Did Harbaugh Call Timeout Too Quickly?

[HOUSE]

When the Ravens were up 40-25 the entire team's mind was on next week's game

 

[harryS]

1 hour ago, Buffalo716 said:

I don't really think harbaugh had any choice and I'm sure McDermott was ready for every situation 

 

I dunno, man.  A part of me was wondering if Harbaugh hadn't called timeout at all after Keon was tackled, would McD have yelled for Josh to clock it, thus giving Baltimore a free timeout?  Then the Ravens would've had 30 seconds or so for a drive of their own at the end.

[GunnerBill]

1 hour ago, Buffalo716 said:

I don't really think harbaugh had any choice and I'm sure McDermott was ready for every situation 

 

As soon as Coleman fell down.. I knew we had the game iced

 

The kicking team was probably ready if he didn't call a timeout to run out there but harbaugh has too Call them 

 

If harbaugh holds on to them Allen can stop the clock with a spike at any time

 

Yea if Harbaugh doesn't call time out Josh lines them up and spikes the ball once it gets under say 10 seconds.

 

Could he have waited until say 15 seconds then called time out? Possibly. At that point with no time outs I think the Bills probably kick on 3rd down and maybe the Ravens get the chance to try and break a return or do throwbacks etc. That might have been the optimum usage. 

 

But the idea that he just doesn't call it and the Bills are panicking I don't think so. It was 3rd down. It would benefit the Bills to get under 10 seconds, spike it and then have the chance to walk the kicker out with a full play clock. 

[Last Guy on the Bench]

2 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

 

Yea if Harbaugh doesn't call time out Josh lines them up and spikes the ball once it gets under say 10 seconds.

 

Could he have waited until say 15 seconds then called time out? Possibly. At that point with no time outs I think the Bills probably kick on 3rd down and maybe the Ravens get the chance to try and break a return or do throwbacks etc. That might have been the optimum usage. 

 

But the idea that he just doesn't call it and the Bills are panicking I don't think so. It was 3rd down. It would benefit the Bills to get under 10 seconds, spike it and then have the chance to walk the kicker out with a full play clock. 

Yeah, there's no benefit to not calling the timeout at all - that puts total control with the Bills. Its your second scenario that was kind of interesting to me (call it at 15 or so). It just had never occurred to me until I heard the Dolphins fan, but it could have resulted in at least a kickoff and one play for them.

[finn]

1 hour ago, Last Guy on the Bench said:

Heard an interesting point from a Dolphins fan (I was watching a reaction video and enjoying their crushing disbelief). At the end of the game, when the Bills were just downing it, forcing the Ravens to use up their timeouts so the Bills could kick with no time left, Harbaugh could have forced them into more of a scramble drill. After the 2nd Down knee, Harbaugh uses his last timeout right away at 32 seconds. The Bills can now down it one more time and than have a relatively leisurely half minute to get the kicking team out there, which is what happened. Instead, Harbaugh could have let the clock run down a bit to maybe 15 seconds or so. Then the Bills have much less time after the knee to get the field goal team in place. They could still do it, but it would be rushed.

 

In fact, he could have caused quite a panic even before that - the Bills are expecting the timeout there, but was the FG team ready to run on if Harbaugh didn't call time out at all? If he just let the clock run. Even if they do react well and run out there in good order while the clock is ticking, Harbaugh can still call his time out with enough on the clock that they don't want to kick on third down, so they have to go through the condensed knee/switch units deal. Maybe they decide to just kick on third down with 15 seconds left, rather than risk it, but then the Ravens at least get a kickoff and Hail Mary.

 

Anyway, thought that was interesting, from a very depressed Dolphins fan. Sorry if this was already discussed. I tried to read everything, but may have missed it.

Tell me more about depressed Dolphins fans. 😁

[Generic_Bills_Fan]

31 minutes ago, HOUSE said:

When the Ravens were up 40-25 the entire team's mind was on next week's game

 

I think they don’t handle adversity well because things are usually way too easy for them lol when games tighten up and a few Henry runs start getting stuffed they seem to panic. They just don’t feel like they have the clutch gene 

[GunnerBill]

38 minutes ago, dave mcbride said:

I think harbaugh played it right because by letting the clock run, the bills had to be as simple as possible on the kick snap count and the linemen could not move at all - a false start would have ended the game (10 second runoff). That allowed kyle hamilton to slice through with ease and he missed the block by about an inch. It was so close to being blocked.

 

Harbaugh is an old special teams coach and gets this.

It is an open question if Jackson could have played on the 4th down play because of the oliver hit, and I seriously doubt they would have run him. The Bills would have realized this. He was limping after that hit and in pain.

 

I think that is a good point on the FG try. He was making the Bills execution be perfrct and maximising his chance of a block because the Ravens could time their jump.

 

I still think they should have run Lamar on 3rd down. That was the call I was fearful of. I was happy to see him chuck it short of the sticks.

[Last Guy on the Bench]

2 minutes ago, finn said:

Tell me more about depressed Dolphins fans. 😁

Ha ha. I can't say it was my proudest moment, sitting in my office for 20 minutes forwarding through this Dolphin Fan reaction video to get to all the juicy parts. He wasn't even an interesting personality or commentator, really. I should not have been enjoying it as much as I was.

Edited September 9 by Last Guy on the Bench

[Tulsabillsfanz]

5 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

 

I think that is a good point on the FG try. He was making the Bills execution be perfrct and maximising his chance of a block because the Ravens could time their jump.

 

I still think they should have run Lamar on 3rd down. That was the call I was fearful of. I was happy to see him chuck it short of the sticks.

When Lamar ran over to Hopkins and spoke in his ear before that 3rd down play, I told my son that we better be all over Hopkins because Lamar is throwing it to him….. he immediately did.     

[Buffalo716]

56 minutes ago, mathja said:

Not quite on topic, but I’ve watched the replay of the field goal a bunch of times and I think it was Kyle Hamilton that almost got through and blocked it. He was visibly upset because he literally just missed it. I can’t believe how unblocked he was.

The end man on our line of scrimmage chucked their Edge guy, leaving the inside route 

 

Yes it was very close, it also isn't as close as it seems based on his effort and blocking technique

 

he needed to lay out Superman style and get it almost off the boot... he jumped like a volleyball player trying to knock down a spike

 

And a long time professional kicker like prater can get it up and around that

[AKC]

1 hour ago, dave mcbride said:

Also, the Bills could thrown a deliberate incomplete end zone fase pass on third down and gotten the clock down to 10 or so seconds. The fg takes around 5 seconds, and then you kick it out of the end zone (no chance for a td return). They have 5-6 seconds and no timeouts and therefore have to complete a 65 yard hail mary.

 

 

Great point. As that last 15 seconds ticked down all I could think of was a kicker who had been in our gear for a few days- what could possibly go wrong here?

[Low Positive]

13 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

 

I think that is a good point on the FG try. He was making the Bills execution be perfrct and maximising his chance of a block because the Ravens could time their jump.

 

I still think they should have run Lamar on 3rd down. That was the call I was fearful of. I was happy to see him chuck it short of the sticks.

As I said in the other thread, I usually don't know what I'm looking at but what I see when I watch that is that the Bills were expecting Lamar to run to the left and had contain. That's why Oliver was out there and his rush was delayed.

[Scott7975]

1 hour ago, Last Guy on the Bench said:

Heard an interesting point from a Dolphins fan (I was watching a reaction video and enjoying their crushing disbelief). At the end of the game, when the Bills were just downing it, forcing the Ravens to use up their timeouts so the Bills could kick with no time left, Harbaugh could have forced them into more of a scramble drill. After the 2nd Down knee, Harbaugh uses his last timeout right away at 32 seconds. The Bills can now down it one more time and than have a relatively leisurely half minute to get the kicking team out there, which is what happened. Instead, Harbaugh could have let the clock run down a bit to maybe 15 seconds or so. Then the Bills have much less time after the knee to get the field goal team in place. They could still do it, but it would be rushed.

 

In fact, he could have caused quite a panic even before that - the Bills are expecting the timeout there, but was the FG team ready to run on if Harbaugh didn't call time out at all? If he just let the clock run. Even if they do react well and run out there in good order while the clock is ticking, Harbaugh can still call his time out with enough on the clock that they don't want to kick on third down, so they have to go through the condensed knee/switch units deal. Maybe they decide to just kick on third down with 15 seconds left, rather than risk it, but then the Ravens at least get a kickoff and Hail Mary.

 

Anyway, thought that was interesting, from a very depressed Dolphins fan. Sorry if this was already discussed. I tried to read everything, but may have missed it.

 

If Harbaugh called his last timeout at 15 seconds then I just run the FG unit out there and then there is no fire drill.  Im not worried about the Ravens scoring in roughly 10 seconds with no timeouts.

[Psautcsk]

1 minute ago, Scott7975 said:

 

If Harbaugh called his last timeout at 15 seconds then I just run the FG unit out there and then there is no fire drill.  Im not worried about the Ravens scoring in roughly 10 seconds with no timeouts.

I would have been worried. Very worried.

[Scott7975]

1 minute ago, Psautcsk said:

I would have been worried. Very worried.

 

Not me. It would take some fluke. I know flukes happen but I still don't worry about them.

[Buffalo716]

4 minutes ago, Psautcsk said:

I would have been worried. Very worried.

With a quarterback who can't throw from the pocket like mahomes or Allen? Not worried with 10 seconds left lol

 

I would be worried with a minute and 25 seconds left

[Psautcsk]

2 minutes ago, Scott7975 said:

 

Not me. It would take some fluke. I know flukes happen but I still don't worry about them.

You are a better man than me!

[dave mcbride]

16 minutes ago, Psautcsk said:

You are a better man than me!

The chiefs had 3 TOs in the 13-second game.

[CSBill]

3 hours ago, Last Guy on the Bench said:

Heard an interesting point from a Dolphins fan (I was watching a reaction video and enjoying their crushing disbelief). At the end of the game, when the Bills were just downing it, forcing the Ravens to use up their timeouts so the Bills could kick with no time left, Harbaugh could have forced them into more of a scramble drill. After the 2nd Down knee, Harbaugh uses his last timeout right away at 32 seconds. The Bills can now down it one more time and than have a relatively leisurely half minute to get the kicking team out there, which is what happened. Instead, Harbaugh could have let the clock run down a bit to maybe 15 seconds or so. Then the Bills have much less time after the knee to get the field goal team in place. They could still do it, but it would be rushed.

 

In fact, he could have caused quite a panic even before that - the Bills are expecting the timeout there, but was the FG team ready to run on if Harbaugh didn't call time out at all? If he just let the clock run. Even if they do react well and run out there in good order while the clock is ticking, Harbaugh can still call his time out with enough on the clock that they don't want to kick on third down, so they have to go through the condensed knee/switch units deal. Maybe they decide to just kick on third down with 15 seconds left, rather than risk it, but then the Ravens at least get a kickoff and Hail Mary.

 

Anyway, thought that was interesting, from a very depressed Dolphins fan. Sorry if this was already discussed. I tried to read everything, but may have missed it.

 

If there were no timeout, the offense could line up, let the clock run 3 seconds, and spike the ball.

[Matt_In_NH]

Ha.  I just came here to start this same thread.    It would have been way more interesting if harbaugh let the time tick.  At some point the bills would have been forced to send the kick team out on third down.  And if he called timeout with like 12 seconds it probably would have forced the bills to kick on third and would have at least gotten a kickoff.  

1 hour ago, Scott7975 said:

 

If Harbaugh called his last timeout at 15 seconds then I just run the FG unit out there and then there is no fire drill.  Im not worried about the Ravens scoring in roughly 10 seconds with no timeouts.

Ok but it would have been a better strategy than what they did.  I actually think just not calling the timeout and watching what the bills did would have been interesting.