![]() As we saw at the end of the game the raiders could’ve very well chosen to take the tie and they chose not to. The fact that a timeout was called only increased the chargers chances of getting out of there with a tie prior to knowing the outcome of the 3rd down call. ![]() The chargers not calling a timeout and the raiders running out the clock after running a play on 3rd down would’ve resulted in the raiders still taking a timeout with the 2 seconds on the clock to still win the game regardless but at this point with less risk knowing as long as the field goal doesn’t get blocked it’s at worst a tie for them. This would’ve increases the likelihood of the raiders actually punting it to down the chargers deep in their territory with the risk of still losing the game. The Raiders could’ve still attempted to kick a long field goal (50+ yards) to win the game but at that point with it being 4th down and still time on the clock, they run the risk of missing it and the chargers getting the ball back with a shortened field and not knowing if they would choose to try to drive the field for a field goal. This would’ve put the raiders in a situation where they would’ve been less inclined to win the game with the risk at hand. If the chargers could have gotten a stop on 3rd down, they would have had a timeout to stop the clock again with presumably 30 or so seconds left. There were 38 seconds left in the game and very few time left on the play clock (<3) when the chargers called that timeout. He said he thought the Chargers were thinking "why not just let time expire?' (Not a quote of his words-just an insertion of what the reference of the "thought" was.) It's all right there for anyone who wants to see it. It just didn't seem that way to Staley, who happens to be the person that mattered at that moment in time. The intention at that point - given the unique circumstances - seems completely apparent. Let the play clock tick all the way down, repeat. At 2 minutes, at midfield, you stop throwing the ball and just hand it off. So the question is: what would it look like for that to happen? In my mind, we saw exactly what it would look like. Both teams had to wonder if it got to the point where, inside of 2 minutes left in the game, they could just drain the clock-why wouldn't they? People were literally asking this question all afternoon heading into this game. Obviously the condition of not playing to win is not a usual one-the circumstances, however, were unique. I'm not making any assumptions-I'm going off what he said. They only needed to run one last play for the time to be under the 40 seconds needed for the OT period to expire.
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