But if you look at the drive chart, the Pats’ defense seemed to have tired and the Colts were moving the ball relatively easily. They had 3 easy touchdown drives on the 3 of their prior 4 possesions. All probabilities aside, I think this is the reason that Belichick went for it on 4th down to begin with. With that in mind, why not just let them score and put the ball in Brady’s hands to win the game?
That’s definitely why he went for it on 4th down - but I think you can motivate a defense for one final stand, knowing you don’t need to save any energy for the next quarter. The Colts have a terrible record against Belichick’s Patriots in the red zone.
The short answer is because a coach never ever wants to tell his defense that he has no confidence in them. He would be saying, in effect, “they’re going to score anyway, so we might as well get the ball back with time on the clock.”
Oddly, I think his decision to go for it on 4th down shows the same lack of confidence.
This is why I felt that the OP was tongue-in-cheek. His strategy amounts to a coach saying 'to hell with my defense. Just get ‘em off the field as quickly as possible and get me the ball so my offense can make back the TDs they give up. My real job is to manage the game so that we get the ball last.’ It’s unworkable.
Belichick giving Brady the ball for the 4th down was an insult to his defense, but it was probably the best call to win the game. Whether it was the best call for team morale, or at least for defense morale, I don’t know. But to tell them ‘you’re so god awful I literally want you to get out of the way and let them score’ is just unworkable. It’s much worse than a slap in the face. And is it even… I don’t know…allowed?
It will certainly be taken as an insult by the defense, and part of Belichick’s job is to keep up team morale. Bruschi wrote an article saying that that it was a slap in the face, and he’s probably a fair example of how other defensive players would react.
The problem with this is that it’s based on the idea that punting is normal & correct in that situation. Really what’s been happening is that coaches have been insulting their offenses for years by punting in such situations, but nobody realized it :).
From my perspective, the defense whining about being insulted is the same as TO whining because he’s not getting enough balls thrown his way. They can cry me a river.
And it has been done before (letting the offense score), but I can only think of examples where the offense could win with a FG. The principle is the same though.
I’m not really arguing the point you make in post 25. It was probably the best way to win the game, and that’s fine, the hurt feelings of the defense be damned. But I’m really arguing against the OP’s strategy of just letting the Colts score to get the ball back. You’re saying you’ve seen it happen before? I’m not quite sure I follow your last post.
It happened this week. The Jets let MJD score a touchdown, but he was smart enough to kneel at the one instead. Both teams recognized that it was in the Jets’ best interest for the Jags to score a TD. It also happened in Super Bowl 32; in a tie game Holmgren had his defense allow a touchdown, so they’d have time to try for a comeback TD of their own.
In both of these cases, the defending coaches wanted to avoid allowing the other team to run out the clock and win on a field goal on the last play. The IND-NE game is different because Indy needed a TD to win rather than a FG, but the logic of the strategy is similar.
Super Bowl XXXII: The Packers defense parted way for Terrell Davis on Denver’s last scoring drive to allow their offense time to come back for a tying touchdown. Earlier in the season the Packers lost to the 3-13 Colts when the Colts sat on the ball close the goal line before they kicked a extra-point length field goal with little or no time left.
This example also isn’t the same as Sunday. In this case, Denver could have run the clock down and kicked a field goal to win. Allowing TD to score the TD gave the Packers their only shot: by driving and scoring a TD of their own to tie the game and send it into OT.
But the Colts needed a TD, period. As Borschevsky noted, I can’t remember a situation in which a team intentionally turned down a free TD in order to run the clock out (when a TD was their only chance at winning).
Belichick should have told his defense lay off, and let the Colts make an unprecedented decision. If it happened right after the turnover on downs, what would Indy do? Run the clock down and only have 1-2 chances to score a TD? I don’t believe they would. They would have just taken the easy TD and left plenty of time for Brady and Co. to move 50 yards for a FG.
Again, short FG’s are easy. Short TD’s are not.
Please, please tell me this is well-disguised sarcasm.