Extra Choices in N.F.L. Overtime Rule
By JUDY BATTISTA
INDIANAPOLIS — Peyton Manning said he had forgotten how the new playoff overtime rule would work until Colts Coach Jim Caldwell mentioned it this week.
No matter. No N.F.L. coach worth his polyester shorts would not consider trying to score a touchdown on the opening drive of overtime with Manning as his quarterback.
Under the new rule, which starts with this weekend’s wild-card round, the team that receives the first overtime kickoff would win the game on that possession only via a touchdown. A field goal then would not end the game in sudden death but would give the opponent’s offense a chance to score. On any subsequent overtime possessions, either team could win with a score of any kind.
So, should coaches defer the opening kickoff? Is a long field-goal attempt on the opening drive preferable to trying to convert on fourth down? Or is punting the better option?
The nuances of the new rule have confused fans and sent coaches into extra meetings to discuss strategy.
Coach Mike McCarthy, whose Packers teams have gone to overtime in four of their last six playoff games, said that he and the team’s director of research and development talked after the rule was passed last spring. They discussed strategy again this week ahead of Sunday’s game against the Eagles.
Ravens Coach John Harbaugh, whose team plays the Chiefs on Sunday and was one of four to vote against the rule change, said he discussed strategy this week with his assistant coaches and with General Manager Ozzie Newsome.
“There is more value in the second possession than there has been in the past,” Harbaugh said Wednesday. “On the second drive, they basically have four downs to move the ball down the field. That second drive has a real good chance to move down the field percentagewise more than it normally would. So you have to keep that in mind. You might see some teams defer.”
The rule was created to avoid what N.F.L. officials feared most: a Super Bowl decided in overtime by a kicker, with only one team touching the ball.
The league encountered just such a outcome in last season’s National Football Conference championship game, which the Saints won in sudden death on a field goal on the opening overtime drive, leaving Brett Favre and the Vikings’ offense on the sideline with no role to play.
So the competition committee devised a formula: each team would get a chance to move the ball if the team with the first possession did not score a touchdown. If each team gets a chance and the teams are still tied, overtime reverts to the old sudden-death rule.
Still, there are tricky possibilities: a safety on the first overtime drive, for example, would win the game because both teams would be deemed to have had a possession.
Most coaches were opposed to the new rule when it was adopted because it created another layer of decision making and the potential for second-guessing. And they were upset when owners later decided not to extend the rule to the regular season, because that meant they missed opportunities to test strategy and to scout how opponents would handle overtime. Players were not thrilled with the original change, either, because they feared an increased risk of injury with longer regular-season games.
As it turned out, 19 regular-season games went to overtime. Just two were decided on the first possession, and both were won on a field goal. In the other 17, both teams touched the ball. The competition committee noted that starting in 1994, teams that won the overtime coin toss went on to win the game 59.8 percent of the time, 34.4 percent of the time on the first possession.
The rule diminishes the importance of field goals, which does not please one of the most clutch kickers in N.F.L. history, the Colts’ Adam Vinatieri.
“The way I look at it, your offense is supposed to score,” he said. “Your defense is supposed to keep the other team from scoring. If they do that, you get the ball back anyway.”
Coaches essentially may find themselves having to make up overtime strategy on the fly. Saints Coach Sean Payton, an outspoken opponent of the change, said this week that he would probably wait to see how his team’s wild-card game Saturday against the Seattle Seahawks was going — whether his offense able to score touchdowns, whether his defense was stopping the opponent — to determine how to handle overtime.
Like Payton, McCarthy, who has a strong defense and a strong quarterback, will gauge how the game is being played before making any final decisions on overtime, although he said that the team had reviewed the variables that could be presented in the game.
Overtime decisions may be most challenging to coaches who have stingy defenses — the Ravens and the Jets, for example. When the rule was approved, Jets Coach Rex Ryan caused a stir when he said he might consider deferring the opening coin toss to put his defense on the field first. By Tuesday, Ryan had changed his mind and said he would take the ball if the Jets won the toss. He planned to review the rules with players this week.
Tony Dungy, the former Colts coach who is now an analyst for NBC’s “Football Night in America,” said that if he were a coach with a strong defense, he would at least consider deferring.
“Coaches are going to be much more apt to defer and take the wind because you know if you can at least hold a team to a field goal, you’re going to get the ball again,” Dungy said this week in a conference call. “In the past it was hard to make that call, even if you had a great defense — to say, ‘Hey, I’m going to give the other team the ball’ — because you might not get it back. I think they’re going to play through that in their minds, especially if you have a team like the Jets who is a defensive team. I don’t know that you’d give the ball to Peyton Manning first, but you’d sure have to think about it.”
Mike Mayock, another NBC analyst, said he expected that whoever wins the toss will take the football.
Manning has a better solution.
“I think the coin toss is still very important in overtime,” he said. “I always try to do whatever I can to win in regulation and take the coin toss out of it.”
No matter. No N.F.L. coach worth his polyester shorts would not consider trying to score a touchdown on the opening drive of overtime with Manning as his quarterback.
Under the new rule, which starts with this weekend’s wild-card round, the team that receives the first overtime kickoff would win the game on that possession only via a touchdown. A field goal then would not end the game in sudden death but would give the opponent’s offense a chance to score. On any subsequent overtime possessions, either team could win with a score of any kind.
So, should coaches defer the opening kickoff? Is a long field-goal attempt on the opening drive preferable to trying to convert on fourth down? Or is punting the better option?
The nuances of the new rule have confused fans and sent coaches into extra meetings to discuss strategy.
Coach Mike McCarthy, whose Packers teams have gone to overtime in four of their last six playoff games, said that he and the team’s director of research and development talked after the rule was passed last spring. They discussed strategy again this week ahead of Sunday’s game against the Eagles.
Ravens Coach John Harbaugh, whose team plays the Chiefs on Sunday and was one of four to vote against the rule change, said he discussed strategy this week with his assistant coaches and with General Manager Ozzie Newsome.
“There is more value in the second possession than there has been in the past,” Harbaugh said Wednesday. “On the second drive, they basically have four downs to move the ball down the field. That second drive has a real good chance to move down the field percentagewise more than it normally would. So you have to keep that in mind. You might see some teams defer.”
The rule was created to avoid what N.F.L. officials feared most: a Super Bowl decided in overtime by a kicker, with only one team touching the ball.
The league encountered just such a outcome in last season’s National Football Conference championship game, which the Saints won in sudden death on a field goal on the opening overtime drive, leaving Brett Favre and the Vikings’ offense on the sideline with no role to play.
So the competition committee devised a formula: each team would get a chance to move the ball if the team with the first possession did not score a touchdown. If each team gets a chance and the teams are still tied, overtime reverts to the old sudden-death rule.
Still, there are tricky possibilities: a safety on the first overtime drive, for example, would win the game because both teams would be deemed to have had a possession.
Most coaches were opposed to the new rule when it was adopted because it created another layer of decision making and the potential for second-guessing. And they were upset when owners later decided not to extend the rule to the regular season, because that meant they missed opportunities to test strategy and to scout how opponents would handle overtime. Players were not thrilled with the original change, either, because they feared an increased risk of injury with longer regular-season games.
As it turned out, 19 regular-season games went to overtime. Just two were decided on the first possession, and both were won on a field goal. In the other 17, both teams touched the ball. The competition committee noted that starting in 1994, teams that won the overtime coin toss went on to win the game 59.8 percent of the time, 34.4 percent of the time on the first possession.
The rule diminishes the importance of field goals, which does not please one of the most clutch kickers in N.F.L. history, the Colts’ Adam Vinatieri.
“The way I look at it, your offense is supposed to score,” he said. “Your defense is supposed to keep the other team from scoring. If they do that, you get the ball back anyway.”
Coaches essentially may find themselves having to make up overtime strategy on the fly. Saints Coach Sean Payton, an outspoken opponent of the change, said this week that he would probably wait to see how his team’s wild-card game Saturday against the Seattle Seahawks was going — whether his offense able to score touchdowns, whether his defense was stopping the opponent — to determine how to handle overtime.
Like Payton, McCarthy, who has a strong defense and a strong quarterback, will gauge how the game is being played before making any final decisions on overtime, although he said that the team had reviewed the variables that could be presented in the game.
Overtime decisions may be most challenging to coaches who have stingy defenses — the Ravens and the Jets, for example. When the rule was approved, Jets Coach Rex Ryan caused a stir when he said he might consider deferring the opening coin toss to put his defense on the field first. By Tuesday, Ryan had changed his mind and said he would take the ball if the Jets won the toss. He planned to review the rules with players this week.
Tony Dungy, the former Colts coach who is now an analyst for NBC’s “Football Night in America,” said that if he were a coach with a strong defense, he would at least consider deferring.
“Coaches are going to be much more apt to defer and take the wind because you know if you can at least hold a team to a field goal, you’re going to get the ball again,” Dungy said this week in a conference call. “In the past it was hard to make that call, even if you had a great defense — to say, ‘Hey, I’m going to give the other team the ball’ — because you might not get it back. I think they’re going to play through that in their minds, especially if you have a team like the Jets who is a defensive team. I don’t know that you’d give the ball to Peyton Manning first, but you’d sure have to think about it.”
Mike Mayock, another NBC analyst, said he expected that whoever wins the toss will take the football.
Manning has a better solution.
“I think the coin toss is still very important in overtime,” he said. “I always try to do whatever I can to win in regulation and take the coin toss out of it.”
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