NFL head coaches are presumably very smart football thinkers, but sometimes, they overthink decisions to an embarrassing degree.
Indianapolis Colts head coach Chuck Pagano may have outsmarted himself into making an unexplainable play call in his team's Sunday night loss against the New England Patriots in Indianapolis. At a critical juncture in the game -- down 27-21 with just over a minute left to go in the third quarter -- Pagano had his team lined up to punt the ball on fourth-and-3.
Until, he didn't. The Colts shifted their formation to fake the punt and try and pick up the three yards needed for a first down. But instead of quarterback Andrew Luck lined up to lead his team to gain those three yards, wide receiver Griff Whalen and safety Colt Anderson were left in charge of the ball.
Then everything went wrong.
Not only did the Patriots totally stuff the play, but referees flagged it because the Colts' formation was totally illegal anyway. The Patriots declined the penalty, took over possession of the ball and scored a touchdown six plays later, icing an eventual 34-27 Patriots win.
There wasn't a single thing about this fake punt that made sense, but Pagano, presumably a top football mind, drew it up and called it. So coach, what happened?
"I didn't do a good enough job coaching it during the week," Pagano said postgame, going on to explain the cloak-and-dagger idea behind the play:
"The whole idea there on fourth-and-3 or less [is] shift the alignment so you either catch them misaligned, they try to sub some people in, catch them with 12 men on the field and if you get a certain look, you've got three yards, two yards and you can make a play.
Alignment-wise we weren't lined up correctly and a communication breakdown between the quarterback and the snapper [occurred] and that's all on me. I take full responsibility on that. And I didn't do a good enough job of getting that communicated to the guys"
Colts players, having seen the game slip away due to a coaching folly, were left stunned. Whalen, the Colts player who snapped the ball, also said postgame that the snap was "miscommunicated." Colts punter Pat McAfee, who should've handled and punted the ball on the botched play called it "one of the most failed fakes probably of all time."
Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman, however, had the best explanation for it the play:
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