Alliance... » During the fourth quarter of Sunday’s game

Philadelphia Youth Brian Westbrook Jerseys , the Eagles scored a touchdown to cut their deficit to 20-12. Everyone assumed they’d kick the extra point to make it 20-13.But coach Doug Pederson did what no one expected: He went for two, and it worked, and the Eagles cut the deficit to 20-14.When Pederson made the highly unusual decision, the TV announcers questioned it, and social media lit up with the question: What is Pederson doing?What Pederson was doing was showing he has a far greater grasp of analytics and game theory than any other NFL coach. Because while every NFL coach has always kicked the extra point in that situation, the analytics community has steadfastly insisted that going for two is the better option.Kevin Cole, the Director of Data & Analytics for RotoGrinders, spelled out the reasoning last year: If you’re trailing by 14 late in the game, and you score a touchdown to cut the deficit to eight points, when you kick the extra point to cut the deficit to seven you’re hoping that you’ll later get another touchdown and another extra point, which will send the game into overtime. In overtime you’ve basically got a 50-50 shot of winning. But if you go for two after that touchdown in an attempt to cut the deficit from eight to six, now you’ve changed the odds from 50-50 to more like 62.5 percent in your favor: 50 percent of the time you’ll make the two-point conversion, in which case you’ll win in regulation with a touchdown and one-point kick. But there’s also the 50 percent of the time in which you’ll miss the two-point conversion, and in those cases after you score another touchdown you’ll still have a 50-50 chance of making another two-point conversion, followed by a 50-50 chance of winning in overtime. And 50 percent (that you miss the first two-point conversion) of 50 percent (that you make the second two-point conversion) of 50 percent (that you win in overtime) is 12.5 percent, so add that 12.5 percent chance of winning to the 50 percent chance of winning from making the first two-point conversion and you have a 62.5 percent chance.The Eagles ended up losing Sunday’s game Youth Herman Edwards Jerseys , but that’s not the issue. The issue is whether Pederson made the correct strategic decision at the time, and he definitely did: He went from his team’s best-case scenario being another touchdown and a 50-50 chance of winning in overtime, to his team’s best-case scenario being another touchdown and a game-winning extra point in regulation. And even if the Eagles had failed on that two-point conversion, they still could have gone for two after their next touchdown to get back to that 50-50 chance of winning in overtime.This might all sound like a justification that only sounds good after the fact, because the Eagles got that two-point conversion. But that’s not what this is. People who have thought through the scenarios have been saying for years that some coach ought to do what Pederson did. During the fourth quarter of the Steelers’ playoff loss to the Jaguars last season, I tweeted when the Steelers scored to bring the deficit to eight that they should have gone for two. I also added that “no NFL coach would even consider it.”As it turned out, there was one NFL coach who would consider it, and it was the same coach who won the Super Bowl last season while embracing analytics. Pederson made a great call. CHICAGO (AP) — Maybe it was the absence of all those high-powered offenses on byes.Perhaps it was the jitters for some younger teams, particularly their quarterbacks: Deshaun Watson, Mitchell Trubisky and Lamar Jackson.Or maybe defense actually still has a place in the NFL, especially in the playoffs. The most points anyone scored during wild-card weekend, when only Dallas won at home, was 24 by the Cowboys. In total, 145 points were scored, an average of 36.2 per game. The Chiefs averaged 35.3 all by themselves this season.As Nick Foles — St. Nick in Philly for his clutch work as a relief pitcher and, oh yes Wes Hopkins Jerseys Stitched , as a Super Bowl champion — observed following the Eagles‘ 16-15 comeback escape in Chicago : "Our defense really kept us in this game. It was a hard-fought defensive battle tonight and we were able to come up big in the end."Or as coach Anthony Lynn noted following the Chargers‘ 23-17 win at Baltimore in which Los Angeles forced three turnovers and held the Ravens to 229 total yards, 90 on the ground: "Our defense was outstanding. We held that team down to 100 yards rushing. No one has played that team the way our defense played today. I was really impressed with the way our defense stepped up."All the winning defenses will need to step up a few more rungs next weekend. Consider that aside from the Chiefs scoring 565 points this season, the Rams got 527, the Saints 504 and the Patriots 436. All of them will be at home. The Colts (11-6) head to Kansas City (12-4) on Saturday, followed by the Cowboys (11-6) at the Rams (13-3). On Sunday, the Chargers (13-4) are at the Patriots (11-5), while the Eagles, who lost 48-7 at the Saints during the season, finish off the divisional round at New Orleans (13-3).While the NFL loves to tout all the scoring records set during the 2018 season, all of the yards gained and general wide-openness of weekly contests, when it comes down to deciding who winds up in the conference title games, maybe the guys trying to stop those video-game offenses will have a say.It's unlikely that any of the wild-card victors can win a Super Bowl without being balanced. The Eagles will need to play far better defense in the Big Easy or Drew Brees will have, well, an easy time picking apart a secondary playing mostly backups. The Chargers likely will require more than 24 points to succeed in Foxborough, where the Patriots had the NFL's only unbeaten home record this season.Dallas needs more offensive imagination and another huge performance against the run to win at L.A. Only Indianapolis, which was superb on both sides of the ball at Houston Youth Seth Joyner Jerseys , displayed enough of the formula needed to get the conference championship game.Then again, the Colts must slow down All-Pro quarterback Patrick Mahomes and crew at Arrowhead Stadium."We're not worried about who's on the other side," said Colts rookie linebacker Darius Leonard, himself an All-Pro. "We always talk about whoever's playing on the opposite side is gray matter. So we're always talking about doing what we can do and controlling what we can control, and that is going out, playing each play, play by play and going from there."What about the four teams coming off byes? Which ones are best suited to come up with a solid defensive showing?The two most suspect are the Chiefs and Rams. Sure, KC averaged all those points weekly. It also yielded 26.3, including 43, 54, 29 and 38 in its losses, and the 421 points opponents scored by far were the most any playoff team surrendered. The Rams allowed 384, easily the most of any NFC postseason qualifier; L.A. had seven games in which it allowed at least 30 points.New England also can be vulnerable on defense even though it's been stingy at times when it comes to giving up touchdowns. The Patriots aren't a force in the pass rush and against quality quarterbacks the linebackers and secondary have had trouble in coverage.New Orleans probably has the most well-rounded roster, with some standouts on defense to accompany Brees and All-Pro receiver Michael Thomas and the terrific running back duo of Alvin Kamara and Mark Ingram.And don't think defense won't be needed through the rest of January and into February.