Sean McDermott was thinking about Bills’ “morale” when he kicked field goals

[Billy Buffalo]

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Bills coach Sean McDermott may realize, in hindsight, that he should have been more aggressive on fourth downs in Sunday’s AFC Championship Game. But at the time, he thought he had to play it safe.

McDermott said today that he worried about going for it on fourth down and seeing his team get discouraged if they failed. McDermott said “morale” was a big part of his reason for kicking field goals on fourth-and-goal from the 2-yard-line and fourth-and-3 from the 8-yard-line.

But what would have been really great for the Bills’ morale — and their chances of winning the game — would have been scoring touchdowns on those two plays instead of settling for field goals. The Bills were underdogs against the Chiefs and had to know they’d need to take some chances to win. McDermott declined to take those chances on fourth downs.

Analytics research has consistently shown that coaches should go for it on fourth down more often than they do. McDermott may have thought he was giving his team’s morale a boost, but he wasn’t giving his team the best chance to win.