In the last moments of a nighttime game against the Indianapolis Colts, past New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick made perhaps the most contentious tactical choice of his career on November 15, 2009 when he made the decision to go for it on 4th and 2 in his own territory. Belichick received a lot of criticism for his “gamble,” and the team was unable to change because Peyton Manning took advantage of the little industry to report the winning touchdown.
In the 15 years since, NFL companies have embraced analysis, and one of the main benefits has been a more aggressive strategy league-wide on fourth ups. In the first 12 months of 2009, team just went for it 20 % of the time on 4th-and-2. This year, that amount is all the way up to 42 %, according to statistics shared by Michael Lopez, the team’s top producer of sports data and analytics.

Team just miscalculated the danger versus the reward of going for it for the first half-century of the Super Bowl time. In fact, mentors started to be more reserved on fourth down in the years following the Belichick event. As recently as 2017, teams sent their offenses onto the field on fourth down just 41 %, 14 % and 13 % of the time with one, two and three yards to gain, respectively.
In 2024, teams are going for it 71 % of the time on 4th-and-1, 42 % of the time on 4th-and-2 and 30 % of the time on 4th-and-3. All three of those ratios are all-time spikes, by substantial profits.
The pandemic-riddled season of 2020 saw the biggest spike in 4th-and-1 attempts, with the go-for-it rate jumping from 54 % the prior season to 67 %. Aggressiveness with more length to obtain was a deteriorating pattern, with head coaches eventually getting over the tail in 2024 on 4th-and-2 and 4th-and-3 situations.
The cost of this shift is likely to be related to correlation somewhat than cause, but it should be noted that the average contract price for the top 10 highest-paid gamblers, whose responsibilities are now more limited, has not changed since 2021, despite the NFL salary cap’s increase of more than 20 %. On the flip side, the typical earnings of the top 10 highest-paid head coaches has increased 30 % in the past three months.
Detroit Lions head coach Dan Campbell, who earns$ 11 million yearly, has led the charge in fourth-down courage. In his introductory press conference, Campbell notably set a brave tone, followed by a strong defense on the industry, going for it on 118 third downs between 2021 and 2023, which equaled 14 attempts for any other team that year.

In his first three months, Campbell avoided the punt or kick on roughly 29 % of all third ups, a league high of just 20 %. According to a fourth-down anger measurement from Pro Football Focus that considers various factors such as industry position, report margin and time remaining, Campbell got a rating of 0.86 and a label of “DARING” in 2023. A score greater than 0 / 50 was merely obtained by two other coaches.
In the 2024 NFC Championship Game against the San Francisco 49ers, Campbell made the decision to go for it on two third downs in the next half. Campbell was the subject of heated discussion the following day as the crew turned it over on offs both times, which led to a 49ers comeback victory.
The talk, though, was not one as one-sided as it had been with Belichick years before. Most statistical designs really confirmed that Campbell’s decisions were right. ” I do n’t regret those decisions, and that’s hard”, Campbell said after the game. ” But I understand the scrutiny”.
This season, the Lions have n’t been in many positions to make risky go-for-it decisions, as they’ve cruised to a 10-1 record, with six of those wins by double-digits.