Philip Rivers, in his FIFTEENTH YEAR as an NFL QB, set the bar to a new low Sunday for situational football. First, he celebrated a short pass completion as if it had won the game. It had not, it was just an almost meaningless first down. Then, coming out of the 2 minute warning (essentially a free timeout to discuss SITUATIONAL FOOTBALL), with a 2 point lead, and a 3rd down, and his opponent out of timeouts, Rivers THREW A SCREEN PASS INTO THE DIRT to give his opponent an extra 40 seconds. OF COURSE his opponent used those 40 seconds to beat Rivers’ team as time expired.
Does it matter Von Miller had read and intercepted a screen pass to the right side earlier in the game, and the best Rivers and Lynn could come up with the game on the line was a screen pass to the right side which Von Miller read?! Actually, no it doesn’t because all Rivers had to do was fall down to keep the clock running.
With 1:10 or so, the Broncos would have been desperate, and since their QB is Case Keenum, the Chargers would have had a great chance to win. And that’s if the run play hadn’t converted, which is surely could have as it was 3rd and 7, which is not impossible. The Chargers had gotten a 24 yard completion to Gates moments earlier on the same drive. Plenty of run plays have gotten more than 7 yards, even against defenses expecting run (see Patriots v Jaguars Lead Outside Zone that sealed the AFC title game against a defense which expected that call).
But the Chargers QB was Philip Rivers, and so the Broncos got the ball with plenty of time, moved down the field with short passes (including a check down), and even overcame an offensive pass interference penalty.
Today, all sorts of podcasters are whining about how Blake Bortles is holding back the Jaguars when the truth is Tom Coughlin’s decision to overpay Bortles coupled with Doug Marrone’s moronic playcalling are the things killing the Jaguars. Bortles is terrible but he can throw enough to win against loaded boxes (see the Iso Pop Pass v Steelers in last year’s playoffs and his passes in the win versus the Patriots earlier this year) when the play design helps him. But Marrone shows a lack of faith in big moments (last year’s AFC title game, yesterday) and runs uncreative run plays which barely have a chance. These podcasters (Kevin Clark the worst I’ve heard so far) pretend that passing is smarter than smartly running out the clock. Even when we have examples like Philip Rivers, these podcasters say “hey! rules favor offense, rules favor passing, you should never run!” while a smart coach understands it’s never just “run or pass”. There’s play action, bootlegs, RPOs, screens run to the side Von Miller isn’t aligned to, etc. It’s about the decision, the play call, the play design, the execution. It’s never just running or throwing (Rivers mistake was, seeing the screen play blown up, not knowing in the moment to take a sack), but a 100% chance to keep the clock running is often a better decision than a 75% (or whatever percentage you want to attach to “safe” passes) chance to keep the clock running.
In his podcast, Clark repeatedly says “what are we doing?!” rhetorically, as if he’s doing anything other than misleading the listener on situational football. I’ve watched a lot of football, and I’ve seen ONE TEAM successfully run the clock out passing, and it was the Patriots, who have definitely the best coach and probably the best QB of all time and STILL USUALLY RUN THE CLOCK OUT BY RUNNING THE BALL, but understand situational football is almost always unique and should be treated as such.
Doug Marrone failing while running instead of passing doesn’t mean you should pass, and Philip Rivers failing while passing instead of running doesn’t mean passing is always stupid. It’s always about the context of the situation. But with the worst situational coach of all time, Andy Reid, getting unanimous praise for his offense, it will probably just get worse. We’ll look back fondly on the days of Reid blowing a Super Bowl by not understanding there was a clock in the game by saying, “At least it wasn’t as bad as Dan Quinn and Kyle Shanahan blowing a 25 point lead to the same fucking team.” Because that’s the world we’re living in, where garbage coaching is rewarded with millions of dollars and the people podcasting about it lie about what really wins and loses games.
Note: Sometimes it never comes down to situational football, and for an example of that, see the Saints v Eagles game from yesterday, which was just a whooping. It wasn’t because Payton called lots of pass plays or called lots of run plays, he did both with ease. It was just a whooping, because one team spent all offseason talking bout how much fun they have, and how they’d rather win one title while having fun than win five titles by, I don’t know, working real hard? Games like that are harder to learn from, but they’re a brief respite in this world of shit because they can’t be misunderstood. One team is good, the other team is bad, and the scoreboard proves it.
Whiskey Over Milk 