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BGonline.org Forums
OT -- Weekend Football Observations -- Long
Posted By: Steve Mellen In Response To: OT -- Weekend Football Observations -- Long (Bill Riles)
Date: Tuesday, 26 October 2010, at 2:41 p.m.
The reason why Missouri invariably wins in the situations where they lead by 9 is not the extra information they possess, it is the fact that it is very hard to score twice in three minutes. Yes, if Oklahoma attempts an onside kick and fails, they will surely lose, but they lose because of the game situation, not because of the information.
A useful way to think about this problem is to pretend that the result of the inevitable 2-point conversion attempt is sealed inside an envelope. Who gains if the envelope remains sealed, and no one knows if Oklahoma needs two scores or only one?
Oklahoma has to choose between two very different strategies depending on whether they need one score or two. Needing one score, they will most likely kick deep and try to hold on defense. They would never kick deep if they knew they needed two scores. The information still does not have that much value, since they are very unlikely to get two scores even if they know they need them, but at least they have a nonzero chance of success provided they know.
Missouri, on the other hand, does not suffer in the least from their lack of information, because they will assume that Oklahoma needs only one score and will play optimally to prevent that outcome. In the scenarios where they are wrong, it does not matter because they win all of those games despite suboptimal play.
Treating the outcome of the 2-point conversion as if it were sealed in an envelope also helps prevent the sort of sloppy analysis where one assumes a miss if the attempt occurs immediately, but a chance of success if the attempt is delayed. If the envelope contains a miss now then it will contain a miss later.
A couple questions to help anyone focus their analysis:
A) If the envelope contains a successful 2-point conversion, would Oklahoma rather find out now or later?
B) If the envelope contains a miss, would Oklahoma rather find out now or later?
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