Was Andy Reid’s 4th Down Decision “Gutsy” or “Reckless”?

This is a classic case of judging a decision by its outcome if there ever was one. And in this case, I’m going to argue that it was the polar opposite of the famous decision that Pete Carroll made late in the 2014 Super Bowl where he was criticized by most for not running Marshawn Lynch and instead calling for a pass that was intercepted. This has been written about extensively and shown to have been a really good decision that just happened to have resulted in a bad outcome. For those interested, I’d recommend reading the first chapter of “Thinking in Bets” by Annie Duke for a very detailed explanation.

Pete Carroll made a good decision and had a bad outcome. Andy Reid yesterday made a terrible decision but it worked out so nobody is going to criticize it. Except me! :-)

So let’s look at the situation from yesterday. Up 22-17, the Chiefs have 4th and 1 from their own 49 where they have to snap the ball with 1:11 remaining (why they chose to snap the ball with 1:16 remaining is puzzling and also not something I’ve seen addressed postgame). If they convert, the game is over. If they fail, the Browns take over at midfield with a chance to drive to win the game.

Everyone expected that the Chiefs were simply going to lineup to try to draw the Browns offsides, take a timeout if they failed to do so, and punt the ball. To the shock of everyone, they snapped the ball, and Henne rolled out and hit Hill for a 5 yard gain. Game over. Reid is being hailed as a genius. Tony Romo can’t stop gushing about what a great call it was. “Only Andy Reid”. Search online this morning and you’ll see piece after piece refer to it as a “gutsy call”.

Now of course, if it fails, the same exact people would be writing about what a terrible decision it was! How it was “reckless” and “unnecessary”. How the obvious decision there was to punt the ball. This is a mistake that 99%+ of humans make. We judge our decisions and the decisions of others by their outcomes instead of whether the decision that was made was proper given all of the potential outcomes that could have occurred. Life is a probabilistic endeavor and while only one path ends up occurring, an infinite number of things could have occurred.

So with that as a backdrop, was Andy Reid’s decision a good one or not? I would argue that it most certainly was not! In fact, it was a particularly AWFUL decision! It isn’t even close.

If they punt from their own 49, the average starting position for the Browns would be their own 10 yard line. They would have to go 90 yards with a minute to go (a punt takes somewhere between 8 and 13 seconds) and no timeouts. I’m going to assign a 5% probability to scoring there although I think that’s likely a bit high. It won’t change the math all that much.

If KC fails on that 4th and 1, Cleveland has the ball at midfield with 1:05-1:07 remaining. Even with no timeouts, a reasonable chance to score a TD. Let’s assign a 35% chance to them scoring (again the precise number won’t change the math I’m about to do materially)

Obviously if KC converts (as they did), the game is over. So what would the probability of converting the play had to have been to have made Reid indifferent between going for it and punting?

Punting gives you a 95% of winning and going for it gives you either an 100% chance or a 65% chance. So we need to solve for: .95 = x + .65(1-x). When we do the math, it turns out that it’s 85.7%.

So does a backup QB have over an 85% chance of converting fourth and 1 under that pressure??? Said another way, does Henne convert over 17 of 20 times in that situation? I’d argue that even Mahomes does not!

The clear correct decision there is to punt and it’s not even close. Andy Reid is a great coach but he gets an “F” for that decision.

He probably did have something like a 70% chance of succeeding so it’s not a surprise that it worked. But he needlessly lowered his team’s probability of winning. Assuming it was 70% to make it - punting would have been 95% to win. Going for it decreased the Chiefs odds of winning to 89.5% or said another way, more than doubled their chances of losing.

Just a horrible decision. Not gutsy in the least. More like “really really stupid”. An unforced error. But in the world we live in where we judge decisions based on outcomes, there is no headline this morning reading “Andy Reid makes obscenely bad decision late in game but it doesn’t cost team”. And that’s the truth.