Sean Payton should've kicked the field goal to go up 10-0 in the second quarter. That was clear in the moment, not after the fact.
Instead, he went for it and passed the ball with a backup quarterback. It was a bad play call and a bad decision which led to the loss in the AFC Championship Game.
37 comments
I look at it this way, if we would’ve won that game and gone to the Super Bowl with Stidham as the QB I think we would’ve been completely embarrassed, cause he looked like dog shit. Not happy Broncos lost, but I think he saved us from a complete embarrassment in the Super Bowl.
And now the New England Patriots get embarrassed instead of us.
yes it changed the entire momentum of the game. pats had nothing going but after that stop their entire team seemed to get a jolt of energy.
and you have your backup qb starting. you need points. his ego cost them the game.
I don’t mind Sean going for it. I do mind the dogshit playcall. Run a stupid tush push and get the first down
Going for it is always one of those things that either makes you look like an idiot or a genius in hindsight. It’s a gamble, and sadly, sometimes it fails.
I mean I get it. You go up 14 with that storm coming and the defense and it’s practically out of reach. But the play call and executing was horrid.
i agree with the decision to go for it, it was only 1 yrd and barely that. The Play was wrong. You dont want Stidham having to throw, you want your very best running play. The best running play that gained yardage all year was when we do a pitchback to the running back and he either hits it inside or uses his speed and goes around the end. Funny, we haven’t used this play in the last 7 or 8 games i believe. It has worked for positive yardage all year. that was the play to run
In the moment I thought we should have kicked the field goal. Even if we had we only would have scored 10 points. Stidham’s fumble and all the dropped passes killed us. The defense only gave up 3 points and that *should* have been good enough to win.
I don’t hate the decision to go for it. If we got it and scored a touchdown, 14-0 would have likely been insurmountable.
Play call sucked though.
Let’s say we did and it was tied… I really don’t think we could’ve won in overtime. Like Stidham looked like straight garbage
Seahawks would’ve destroyed Stiddy and our Oline. The only chance we had was with Bo and his clutch gene.
Easy to say when you don’t make it. They do make it and score and we win the game 14-10, he’s a genius, what a great coach to go for the win in the big game. It’s 1 yard, on their 20 and the 2nd quarter, analytics say go for it.
Even if we went to OT we weren’t moving the ball for shit, the weather was even worse and FGs were nearly impossible at any mid to long distance.
There were plenty of other moments that lost us the game. Hell , Lutz had a shot to get those 3 points and it was tipped.
We also stopped them on 4th down and the refs spotted them the first.
This is going to be talked about ad-nauseom all week, all off season. There’s plenty more things to talk about.
I’m fine with going for it on 4 and 1, but should have ran it over
Even worse is knowing the first play was a run, then the Patriots called a timeout and he switched to a pass 🥀🥀
Yep. NE had exactly *12* total yards at that point in the game. The game was 1/3 over already. And there was a blizzard incoming the staff should have prepared for and known about.
You knew at that moment the game was going to be extremely low scoring and every point mattered. I couldn’t let that call go the rest of the game.
Biggest reason Den lost was that call, though Stiddy’s fumble was a close 2nd. But expectations are higher for Payton than Stiddy.
Even if Den gets the first down, they still have 20 more yds to get the TD.
We had a chance at 2 more field goals that isn’t what cost us the game. That stupid fumble did it won the patriots the game like just take the fkn sack and punt why are you trying to make a stupid play happen so deep in your endzone?
I’m not mad at the decision as much as I am with the play call. 4th and 1 and we roll out with our backup qb? Go full tush-push or line up in the I and run that rock.
It’s a tough call. They ate our lunch on the interior o-line today. Especially on that play. Probably should have kicked it or ran a different play, but the belly missed his block and that blew up the play. That’s not the only reason we lost. Stidham didn’t play well enough to win. Receivers dropped balls. O-line didn’t play well. Lutz missed kicks.
We need a physical running back. We need a stud receiver. We still need a tight end. Most of all we needed Bo today. If he plays it’s a different game. We went from being a joke, to making the playoffs, to going to the AFC championship game. We did that while Russel Wilson is our highest paid player on offense pretty much. Next year might be better. At least we get relevant football again.
There’s no excuse for not taking a virtually guaranteed two possession lead at that point in the game. When you factor in the backup QB and a strong Denver defense, it wasn’t even debatable. Payton absolutely blew that decision by every objective measure.
agreed. it was already clear it was gonna be a defensive battle. take the points and go up 2 scores
I was yelling at my tv to kick it.
If that game had gone into OT, the NFC game might have ended before the AFC one did
We definitely should have. Also didn’t help that we missed two other field goals and apparently had no plan for the weather on offense. Just an unprepared disaster from Sean Payton. We could have overcome the backup situation, but he just couldn’t help himself but want to push for more when all we needed was to play the tempo of the game.
It just wasn’t meant to be this year…it is what it is. Go for it and score he’s Sean Payton the genius play caller, go for it and lose- he’s Sean Payton the coach who “lost the game”. I’m as gutted as anyone by the loss but he called that play because he plays to win as opposed to the coach who plays to not lose which I KNOW is cliche but at the end of the day…what are you gonna do? Root for the Avs and the Nuggets and look forward to next year.
Stidham forgetting how to play QB and fumbling was way more consequential
Stiddy had two of the worst turnovers I’ve ever seen. We weren’t winning that game. We also missed two other field goals. Should we have taken the 3 points, probably. Would it have won us the game, probably not. Would the Rams and Seahawks have kicked the shit out of Stiddy, certainly.
Most coaches go for it there. Vrabel went for it on 4th and 1 on their first second half drive. Vrabel just had the good sense to actually QB sneak it, which is the highest % play. The mistake was the playcall, not the aggressiveness.
When Elway was interviewed by Shannon Sharpe he talked about how there are 4 or 5 plays that determine the outcome of NFL games. Got to give New England credit, they came in and made the 4 or 5 plays to win and Denver didn’t.
Play was fine….o line let a guy in instantly. It’s all hindsight now but I was ok with the call at the time. Let’s be honest….going to the SB without Bo would have been a disaster anyway.
If we pulled it off and the D held up like it did he would have looked like a hero but I thought at the time we should have took the points as well. I unfortunately blame Stiddy for the loss. Can’t be that carless with the ball inside our 20. That was a gift TD and the only thing NE had. He doesn’t cough that up they get a field goal and we would have been in much better shape.
Such a dumb play call. I couldn’t believe it
No, you can’t second guess his calls. If you start doing that then you have to question all his funky calls that worked in our favor and then maybe we dont make the playoffs at all
Win some. Lose some. I’ve been here since the 80s…this isn’t so bad. One hell of a season.
I liked going for it, but the play call was stupid. Run it up the middle with Prentice.
This was an obvious take the points situation and it absolutely killed us.
I actually agree with the call.. Going up 14 points would have meant everything. The execution was horrendous though.
glad we lost hear me out we need a true tight end and a number 1 wr out team could use another pass rusher as well. today game showed us we relied on to much luck and it was able to gloss over sean shortcomings. the play style he calls doesnt work for a full game. we will have 1-3 good drives and fizzle we rely to much on our D. we have money next season I dunno who free for us to sign but we need to actually get a wr tight end that can catch the damn ball when hit hands. I could care less about amazing catches we have guys who can do that all rdy.
Down vote me all you want.
Why did we want this win?
To get annihilated by the Hawks or Rams (Officially Hawks now)?
Stidham played like ass, we saved ourselves another embarrassment on national TV.
We win this by at LEAST 14 with Bo. We will be back.