The Passing Premium Puzzle

Alamar, Benjamin

doi:10.2202/1559-0410.1051

Cited by 13 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 1 publication

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“…Both Alomar (2006), and Kovash and Levitt (2009) find that NFL teams pass too little. Nevertheless, it is difficult to follow the NFL without often hearing statements that emphasize the importance of the run such as ''Minnesota is 3-0 when Chester Taylor rushes for 100þ yards.''…”

Section: Excluding the Point Spreadmentioning

confidence: 99%

Predicting the Winner of Tied National Football League Games

Quenzel

Shea

2016

Journal of Sports Economics

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We construct a data set of all 429 tied at the half regular season National Football League (NFL) games between 1994 and 2012. We then examine whether or not the path taken to reach the tie (e.g., rushing yards, turnovers, etc.) has any ability to predict the eventual winner. Our main finding is that only the point spread is significantly predictive, although there is weak evidence to suggest that allowing more sacks reduces the chances of winning. Surprisingly, we find that the team receiving the first possession of the second half does not enjoy a statistically significant advantage. Teams should thus simply try to maximize their first half lead without expecting that first half strategies such as ''establishing the run'' will pay dividends in the second half.

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Section: Excluding the Point Spreadmentioning

confidence: 99%

Predicting the Winner of Tied National Football League Games

Quenzel

Shea

2016

Journal of Sports Economics

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“…We also control for various observables, such as whether the game was played in excessively cold conditions, 18 excessively windy conditions, 19 wet 1 7 For more on the optimality of the pass-rush mix, see Alamar (2006Alamar ( , 2010, Reed, Critch…eld, and Martens (2006), Rockerbie (2008), Kovash andLevitt (2009), andStilling andCritch…eld (2010).…”

Section: Serial Correlationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Serial correlation in National Football League play calling and its effects on outcomes

Emara

Owens

Smith

et al. 2017

Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics

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We investigate the strategic behavior of highly informed agents playing zero-sum games under highly incentivized conditions. We examine data from 3455 National Football League (NFL) games from the 2000 season through the 2012 season, and categorize each play as "rush" or a "pass." We …nd that the pass-rush mix exhibits negative serial correlation: play types alternate more frequently than an independent stochastic process. This is an exploitable strategy, and we …nd that this serial correlation negatively a¤ects play e¢ cacy. Our analysis suggests that teams could pro…t from more clustered play selections, which switch play type less frequently. Our results are consistent with the explanation that teams excessively switch play types in an e¤ort to be perceived as unpredictable.

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“…As we shall show, it is straightforward to derive the optimal share of running and passing plays if the moments of their distributions are known. Alamar (2006) has noted that a passing premium appears to exist for NFL teams, whereby teams do not appear to use as many passing plays as they should, given the average yardage return advantage enjoyed by passing. This puzzle persists despite rule changes in the late 1970's that opened up the field for receivers and made protecting the quarterback more stringent.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This puzzle persists despite rule changes in the late 1970's that opened up the field for receivers and made protecting the quarterback more stringent. Since 1960, Alamar (2006 found that completion rates have increased significantly and interception rates have fallen. Yards per completed pass have increased significantly since 1960, while yards per run have remained essentially unchanged.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%