The two biggest coaching mistakes in Week 7 of the NFL season were made by coaches who have lost two straight after 4-1 starts.
The other mistakes were made by coaches who would love to know what it’s like to still have a winning record after losing two straight.
Maybe if they made better coaching decisions, they’d know.
Falcons going for it on fourth down in overtime
Dan Quinn knows that a touchdown is required to win on only the first possession of overtime, right?
During Sunday’s 33-30 OT loss to the Chargers, he coached like he didn’t know that.
The host Falcons had the ball to start overtime and faced a fourth-and-1 at their own 45-yard line.
And they went for it.
Denzel Perryman stuffed Devonta Freeman for a one-yard loss, and the Chargers pretty much had the game handed to them on a silver platter. They needed just four plays to set up Josh Lambo for the game-winning, 42-yard field goal.
Tevin Coleman gained 64 yards on eight carries, an average of eight yards per carry. But he left the game in the third quarter with a strained hamstring. Freeman averaged 3.9 yards per carry. Theoretically, that would have been enough for the first down. But it’s boneheaded to go for it on fourth down when all your opponent needs is 15 yards to win the game
Teams were 2-for-7 on 4th down in OT last season. Nobody had attempted a 4th-down conversion in the 3 OT games this season prior to Falcons
— ESPN Stats & Info (@ESPNStatsInfo) October 23, 2016
Now the Falcons (4-3) have lost two straight. Considering they lost six in a row last year after a 6-1 start, they need a win to squash any here-we-go-again worries. It’s not the time for Quinn to play fast and loose with conventional wisdom in overtime.
Steelers trying 54-yard field goal in fourth quarter
The Steelers trailed the Patriots 27-16 with nine minutes left in Sunday’s game at Heinz Field.
On fourth-and-3 from the Patriots’ 36, Mike Tomlin called for the field goal unit instead of going for it.
The Patriots had scored touchdowns on their last two possessions. They had countered Steelers field goals with touchdowns all day. Instead of seeing if Le’Veon Bell could somehow get the first down and keep Tom Brady on the sidelines, Tomlin asked Chris Boswell to match the record for the longest field goal made in the stadium.
Boswell’s career long is only 51 yards and he missed a 42-yarder in the first half. He wasn’t even close on the 54-yard attempt.
The Patriots burned three more minutes off the clock on their next possession and the Steelers (4-3) never got closer than the New England 45 the rest of the way, eventually losing by that 27-16 score.
So what was Tomlin thinking?
Mike Tomlin said no debate abt 54yd FG attempt that didn't work. Said Chris Boswell once made a similar kick. When Steelers tried him out
— Aditi Kinkhabwala (@AKinkhabwala) October 23, 2016
No, the 54-yard field goal that stands as the Heinz Field record isn’t the one Boswell made in his tryout. Old Dominion kicker Jarod Brown did it in 2013. It’s a lot easier to kick a 54-yard field goal in a tryout than a real game.
Trailing Tom Brady by 11 points in the fourth quarter, the Steelers needed to go for touchdowns, not field goals they had little chance of making. They tried to put out a fire with a squirt gun.
Browns calling timeout, aiding Bengals’ TD drive
We can always count on Hue Jackson to make a dumb coaching move with the Browns (0-7) off to their worst start since the franchise was revived in 1999.
This one wasn’t his dumbest. So maybe he’s making progress.
Overall, however, the Browns don’t appear to be getting any better. They followed up their two-point loss at Tennessee in Week 6 with a 31-17 defeat at Cincinnati Sunday.
The Browns hung around in the first half, trailing just 14-10 with 1:03 left. The Bengals had the ball at their own 15 and Giovani Bernard gained five yards.
Then the Browns called timeout.
Bad move.
Bernard picked up six more yards and a first down on the next play and the Bengals used their second timeout with 47 seconds left.
The Bengals still had a timeout to use when Andy Dalton was sacked with 12 seconds left. They might not have had that timeout available if the Browns had kept the clock moving and forced them to use a timeout after the first play of the drive.
Two plays after the Bengals used their final timeout, Dalton threw a Hail Mary that A.J. Green came down with in the end zone as time ran out to extend the Bengals’ lead to 21-10 at halftime.
Kevin Hogan, replacing an injured Cody Kessler, scrambled 28 yards for a touchdown on the Browns’ first possession of the second half. It would have given them the lead if they didn’t help kick-start the Bengals’ scoring drive at the end of the previous half.
Then again, they’d have lost the lead less than a minute later anyway because Jeremy Hill ran for a 74-yard touchdown. A Mike Nugent field goal later in the third quarter topped off the game’s scoring.
The Browns are still searching for their first win. They’d have lost Sunday even if Jackson used his timeouts properly, but it was yet another game in which Jackson didn’t help.
Jaguars punting down 17 in fourth quarter
This wasn’t a coaching mistake as much as it was a pitiful coaching move.
The Jaguars trailed the Raiders 26-9 with 9:33 remaining. On fourth-and-6 from their own 40, Gus Bradley called for a punt.
It was four-down territory for the Jaguars (2-4), but along with the red challenge flag in his pocket Bradley should have had a white flag to throw on the field to signal that he was giving up.
Gus Bradley is punting down 17 in the 4th with 9 minutes left. Jim Tomsula would be impressed. What a joke
— John Middlekauff (@JohnMiddlekauff) October 23, 2016
The Raiders did go three-and-out on their next possession and the Jaguars drove 83 yards for a touchdown to pull to within 26-16 with 4:17 left. But the onside kick went out of bounds and the visiting Raiders clinched their 33-16 win with a touchdown.
Titans in shotgun on third-and-1 in second quarter
The exotic smashmouth Titans needed to be more smashmouth and less exotic on third-and-1 from their own 45. They were down 17-6 to the visiting Colts with less than six minutes left in the first half and needed just a yard to keep their drive going.
In that situation, the defense always has to be wary of the quarterback plowing forward for that one yard. But the Titans allowed the Colts to scratch that possibility off the list when Marcus Mariota lined up in the shotgun. Mariota then lobbed an incomplete pass and the Titans had to punt.
The Titans (3-4) lost the game 34-26, their 10th straight loss to the Colts.
The first thing the Titans need to do to get back on track is ditch the buzzwords “exotic smashmouth.” Doesn’t Mike Mularkey know that the word “exotic” has been commandeered by the adult entertainment industry?
The AFC South, meanwhile, is not very entertaining.
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