Chalk Talk Discussion: Homer Smith says: Time of Possession is "meaningless". Why?

[KDawg]

Sure I know, but before the start of the game, you assume your offense will put points on board. defense or ST scoring points (asides from FG) are just bonuses that you may get to me.

I never assume anything. It's my job to have the team ready and put them in the best position to win the game. I don't assume, or care, where points come from. I know mistakes happen and that in this game anything can and usually does happen, from both the good perspective and the bad perspective.

Well, that's either you score quickly, by forcing long throw and big plays, or you just take the 3 and out. trick here is to get your offense out of the game as fast as possible to me. IMO, you can shorten plays to some extends, but you can never go past 45 seconds. Or you'll eat a DoG penalty.

I'd argue that intentionally going three-and-out is a rather poorly thought out plan of attack, especially considering field position. Yes, I may have the ball on the last drive of the half, but I also just gave up a major opportunity for the opposing team to score points, which is exactly what you're trying to prevent by having the last possession. I'd argue that you'd want to try to achieve seven points in any way possible and make adjustments to your strategy in order to get the ball back after your drive has halted for the last possession. One way to do that is to not waste time outs. If I have all three time uts (or any timeouts) and manage to score on the drive that you had voluntarily given up, I can not only achieve my goal of the last possession, but also put additional points on the board. I'd argue that it's mostly unwise to go three and out purposely.

[Oldfan]

...I think coaches use these goals as a motivational tool and a path, rather than absolute goals. The players are motivated by these things...

I think you are giving your coaching brethren too much credit. I'm convinced that some coaching strategies only make sense when coaches forget that the goal is winning and substitute something like the turnover ratio instead. I think Greg Blache's defensive strategy was a good one for achieving job security for a DC because it was aimed at a higher ranking on the points against stat that Greg spoke of often, but it was dumb if winning is the objective.