Ottawa at BC Game Thread- Saturday September 16, 2023

CFL Talk
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The difference in this instance in your examples is that for one the Seattle play was boneheaded in retrospect but not necessarily clearly so at the time and as I recall it came with seconds left on the clock. It wasn’t the highest percentage play I am sure but it wasn’t a barking mad call like Dyce made as Seattle didn’t have the game locked up and would still have to have scored on a running play which could have resulted in a fumble. . Plenty of those types of plays happen all the time like fake kicks and surprise onside kicks and 3rd or 4th down gambles that aren’t high percentage.

The Hamilton sneak by Bo this year isn’t even in the same category. For one it didn’t cost them the game. It was also only a bad call if you are of the opinion that Bo is the answer in Hamilton. I am not and I think many share my view and that play could also be looked at as inadvertently Hamilton’s best play call of the season.

Contrary to your opinions about my “precious Bombers” in fact that never even crossed my mind. I am giving this opinion having no skin in the game and cannot find another call as bad in my mind from 50 plus years of watching football. I could be wrong and if anyone else can think of one I’m still all ears, but your examples aren’t in the same league to my mind. It was just such a simple call to make and botched so badly.

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As other posters have pointed out Kick-offs are very different than field goals. But also kick-off returns in the NFL these days are almost non existent with so many resulting in touchbacks. So 0.6% of all kick-offs would be a much larger number as a percent of kick-offs that were actually returned and almost all are returned in the CFL.

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Carroll’s cost him a Superbowl & Orlondo’s cost him his starting qb, much,much, bigger stakes than a probably meaningless mid-season game. We’ll see how much those 2 points mean only at the end of the season. No skin in the results? I bet the BB were rooting hard for Ottawa, now the Lions on on their heels again, keeping it close. Anyway you’re not going to change my mind & I’m not changing yours so carry on. Cheers :v:

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That’s fine but there is no need to paint my
opinion with a Bomber brush. I’m not painting yours with a BC brush.

I posted the same opinion in the game thread as I do now and I can tell you it took me about 10 seconds to think through the options and I’m not a professional football coach and just like Dyce I’m sure, I didn’t think of the Bombers or any other team in reaching that conclusion. For me this is only about this game and the decision made and it isn’t after the fact. I would be intellectually dishonest if it were otherwise and I can assure you I am not even though you may disagree with my opinion on the call made.

As to BC/Winnipeg I have consistently posted that:

  1. First place is extremely important in the CFL given the current bye set up

  2. First place in the West will likely be decided when the two teams meet in 3 weeks

  3. In spite of that any win or loss in the regular season, even if it clinches first place, is forgotten and immaterial as only playoff wins and losses matter and anyone can win a playoff game so whether BC or Winnipeg finishes first neither team is guaranteed anything.

  4. I have also consistently posted that my preference is to see my team win important games by outplaying the other team when it counts and never celebrated backing into anything whether that occurs by the competition losing when they shouldn’t or via injury or geographical advantage or disadvantage or a number of other reasons. To me that is the essence of sport. Beat your best competition when it counts and earn your seeding and you deserve to win and if you can’t then you don’t deserve to win.

Believe me when I say that the Lions losing this game to aid the Bombers was not even a thought that entered my mind when opining on the coaching decision in game and I’m pretty sure this game will be irrelevant to the Bomber/BC battle expected to come.

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Did I misunderstand. Are you saying all kick offs are returned for TDs? Please explain.

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who cares about the blunder, Lions get credit for taking advantage of stupidity and they deserved the win for coming back and not quitting. TWO POINTS. :slight_smile:

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I’m sure he meant that most CFL kick-offs results in a return of some sort.

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You are correct that my 99.9% number wasn’t scientifically calculated by a Harvard professor of mathematics (my old job) but it has to be pretty close and certainly no more than 1%. It would be interesting to see for instance a computer calculation of the different odds of winning if that is even possible but I guarantee you that whatever the exact odds are attempting a 50 yard field goal for no discernible benefit and with considerable downside would give you the most chance of blowing the game and is the only choice that should never have been made.

We know that the chance of recovering an onside kick is 8.1 %. BC’s odds of winning therefore couldn’t be higher than that if they were forced to recover one and in fact would just spiral down from there. We also know that if BC scored on a drive after receiving a punt and didn’t recover an onside kick that Ottawa could burn 60 plus seconds off the clock by kneeling as BC had no timeouts. So to start, if BC took only 40 seconds to make their first score and didn’t recover the onside kick the game was over.

Yes there is always the chance BC could have returned the punt for a TD if the punt was poor, but I see that as only raising their chances of winning from .01% to 1%. The punt should have been directional and even if not OB pinned BC in one corner of the field. A pooch kick of some 25 yards would also have sufficed. As I said before, BC would then have to go 60-80 yards in virtually no time to even have a remote chance. Ottawa could have given them 20-30 yards a play and that wouldn’t have been good enough. They just couldn’t have allowed a one play 60-80 yard TD pass and that was extremely unlikely. Ottawa also almost certainly would have won had they just turned the ball over at midfield on downs after three running plays which would have left less than 1:20 on the clock for BC to score twice. Although this wouldn’t have been nearly as smart an option as an OB punt it would have been a better choice than a long field goal attempt. In the cobwebs of his mind Dyce also failed to recognize that the extra 20 seconds off the clock a second down running play would have yielded would have been a smarter choice than throwing an incomplete pass and giving BC a free timeout they didn’t have. There were several virtually assured paths to victory and the only realistic possibility of blowing the game was trying a long field goal that was returned for a TD.

If BC wasn’t given the opportunity to return a missed field goal the odds of even making a TD at all in their drive weren’t great, but let’s assume they did. The odds of winning would take another dive just because a convert would have to be made and those aren’t 100% guaranteed. Assuming that happened we are back to the 8.1% chance of recovering the onside kick that would almost certainly have to be made as there very likely wouldn’t be more than a minute or even 1:20 left on the clock. Assuming the kick was recovered BC would still have to move into range for likely a long field goal and probably have only 10-40 seconds at best to do so. The long field goal would then also have to be made. Assuming this crazy scenario had actually played out then BC would have had to win in OT, a 50/50 chance at that point but still enough to move the 8.1% best case scenario chance they started with down further. No, I’m sticking with about a 1% chance for BC to win had Ottawa not foolishly attempted a 50 yard field goal.

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The similarities are stunning​:joy: I give up. :white_flag:

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Why do you say Dyce going for the 50 yard FG would have served no discernible benefit? Weren’t the RedBlacks up by 10? Would a FG not have given them 3 more points giving them a lead of 13 with around 1:40 remaining in the game. That is 2 TDs and a convert. How is that not a benefit to the RedBlacks? You lost me.

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I don’t understand why you ask this when it has been explained already.

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Because the statement is incorrect and it hasn’t been explained. The FG attempt decision has be thoroughly debated not the benefit or lack of. And I don’t recall it being said before.

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Now THAT I agree with!!:+1:

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I’m hoping so.

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No I was just saying most kick offs are have a return of some sort unlike the NFL with their touch backs so the percentage of kick-offs returned for touchdowns would be much higher in the CFL even if the percentage of returned kicks that went for a touchdown were the same.

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Oh, okay. Got it. That makes good sense. You obviously know your football👍

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Objectively speaking that FG decision was so atrocious and I am astounded another coach or even a player didn’t speak up. If it was Dyce, then it’s inexcusable. The difference between a lead of 10 points and 13 points is moot here. He had no reason to go for the FG with that much time left and that many points and it’s not rocket science math. there’s no way at all that a FG attempt was smarter than a short punt to the corner. The fact the Lions made them pay is commendable and that was a ridiculous runback by Williams, makes it all the more sweeter to savour too.

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I agree with GG that the rationale on why the FG wasn’t important has been explained, more than once actually. There are other posts but my latest attempt is linked below:

https://forums.cfl.ca/t/ottawa-at-bc-game-thread-saturday-september-16-2023/88314/195?u=jon

This time I truly won’t go on about this in any more posts and you are certainly free to disagree with me as you know from past interactions as I am free to express the basis for my opinion.

First we talked about how terrible the call was to kick a field goal and at first you didn’t agree but then said you did.

The latest banter was surrounding my thinking that this was one of the worst coaching decisions ever and certainly that I have seen in a long time and other similar comments.

I stand by that position but perhaps after reading responses haven’t made myself completely clear.

I didn’t intend to assert that the call that lost the game was the most important call ever in the most important game ever. In fact I have already stated that this game was of little importance in my opinion. So @PorkyPine you are correct in saying that losing a Super Bowl is more important than losing last weekend’s game but I never intended to say otherwise.

Rather I am looking at this call in a vacuum if you will and for the life of me cannot think of a call that was more egregiously wrong in a game that was essentially over to approximately a 99% level of certainty that should never have been made and for which so many other options existed and even taking a knee would have been better.

The Super Bowl example is a good one but the game wasn’t nearly 99% over and Seattle never had the points they needed in the bank and any one play such as a fumble could still have lost them the game. A running play, especially in retrospect, had a higher percentage chance of success in all likelihood but it wasn’t a 99% thing by any stretch. Yes an IT happened and ended the game but a run could have been fumbled to do the same thing. It was one play in a game that wasn’t a two score game and in which the team that screwed up didn’t have the lead. Had the pass been successful for a TD a lot of pundits would have been saying how brilliant a call Carroll made to fool the wily Belichik by surprising him with a pass.

In last weekend’s game the result was a virtual certainly if the game had been managed properly. Ottawa was leading by two scores with less than two minutes left and had lots of breathing room. All they had to do was play it smart and make BC earn their points by forcing them to use their offense and whittle down the time on the clock and even if they scored force them into an onside kick they only had an 8.1% chance of recovering which I’ve been through.

They had to avoid giving up the big play. As I’ve said it is remotely possible that BC could have scored with an 80 yard TD pass on their first play from scrimmage but extremely unlikely and I didn’t see Milt Stegall out there. Even BC scoring in 4 plays after an OB punt wouldn’t have been good enough in all likelihood. Ottawa simply kneeling at midfield and taking twenty more seconds off of the clock as they turned it over on downs would still have given them at least a 90% or more chance of winning.

There was almost no realistic chance to lose if the right coaching decision was made. Trying a long field goal and having it returned for a TD in 12 seconds or whatever it took was the only thing that couldn’t have happened and shouldn’t have happened and was totally within Dyce’s control. Never seen anything like it.

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If you didn’t think attempting a FG thereby putting the team up by 13 points instead of 10 with only about 1:40 on the clock didn’t present a discernable benefit for the RedBlacks there is nothing more I can say than to disagree.
Thanks for the insights. I’ll be moving on now from this topic.
I’m looking forward to seeing the Edmonton/BC game on Friday.
Cheers :+1:

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What’s sort of funny is that inexcusable decision-making is pretty much what sealed Lapo’s fate before Dyce. That was probably worse than a Lapo lapse there.

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