Guest Blogger: In Defense of Both Mickey Matthews and His Firing
It seems to me that if you’ve been paying attention to JMU football over the last few years, you had an understanding that Coach Matthews’ job was less than secure. Some of that insecurity is due to expectations built up over a successful run from 1999-2013 or at least the appearance of one. Matthews compiled a .606 winning %, appeared in the playoffs 6 times, and won one national championship. However, his tenure was not great across the board: There were 7 years that were marked by a record of .500 or worse in conference play. Was it reasonable to expect anything different over the last few years? (Note: 2010 and 2013 were years in which JMU was less than .500 in conference play). An argument could be made that while frustrating in any particular year, Matthews gave us exactly what was reasonable to expect given his career at JMU- moments of greatness while moments of futility. Just two short years ago, JMU got to the second round of the playoffs. This was only the third time this happened in Matthews’ tenure. In fact Matthews’ greatest run was from 2004 to 2008 which went championship, missed playoffs, first round loss, first round loss, semi-finals loss. This run was bookended on one side by 4 consecutive years without a playoff appearance and on the other side by two years without a playoff appearance. It isn’t rational to expect any different than what we know already from Matthews and what we know is that his tenure was marked by highs and lows. Does this mean Matthews should have been retained? I don’t think so but the reality is that our expectations should have been in line with Matthews’ track record
I do think Matthews should have been removed as coach because of his coaching. I want to admit that I am by no means a football know-it-all. I know football neither as well as Rob nor Todd nor some of the commenters on this blog. However, I have studied the behavior of high-level managers in similar settings; namely, CEOs and MLB managers. Individuals in these positions are unique because it is hard to measure their ‘input to production’. It is easy to measure how many hits/TDs a ‘worker’ gets and the effect of those on wins. The inherent problem is “how many of those hits/TDs are due to coaching?” Coaches, like CEOs, are graded on circumstances beyond their control. Coaches certainly have an effect on which plays are run but not how they are run. Players can be taught but there are things that are ‘random’ that have an effect as well- weather, mindset of the players, etc. As such, coaches are compensated for the uncertainty inherent in evaluation of their job performance. For instance, Matthews’ makes more than the average person but only when you fail to account for the randomness. Under a rational pay scheme, pay should increase as it becomes harder to measure the input to production. Hence, middle managers make more than line workers etc.
This uncertainty leads managers to make decisions that may or may not lead to positive outcomes. They make these decisions to minimize the uncertainty. If we look at mutual fund managers, we can see that they tend to pick the same stocks as their peers. They do this because a manager who deviates from the norm and fails looks much worse than a manager who deviates from and succeeds look better. This result is irrational but holds in a variety of settings: ‘taking a chance’ and failing hurts you more than ‘taking a chance’ and succeeding helps you. As such, managers who are in fear of their jobs tend to ‘herd’ with other managers. In baseball, this result is clear. We see managers bunt in situations where it is irrational to do so because it is the seen as ‘right’ thing to do, i.e. go along with the herd. In football, we see this same behavior. Matthews’ tenure illustrates it perfectly. During the 2004 to 2008 time period (when I was sucked back into JMU football by Rob and Todd), I loved watching JMU eschew the punt in favor of going for it on 4th down many more times than the average team. This behavior is rational. It has been shown by an Economist that teams should go for it much more often than they do. One of the reasons the author gives for this seemingly irrational behavior is that the ‘conservative’ play is a herd mentality (and demonstrates severe risk aversion). I believe that as Matthews began to worry about his job, he played more conservatively and as such, lost more games.
What should you take from this? 1) Our expectations of Matthews were at least partly unfair. We expected him to be better than what his career illustrated. 2) These expectations led Matthews to fear for his job. 3) As the probability of being fired increased, Matthews exhibited herd behavior and lost more games.
This was a guest post written by friend of JMUSB, Rich Prisinzano (aka Coach Priz in the comments). Rich is a JMU grad who went on to earn his PhD in Economics from the University of Texas becasue he convinced the department studying the hiring and firing of MLB managers was valid economic research. He’s also taught Sports Economics at Southwestern University and Johns Hopkins University and has been published in the Journal of Sports Economics.
I did notice that he went for it on 4th down a lot more often and I suspected it was because he feared for his job. Glad to know I wasn’t the only one thinking along those lines.
As a fellow PhD economist and JMU alum (’98) I greatly enjoyed this analysis.
Short and sweet, a hell of a write up!
@Kevin – no kidding. I was ’97. That makes 3 PhDs in 2 years since there’s another one in my cohort.
Coach Priz – I know of two other PhDs from my year. An upward sloping trend!
I knew within the first 1/2 paragraph that this was written by an economist. The scent was overwhelming.
My roommate was an econ major, so here we go:
As a fellow Zane Showker School of Business Alum, I would define economics as the study of the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services without actually participating in the creating of any of them. Economists prognosticate future trends based on a set of grossly generalized assumptions that are, quite often, false. Or not based in practical reality.
For example:
“Matthews gave us exactly what was reasonable to expect given his career at JMU”- That is correct. That is why he got fired.
“It isn’t rational to expect any different than what we know already from Matthews” -Also correct….also why he got fired.
“but the reality is that our expectations should have been in line with Matthews’ track record” -No. If there is any relation to economics here, it would be to your beloved demand curve. Our expectation to win is the demand curve. The supply curve needs to be shifted to create equilibrium. Thank you, Jeff Bourne.
“certainly have an effect on which plays are run but not how they are run.” -This is flat out false. You coach fundamentals 5 days a week, 5 months a year so that the plays are run correctly. If they aren’t, you either didn’t coach well, or you recruited a munch of morons. Either way, it is the coach’s fault.
” As such, coaches are compensated for the uncertainty inherent in evaluation of their job performance.” No, they aren’t. Coaches are compensated for the residual and projected financial gain the investment in their salary will bring to the university. Every job on earth has to account for “randomness”. It has nothing at all to do with compensation. Salaries are investments by employers who expect a return. You either meet their expected return or you don’t. if you don’t, you get fired. If their expectation of return was unrealistic based on inputs….. you still get fired. The employer holds the assets and therfore gets to call the shots.
“This behavior is rational. It has been shown by an Economist that teams should go for it much more often than they do” -Typical of economists, the entire study was conducted under the microscope of 3rd and 4th down conversions. It virtually ignored the probability of A) the offense actually scoring on subsequent plays, and B) the defense stopping the opponent after a punt, which decreases the risk of having the opponent gain valuble field position and frequently advances the ball over the course of the game via positive field position. Both of these are also affected by your aforementioned “random” events, such as Harrisonburg’s 20 mph north wind that occationally blasts through the Purple Palace. The goal is to win the game (all 60 mins of it, ODU)…. not just to win a 2 play series.
I miss arguing with economists 🙂 Loved your write up, though!
-The Zane Showker Alumni Accounting Department.
This is a class they should be offering at JMU. Great write up.
Accounting Department, first of all I love the sort of comment you made. It’s opinionated, but shows respect for the counter argument, and it’s funny. However, I don’t think expectations equal the demand curve. Expectations are one of several (non-price) determinants for the demand curve, but they’re not equivalents. And if you do want to carry forward the supply and demand curve analogies, I assume you’re plotting number of wins on the horizontal axis. How does Bourne control that supply?
Actually, it might be kind of fun for us to explore how exactly we could plot the supply & demand for wins. It’d be cool to see what sort of factors production go into wins. Well, fun for me in a completely geeky sort of way at least.
Thanks everybody for the comments.
@Accounting – I’m glad I could help rekindle your JMU days. This will probably help even more:
First- All of your points about the paper are actually addressed in the paper. Most are accoutned for in the expected value of an action. THe author did not break things down by particular team or place and you may think that games against Green Bay may have more wind or what not but since the sample is large these should was out. That doesn’t mean that coaches should ignore conditions or the fact that 3 points means much more in OT than in the first quarter but again the author addresses these issues.
Your point about the supply and demand is a little confusing but I don’t think we disagree: Demanders of JMU wins wanted more than we got. However, It was unfair to expect those wins from Matthews. Solution: get a coach that can supply those wins.
Your other points about coaching- Coaches actually can’t control how plays are run. There is enough randomness in each play that makes it very hard. I can think of plays where a defensive player falls down but ends up making the play because he fell down. I am thinking of a reverse where the defense over pursues but one guy falls down and as such makes the play. And yes, this happened to me recently in an Old Guy Flag Football game. That outcome is particularly bad for the coach and had nothing to do with anything he had control over. The compensation of the coach takes this into account- fans will think he is worse than he really is and want him fired. You see this with CEOs. Stock prices fall and the CEO is fired but the stock price fell because a hurricane took out 3 refineries. CEOs are compensated for this randomness that is beyond their control.
@Rob- I think we could plot the supply and demand out actually. There would be ‘confidence intervals’ around the curves but we could see some interesting things. For instance, we could see the how ‘tolerance’ for losses change over time. I did something like this for my dissertation with MLB.
I think a bigger question is: What is the output of JMU football? Is it wins, $, more applicants, etc… ?
The output question would be particularly interesting to analyze given that JMU appears to be in the midst of an FBS go/no-go decision. If we knew what the administration considers the output of the football program to be, then we could probably build some sort of model to help analyze the potential return on investment.
I’m lost—I’m just a history major.
This was a refreshing geek-fest.
This is also why I love talking football with JMU alums more than VT alums.
Coach Priz-
My roommate and I used to have semester long arguements over theoretical economics versus practical accounting/finance. All in good fun, obviously. Makes me miss the ‘burg. And being a student with lots of free time and no responsibilities. I’ll be awaiting your supply/demand curve plot. lol
Rob-
Bourne (representing the CEO…not Matthews, who actually represents a department manager) controls the supply of wins….”outputs” if you will….. by shifting the supply curve. In business, we often shift the supply curve via a technological advance… such as a new machine than can produce twice as much as the old machine in the same amount of time. If the head football coach is the asset (machine) that produces a good (wins), then an upgrade in technology (a better coach) will shift the supply curve (of wins) upward, and will bring the supply of wins into equilibrium with the demand for wins (expectations of stakeholders).
The only other alternative to achieve equalibrium is to shift demand to meet supply… i.e. tell everyone to stop expecting our team to win (fat chance of that). I mean… we theoretically (tip of the hat to the econ dept) could keep Matthews and send out a letter at the beginning of the year establishing an artificial ceiling: “Dear JMU Nation: Due to ongoing events within the athletic department, we will win no more than 6 or 7 games this season. We appreciate your support.”
Obviously there is a risk here that the replacement coach could suck. You can make an omlette without breaking some eggs, and no successful venture ever happened without taking a risk.
*can’t make…
Old Dominion just announced that it has hired JMU assistant Ulrich Edmonds as its new linebackers coach. The mass exodus has begun.
Hey, Gary Kubiak just got fired. Let’s start a rumor.
Haha Rob…I’m with you. I graduated with a marketing degree and was lost when the first percentages were thrown around. Though, this was my favorite post of the year for two reasons:
1) I couldn’t get frustrated about the football team because I didn’t understand anything that was written
2) Makes me proud that there are so many smart JMU grads out there.
Sorry…meant Ryan
Can Priz use him economics wizardry to help Bourne find a successful, young, long term solution at head coach for JMU?
Can we start a petition to avoid any chance of hiring Shane Beamer?
Who cares? Some people on this blog remember a time when this was a basketball first school. Except for the fact it has playoffs, I-AA, FCS, whatever – it sucks.
We’re 10 games into what’s looking like a rough men’s basketball season. Whoever did this brutal road schedule (Bourne?) needs to be fired. Just stupid and incompetent work.
Xerk- Please don’t remind me of the dark ages. It’s depressing.
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