line on 4th-and-3, still up 24-17 late in the fourth quarter (with 2:30 remaining). But the rookie kicker didn’t reward that confidence by banging a 47 yarder off the left upright. Once again the Saints defense took the field, and once again they came away with a clutch turnover — this time with Demario Davis punching the ball from Tyson Bagent’s grasp where Pete Werner recovered it.

So what can we take away from all of this? Allen isn’t aggressive on fourth down, which we already knew, but the offense isn’t executing its plays well when given an opportunity to go for a gutsy conversion. The field goal unit isn’t reliable enough to settle for easy points, and Grupe isn’t performing well enough to inspire much confidence. This Saints team might have won back-to-back games but they’re still flawed. The good news is that a 5-4 record with the bye week in sight makes it much easier to iron out those wrinkles. For now, time is on their side.

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Football Outsiders says Dennis Allen was one of the least-aggressive coaches in 2022

Football Outsiders research says Dennis Allen was one of the least-aggressive head coaches in 2022. The Saints must improve in this area to survive in 2023:

There’s one easy area to point to as a criticism of Dennis Allen’s first year as New Orleans Saints head coach: a lack of aggression on fourth downs. No offense attempted fewer fourth-down conversions than Allen’s offense last year (11). Whether he trusted his defense too much or didn’t trust his quarterbacks enough, Allen chose to kick the ball away whenever given the opportunity.

But this lack of aggression went under the microscope in an article from Football Outsiders analyst Aaron Schatz, who used FO’s Aggressiveness Index to rank every decision-maker from around the NFL. This tool has been in use since 2006, which Schatz describes as: “The goal was to find a way to rank coaches based on their tendencies on fourth downs in a manner that was easy to understand but accounted for the different rates at which the average coach will choose to ‘go for it’ in different situations.”

And Allen ranked 30th out of last year’s 32 head coaches. Only New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick and New York Jets coach Robert Saleh were less aggressive. Belichick has reversed his tendencies on fourth downs from earlier in his career, when the league was more conservative on average — and no one seems to quite understand what prompted that decision. Saleh was dealing with an even more fraught quarterback situation than the Saints last season, so it makes sense that he didn’t roll the dice in high-leverage situations.

Still, that’s not where you want to see the Saints ranking. Allen had the benefits of a veteran quarterback under center in Andy Dalton and some talented weapons like Alvin Kamara, Chris Olave, and Juwan Johnson at his disposal. Pete Carmichael deserves some blame too for taking Taysom Hill out of the playbook. Hill only had two rushing attempts on fourth down all season while remaining highly effective in short-yardage situations. He averaged 7.9 yards per carry when the offense needed 3 yards or fewer, converting 17 first downs on 26 attempts (65.4%).

Hopefully the Saints can improve in this area. Maybe it means more carries for Hill on fourth down, but that alone isn’t going to fix the problem. Allen needs to act more aggressively and give his team more opportunities to win a game with the ball in their hands than with their backs against the wall.

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Packers’ Matt LaFleur one of most aggressive coaches on fourth downs in 2022

For the third straight season, Packers coach Matt LaFleur ranked as one of the NFL’s most aggressive coaches on fourth down.

The Green Bay Packers offense under Matt LaFleur in 2022 was one of the most aggressive when it came to going for it on fourth downs.

According to Football Outsiders Aggressive Index, LaFleur ranked as the fifth-most aggressive head coach on applicable fourth-down situations last season. How this Aggressive Index works is 1.0 is considered average, and it measures how much more likely, or less likely, a coach is willing to go for it compared to his peers when in a specific situation. This metric also excludes certain obvious go-for-it situations, such as when a team is trailing late in a game, in the final five minutes of a game, or just seconds before halftime.

LaFleur finished with an Aggressive Index of 1.40, meaning he was 40% more likely to go for it on fourth downs compared to an average coach facing the same situations. Out of 85 eligible fourth-down scenarios, LaFleur went for it 19 times, or at a rate of 22.4%, which was the third-highest in 2022. He also went for 11 of the 12 eligible fourth-and-one opportunities, tied for the most in the NFL.

By this metric, Philadelphia’s Nick Sirianni was the most aggressive, registering a 1.57 on the aggressive index scale, followed by Mike McDaniel, Arthur Smith, Kliff Kingsbury, then LaFleur, rounding out the top five.

LaFleur was fifth at 1.46 in 2021, fifth at 2.08 in 2020 and 19th at 1.29 in 2019.

While LaFleur’s propensity to go for it on fourth downs made sense a majority of the time, the Packers were very poor at converting those fourth-down opportunities. Their success rate of 38.7% ranked 28th in the NFL last season, ahead of only New England, New Orleans, Chicago, and Cincinnati.

As always, there is never any one answer behind a team’s successes or struggles, so when it came to Green Bay’s fourth down woes, it was a combination of both play calling and a lack of execution. Not only on fourth downs but in general last season, in those must-have-it situations, including in the red zone, defenses did a good job of taking away the Packers’ run game and forcing them to throw the ball. Even when the passing game was building some momentum in the second half of the season, it simply wasn’t good enough to produce consistent results when leaned upon heavily.

When the offense was at its best, it was due to the success on the ground, and that helped open up the passing game. However, when defenses were able to limit Aaron Jones and AJ Dillon, Green Bay didn’t have a steady passing game to fall back on or, at times, the patience to stick with the run game, and moving the ball became a massive chore.

Although frustrating (and I’m not suggesting it was always the right decision), but when Aaron Rodgers was heaving the ball downfield on third and fourth and short downs last season, it was often related to the look that the defense gave him with more defenders playing closer to the line of scrimmage in an effort to limit the run game, which then created a potential opportunity over the top for Rodgers to exploit. Perhaps on paper that decision-making made sense, but given the issues Green Bay had in the passing game all season long, picking up the two yards needed to keep the drive going would have been the more prudent play.

As a collective group, head coaches have been becoming more aggressive and less willing to punt or settle for field goals in recent years, and LaFleur continues to be one of the leaders in this charge, ranking in the top five of the Aggressive Index during each of the last two seasons.

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The numbers tell you all you need to know about Saints HC Dennis Allen

No one has coached as many games and lost as many of them as Dennis Allen. The numbers tell you all you need to know about who he is, and where his team is going:

Look, at some point you are who your record says you are. And Dennis Allen’s record has little positives to say about him. The New Orleans Saints are 4-9 under his management this season. He’s lost 37 of his 49 games as a head coach in the NFL, making for a career winning percentage of just .245. For context, 17 different coaches have worked 48 to 50 games in the league. Allen ranks second-to-last in winning percentage out of that group, with only Rod Marinelli (.208 in 48 games) finishing below him.

Other numbers don’t help his case. Allen has kicked field goals on more short-yardage situations (fourth down with 1 or 2 yards to go) while tied or leading through just 13 games (5 times) than his predecessor Sean Payton did across three full seasons (3 times). The Saints are tied for the second-fewest fourth down conversion attempts (8) on the year so far. They rank second-highest in field goals and punts inside opposing territory. He’s the least-aggressive coach in the NFL, and New Orleans’ record reflects the consequences of that.

It’s worse because expectations were higher given the situation he walked into. Allen inherited a team that won nine games last year and sent four players to the Pro Bowl, adding another Pro Bowler in Tyrann Mathieu and three rookies drafted in the top 50 picks, and he’s got nothing to show for it. The Saints are 4-9 and as close to mathematical elimination from the playoffs as you can get without making it official.

And so many of their early-season problems remain unresolved. The Saints lead the league in offensive pre-snap penalties with 22 false starts, 4 delay of game fouls, and an infraction for having too many men on the field. They are a sloppy, poorly-coached unit that can’t get out of its own way.

Maybe things change during the bye week. It’s the ideal time to shift responsibilities around within the coaching staff and audition a new play caller on offense (passing game coordinator Ronald Curry is a prime candidate to take the wheel from Pete Carmichael Jr.). But the Saints have drug their feet for 12 months. With their season effectively over, what motivation would they have to take action now? We’ll just have to wait and see how this plays out. Given their inaction so far, we may be waiting for a while before the Saints make a move.

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Packers fail to convert a single third or fourth down during loss to Commanders

The Packers were 0-for-7 on third down or fourth down during Sunday’s loss to the Commanders. Four times, passes were dropped.

The Green Bay Packers’ flailing offense failed to convert a single third or fourth down during Sunday’s 23-21 loss to the Washington Commanders.

The Packers were 0-for-6 on third down and 0-for-1 on fourth down.

According to Rob Demovsky of ESPN, the Packers failed to convert a third down over a full game for the first time since 1999.

The culprit is an easy one to find when scanning the failures: drops. On four of the seven opportunities on third or fourth down, a drop was involved.

– 1st quarter: 3rd-and-4: Aaron Rodgers incomplete to Allen Lazard (drop)
– 1st quarter: 3rd-and-13: Aaron Rodgers complete to Aaron Jones for 7 yards
– 2nd quarter: 3rd-and-25: Aaron Rodgers incomplete to Aaron Jones (drop)
– 2nd quarter: 3rd-and-11: Aaron Rodgers incomplete to Romeo Doubs (drop)
– 3rd quarter: 3rd-and-2: Aaron Rodgers incomplete to Romeo Doubs (drop)
– 4th quarter: 3rd-and-10: Aaron Rodgers complete to Amari Rodgers for 9 yards
– 4th quarter: 4th-and-1: Aaron Rodgers incomplete to Romeo Doubs (drop)

“We had a ton of drops,” coach Matt LaFleur said.

Twice on the offense’s final touchdown drive, the Packers were bailed out on third down (3rd-and-3, 3rd-and-6) with penalties on the defense. On each play, Rodgers threw incomplete.

“We have to coach better, we have to play better, we have to execute better. It’s not good enough,” LaFleur said.

The Packers have lost three straight games to fall to 3-4 after seven games.

“It’s a tough pill to swallow, and we have to better,” LaFleur said.

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Trevor Lawrence loves Doug Pederson’s willingness to go for it on fourth down

Trevor Lawrence is a big fan of Doug Pederson’s willingness to go for it on fourth down.

The Jacksonville Jaguars converted two of three fourth down attempts Sunday, only failing on a low-stakes one in the final 30 seconds of the game.

The gutsiest call was a fourth-and-three situation near the middle of the field on the Jaguars’ first offensive drive against the Indianapolis Colts. Jacksonville converted when Trevor Lawrence hit Zay Jones on a shallow cross for eight yards.

“I love it. I love it,” Lawrence said of Jaguars coach Doug Pederson choosing to go for it often on fourth down. “It’s awesome. I think it just builds confidence in the whole team when he’s willing — we’re on the — what was it today, we’re on the 50 and have a fourth-and-two and early in the game he’s willing to go for it.

“It just shows, one, he trusts our offense; two, he trusts our defense. If for some reason we don’t get it, he trusts our defense to hold up. I think all the way around, that’s the mindset is no, you’re not going to go for every fourth down, but we’re not scared to go for it. We know we’ve got the players to do it, and just being aggressive and instilling that confidence in the whole team.”

In Week 1, the Jaguars went for it on fourth down late in the second quarter, but turned the ball over downs when Travis Etienne dropped a ball near the goal line. It was the team’s only fourth down try in the 28-22 loss to the Washington Commanders.

During Pederson’s tenure with the Philadelphia Eagles, the team earned a reputation for aggressiveness and went for it on a league-leading 35 fourth downs in his last season.

Lions set NFL record for most 4th down conversions and attempts in a season

The Lions broke the record previously held by Bill Parcells and the 1995 New England Patriots

Dan Campbell is not afraid of taking risks. His kneecap-biting mentality as a playcaller just set an NFL record.

When Jared Goff hit Amon-Ra St. Brown for a touchdown in the second quarter of Sunday’s matchup with the Green Bay Packers on 4th-and-goal, the Lions set the NFL record for the most attempts and successful conversions on fourth downs in a season. It was the Lions’ 40th attempt of the season, breaking the record set by the 1995 New England Patriots.

Interestingly, that Patriots team was coached by Bill Parcells, who coached Campbell with the Cowboys during the Lions’ head man’s playing career. Campbell brought up his aggressive nature in a recent press conference.

“When you feel like you have trust in your players or in the play or where the game’s at, I don’t know, it feels right,” Campbell said. “And so, I want to do it. I think you’ve got to feel good about your players and the plan, and if you do, I think you go for it. And I want to send a message that we’re playing to win and we’re not playing to lose and there’s a time to be conservative and there’s a time to be aggressive. And so, it’s just I think a little more in my nature to roll the dice if you will. But I still feel like it’s a calculated risk.”

It was also the 20th successful conversion, another record.

Lions, Dan Campbell now top the metric for best 4th-down decisions

Lions coach Dan Campbell’s aggressiveness on 4th downs is highly favorable to the analytical data

Dan Campbell has taken a lot of heat for his aggressiveness on fourth downs this season. But the analytical metrics strongly favor what Campbell is doing as the Detroit Lions head coach.

In fact, the Lions are now the NFL’s best at deciding when to go for it on fourth downs according to the analytical study from date expert Ben Baldwin. Detroit and Campbell moved to the top with a successful Week 16 slate of decisions.

Note that the data doesn’t track the success rate, just the choice to go for it versus giving the ball away on a punt or kicking a field goal attempt.

The Lions have gone for it on fourth down 36 times, more than any other team. They’ve converted 18, also the most in the league — a figure that includes the successful Jack Fox pass on a fake punt attempt in the Week 16 loss to the Falcons. Campbell’s aggressiveness could challenge the NFL record for most fourth-down offensive attempts with three more in the final two weeks.

Lions vs. Browns: 4 keys to a Lions victory in the Week 11 matchup

The Lions have a chance to notch their first win of the season against the Browns

The Detroit Lions sail down the Lake Erie shoreline to face the Cleveland Browns in a quest to capture The Barge, the commemorative trophy awarded to the winner of the “Battle of the Edmund Fitzgerald.”

The matchup between the 0-8-1 Lions and 5-5 Browns is one where the Lions do have a chance to notch their first victory of the season. It will not be easy and should absolutely not be expected. Cleveland is favored by double-digits and rightly so, even though the Browns are coming off a 45-7 drubbing at the hand of the New England Patriots and feature several key injuries across their roster.

Here are four keys to a Lions victory in the latest installment of the Lake Erie Classic.