I doubt it. The bottom line with Blowes is that he's way too conservative and rarely if ever takes a chance. He's also below average at matching up players with a task. He tries to get players to play his scheme without any regard for whether they can play his scheme. A lot of squarepegs in round holes. He routinely gets outcoached. He simply does not know how to make in game adjustments. How many second half leads does this team need to lose before he realizes he's doing something wrong? To summarize Blowes you are watching a HC that is way too conservative and simply not good enough as a HC to begin with. On any planet that is a losing combination......
Maybe the fact that they did a trick play was aggressive but I am actually of the mindset that going for it on 4th down there was not uber-aggressive and the argument could be made that it was actually the conservative call. If you make it you obviously score a touchdown so that's a no lose situation, but if you don't make it your leaving the Patriots on their own 1 yard line and out of business so there is not really any downside. If you kick the field goal now your handing the ball back to Brady with enough time to do damage, cancel out your field goal "almost" for sure and god forbid maybe even score themselves on top of already getting the ball back to start the 2nd half. I'll probably get deservedly roasted for saying this but I'm not so positive coach Bowles wouldn't have gone for the TD there either. Just more likely it would have been a totally vanilla handoff to Powell right up the middle and it would have been pathetically stuffed. I think THAT would have probably been the difference.
These are the same kinds of responses that were given for why analytics in baseball wouldn't work, and every one has been proven wrong, which is why every team now has large analytics groups and hires managers who embrace the analytics. Embracing analytics does not in any way mean that you ignore whether your kicker is any good or the field is muddy or there are less than 20 seconds left in the game and the opposition has no timeouts; in fact it embraces those things as important factors to input into the analytic models. Using analytics means that you don't blindly adhere to "common wisdom" that is demonstrably wrong, even if your "gut" tells you to, but rather you look at what has actually worked and not worked in similar situations in the past. Using analytics does not, in fact, require the law of averages and long seasons to be effective. These sorts of models increase your probability of success on every play, and that increases your probability of winning the game. It might be one play in a game that makes the difference, or it might be 20, but either way making individual decisions that increase your chances of winning can only increase your overall chance of winning. An expected drop in games won in an individual game of .07 (which is hardly noticeable) adds up to an expected one game fewer won over the course of a season, which is obviously potentially incredibly important. The Eagles would not have been even close to as successful as they were this season, both in the regular season and playoffs, without their heavy emphasis on analytics; it drives everything they do at the most fundamental level, as this article discusses: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/02/sports/football/eagles-analytics-super-bowl-lii.html
One part of that really jumped out: "The Eagles capture value at every turn because they understand where the value lies.That understand saturates an organization that not only accepts counterintuitive thinking, but encourages it". We could equally summarize the Jets as the polar opposite. This off season gets more depressing every day.
I'm sorry but I think this is such nonsense, Jim Schwartz must have been using the wrong algorithm when he was a HC because he sucked as one and all the analytics in the world could not help him. It's just a trend, the patriots who don't use it were used as an example of where Bellichick punted, against a team they beat. There are fundamentals principles in all sports that need to be followed and we don't need an engineer to make it more complicated than it really is. When the yanks were a dominant team, they had pitching and more pitching and more pitching, with hitters that hit for average with occasional long ball. The great cowboy teams and Niner teams and steeler teams had the same blueprint, good HC, good oline, FQB and skilled players at RB and WR. Analitics are not needed to figure these things out, they are tried and true methods for building a football team. You put Mcown, Forte, and Bilal Powell on that eagles team this year and I guarantee they are not winning a SB with analytics. Staff, I mean no disrespect to you, I actually agree with a lot of your posts. I'm just commenting on the trend of analytics.
I’m not going to defend the use of analytics, when it’s so obviously beneficial. Every industry is exactly the same - people are convinced that experience and gut feelings trump what number-crunching nerds can do, they are proven wrong, and eventually embrace evidence-based decision making. Everyone said it would never work in baseball, and now it’s everywhere. Everyone said it wouldn’t work in basketball, and now it’s everywhere. Analytics has absolutely nothing to do with making untalented people talented, and using that as an argument against analytics is pointless. There isn’t the slightest doubt that teams will hire more and more analytics guys in the future, and the implications will change the game. It’s inevitable, whether people like it or not. There is absolutely nothing anyone here can say to change my opinion on this, so I’m just going to stop posting about it.
Coaches are generally stuck in their ways and are so tied to a set scheme/philosophy that they rather get fired over it than adapt. The ones that do change their approach, learn from their mistakes and adjust their schemes and improve on their deficiencies are the ones that succeed. Bowles has a lot to fix in a short period of time and I'm praying he does so because I'm tired of watching 5-11 football.
I read your little article. Whoop dee doo. And at the end of your post you said they wouldn't be anywhere near where they ended up, without analytics, is enough for me to know that you couldn't be more wrong. Not trying to be mean, but that's blind ignorance pertaining to what wins and loses football games dude. Analytics may work in the success or failure in a football stadium, but it won't be on the field. It will be in the concession stand or something. Lol You are being silly. I won't argue with you anymore as I see it's pointless.
Nerds and guys in suits will keep crunching numbers, while wishing they could be on the field. They can't be in the game so they do everything they can to try to influence it. The guys on the field win and lose the game. Against the odds or with the odds. That's just the way it is, something's never change....
I'm not being an ass, but since you understand these things, you must try to get a job as Bowles assistant! Lol It kills me that something that seems so fundamental as adapt and survive or adapt and thrive, are looked upon by coaches as looking outside the box. All the great coaches do it. Most if not all of the coaches who follow scripts all game/season, don't last thru their contracts and usually have short coaching careers. Don't they realize that the game is not scripted? (Maybe it is since the NFL isn't a sport, but rather entertainment) As the game changes, why weather the storm waiting for it to get back on your track? It never does, you must change with it or suffer. Bowles obviously can't think on the fly. I guess that's why he says at the end of every game..."We will have to look at the tape." He doesn't realize when things go wrong, and can't adapt to the constant change. I'm almost certain we don't have a future HOF coach on our roster. Until we do, we ain't never gonna have nice things like, consecutive winning seasons, playoff contention every year, a Dynasty, a FQB, a Killer Defense, nothing! Head coaches mean so so so much in every sport. We are doomed until we have one, I'm sorry to say.
