The Passing Premium Puzzle Revisited
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Duane W. Rockerbie
The passing premium puzzle states that NFL teams do not call enough passing plays, despite rule changes since the late 1970's that have increased the expected return to passing. This paper develops a simple portfolio model to determine how a coach could determine an optimal share of running and passing plays to maximize the expected yardage return from the portfolio. Coaches are assumed to be risk-averse so that they perceive a tradeoff between a higher expected return to passing and running, and a higher variance of yardage to each. The model is tested by computing the optimal share of running plays and comparing to the actual share of running plays for the 2006 NFL season. It is also demonstrated that a tradeoff does exist between expected yardage return and risk which is the basis for the portfolio model. Finally, portfolio selection is shown to, at least partly, determine winning percentage.
©2011 Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin/Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- Conference Paper
- New England Symposium on Statistics in Sports
- Estimating Situational Effects on OPS
- Why On-Base Percentage is a Better Indicator of Future Performance than Batting Average: An Algebraic Proof
- Improving Major League Baseball Park Factor Estimates
- In Search of the "Last-Ups" Advantage in Baseball: A Game-Theoretic Approach
- The Role of Rest in the NBA Home-Court Advantage
- Racial Bias in the NBA: Implications in Betting Markets
- A Simple and Flexible Rating Method for Predicting Success in the NCAA Basketball Tournament: Updated Results from 2007
- The Passing Premium Puzzle Revisited
- Isolating the Effect of Individual Linemen on the Passing Game in the National Football League
- Probability and Statistical Models for Racing
- Improving Golf Instruction with the iClub Motion Capture Technology
- Composite Poisson Models for Goal Scoring
- Skill Evaluation in Women's Volleyball
- Probability Formulas and Statistical Analysis in Tennis
Articles in the same Issue
- Conference Paper
- New England Symposium on Statistics in Sports
- Estimating Situational Effects on OPS
- Why On-Base Percentage is a Better Indicator of Future Performance than Batting Average: An Algebraic Proof
- Improving Major League Baseball Park Factor Estimates
- In Search of the "Last-Ups" Advantage in Baseball: A Game-Theoretic Approach
- The Role of Rest in the NBA Home-Court Advantage
- Racial Bias in the NBA: Implications in Betting Markets
- A Simple and Flexible Rating Method for Predicting Success in the NCAA Basketball Tournament: Updated Results from 2007
- The Passing Premium Puzzle Revisited
- Isolating the Effect of Individual Linemen on the Passing Game in the National Football League
- Probability and Statistical Models for Racing
- Improving Golf Instruction with the iClub Motion Capture Technology
- Composite Poisson Models for Goal Scoring
- Skill Evaluation in Women's Volleyball
- Probability Formulas and Statistical Analysis in Tennis
