Mathematical Football Strategy

972 Words4 Pages
November 31, 2010 Research paper Football Strategy: Run/Pass Balance Football is the most strategic of all sports. A big part of this is the unique feature that each game has about 75-100 trials—the plays. This gives rise to the art and science of play-calling, “balance,” formations, calls, coverage, checks, and etc. Clearly the objective is to score more points than the other team, but what is the best way to achieve this? You must balance your play calling so the opposing team does not catch on. Each team has the choice of passing or running the ball. Even if one is more efficient than the other, you cannot go away from the one that isn’t working as well. Let’s say a team is passing the ball and completing each pass for a gain of 8 yards, but only running the ball for a gain of 3, you can’t just stop running because then the defense will play a package to stop the pass more effectively, which could cause a turnover or forcing you to punt. The goal is to move forward to the other guy's goal-line, continually increasing your chances of scoring a Touchdown. Further, you really want to do this on first and second down: Third down is a defense's down. The odds are in the defense's favor, and so are the strategies. Also, the teams with the best third down conversation rates are invariably the ones who have the shortest average distance to go on third down--further emphasizing that positive first and second down yards are the key. So the goal is to find the mix of runs and passes that maximizes your teams' average gain per play. Though, you must take into consideration the chances of turnovers. A turnover could happen on a pass or a run, an interception or a fumble. You never know when it will come so you have to catch on to what the defense is doing so you can be more effective with having receivers more open or the running backs having more space to run.
Open Document