The Massive Flaws In Todd Bowles’ Reasoning
Credit: Lon Horwedel-Imagn Images
On this, the day of yet another Presidential Election that somehow promises to be stupider than the last, what could be more fitting to say in reaction to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers overtime loss than: It’s Time For Some Game Theory?
Imagine you’re Todd Bowles. Baker Mayfield just drove 71 yards in less than two minutes to put your Bucs within one point of the Kansas City Chiefs. There are 27 seconds left, and you have a choice to make, do you:
A) Go for the two-point conversion and seek to force the Chiefs into performing a miracle to win, or…
B) Settle for the PAT and take your chances in overtime
We know what Bowles chose, and the result. The Bucs lost and are now 4-5, firmly outside the playoff bubble, and sit at just a 37% chance of making the playoffs. We also know why the coach declined to try taking the lead, which was two yards and 27 away.
“We wanted to get it to overtime,” Bowles told reporters after the game. “With the wet conditions on the field, we feel like we had to go into overtime instead of go for two.”
It’s important to try being fair to Bowles, but in this case, it’s hard to buy into his explanation when you spend any time thinking deeper into it.
That’s true even though, mathematically, it’s justifiable to go for the kick instead of trying to punch it in from the two-yard line. Benjamin Morris’ 2017 article at FiveThirtyEight doesn’t recommend going for the two-point conversion when down by one point in the final minute of the game, regardless of how good your offense is. Like Bowles, the numbers said to take your chances in overtime.
OK, point taken, but counterpoint: Patrick Mahomes was still at Texas Tech when this article was written. He was on the sideline opposite Bowles last night. Throw your numbers out.
Or at least, take a look at these numbers. As WIVB’s Nick Veronica pointed out last night, Mahomes was undefeated in overtime heading into last night. Here’s how those games broke down:
2018, Week 14 vs. Baltimore: Won toss, scored FG on first drive
2020, Week 2 @ LA Chargers: Lost toss, scored FG on first drive
2021, Week 15 @ LA Chargers: Won toss, scored TD on first drive
2022, Week 9 vs. Tennessee: Won toss, scored FG on first drive
2022, Week 15 @ Houston: Won toss, scored TD on second drive
So, not only were the Chiefs 5-0 under Mahomes in overtime, they also went 4-for-5 in scoring on their first time and 4-for-5 in winning the coin toss. It’s a track record that mirrors Jesse Pinkman’s warning to the DEA in the final season of Breaking Bad. “He’s smarter than you,” Pinkman says of Walter White before adding an even more important truth. “He’s luckier than you.”
That’s the kind of quarterback you’re potentially handing the ball to in overtime, not Daniel Jones. But if there was a Pinkman on the sideline warning Bowles about the two-time MVP and three-time Champ, he went unheeded. Mahomes proceeded to get lucky on the coin toss, and wore down the Bucs’ defense on a 15-play drive. In the same wet conditions in which Bowles didn’t trust Tampa’s offense to get two do-or-die yards.
By the time overtime rolled around, the defense had already done its job. They were on the field for 33 minutes and 68 plays, holding the most dangerous quarterback in football to 24 points and 4.6 yards per snap. What was the more reasonable ask: for the offense to get two more yards in one play, or for the defense to get one more stop while theoretically giving Mahomes tons of time to dink-and-dunk down the field in overtime?
Bowles read the terrain of the field, but didn’t read the moment. Generously, you can argue the Bucs had a 50% chance of getting the ball first for an opportunity to drive down the field, but that is putting your destiny into a coin flip. Just look at Mayfield’s face after he lost the toss. That’s the face of someone who knows the Football Gods won’t save him.
Baker Mayfield’s reaction when the Chiefs won the coin toss 🤣🤣🤣 pic.twitter.com/VPtUFnshMf
— Farzin Vousoughian (@Farzin21) November 5, 2024
Maybe it wouldn’t have worked out to go for two. Heck, the Bucs might even have scored two, only to see Mahomes pull another rabbit out of his hat and lead a field goal drive in 27 seconds. In any scenario that resulted in a loss for Tampa, Bowles would have been second-guessed, and that’s important to note. But any football fan can point to times when playing-not-to-lose came around to bite the teams making the “safe” decision. It happened again, and now we’re left to wonder what could have happened if Bowles had a better sense of the game theory of that moment.
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