What is win probability in football?

Win probability is the chance that a team wins the game from a given situation: the score, the time left, the down and distance, the field position and the timeouts. A team down 3 with the ball at midfield and a minute left might win about a third of the time. We use win probability tables from nflverse, built from real NFL games.

Why did my call get red when it worked?

Grades judge the decision, not the outcome. If a deep pass gains 40 yards but, on average, that call from that spot loses more win probability than a quick out, it is still graded on its average. The same goes the other way: a good call that falls incomplete stays green.

Does the game know what defense is called?

No. Results come from real NFL plays of the same type from a similar field position late in close games, so the defenses you face are the ones NFL offenses actually saw in those spots, but you do not pick or see the coverage.

Can two players get different results from the same call?

Not on the daily drive. The result of each call is fixed by the drive, the snap number, your tempo and your call, so everyone who makes the same calls gets the same drive. That keeps scores comparable.

How the play-calling grades work

Method version 1, updated October 16, 2026.

Daily Play Call grades every play call by win probability: the chance your team wins from the spot the call leaves you in. Here is exactly how that number is produced, and where it can be wrong.

1. The situations are real

Every drive is a real NFL drive from the 2022 to 2026 seasons where the team with the ball was tied or behind by up to 8 points with 20 seconds to 4 minutes left in the fourth quarter. You start with the real score, clock, down, distance, field position and timeouts. After the first snap the drive is yours, so it can go differently from the real game.

2. Results come from real plays

There are nine play calls (inside run, outside run, QB sneak, quick out, short middle, screen, deep sideline, deep middle and play action) plus spike, kneel, field goal and punt. Each play call has a library of real NFL plays of that type, run late in close games, grouped by field position. When you call a play, the result is one of those real plays: the yards gained, whether the pass was complete, whether the runner got out of bounds, a sack, an interception or a fumble. Play types come from nflverse play-by-play data and FTN charting (play action, screen and QB sneak). Sacks and scrambles have no target in the data, so they are spread across the drop-back pass calls in proportion to how often each is called, with deep calls weighted higher.

3. The clock works like the NFL clock

Incomplete passes, plays that end out of bounds, timeouts and the two-minute warning stop the clock.
When the clock is running you choose a tempo: hurry up (about 13 seconds to the snap), huddle (about 25) or bleed the clock (about 38), or call a timeout.
A spike stops the clock about 6 seconds later and uses a down.
Field goal tries use NFL make rates by distance from 2022 to 2026. A touchdown counts as 7 points.

4. Every call is simulated before you see your result

On each snap we take every call you could have made and play the rest of the drive out 1,000 times. After the first play, the calls are made by a typical NFL play-caller: the mix of calls real NFL teams made in that down, distance, field position, time and score, plus standard end-of-game choices such as kicking a tying field goal on the last play. Each simulated drive ends in a score, a turnover or the end of the game, and is turned into a win probability using nflverse win probability for the other team’s next possession.

5. Grades and scores

Grade	Win probability given up vs the best call
🟩 Best call	1.5 points or less
🟨 Close	up to 3.5 points
🟧 Costly	up to 7 points
🟥 Big mistake	more than 7 points

Your final score is the share of typical NFL play-callers you beat: we compare your total win probability given up with thousands of simulated play-callers who call the same snaps the way real NFL teams do. “Beat the real coach” compares your average points given up per call with the real head coach’s average on the real drive, graded the same way.

When we graded the real coaches on all 575 drives in the game, about 39% of their calls were green, 34% yellow, 19% orange and 8% red. So a red call is rare even for NFL coaches, and a run of greens is a good drive.

6. Difficulty

Each drive is rated from how often a typical NFL play-caller wins it from the opening snap: Easy is 35% or more, Hard is under 15%, Medium is in between. The daily schedule mixes them and never puts two Hard drives on back-to-back days.

Limits

This is a model, not a replay of the real game. It does not know the players on the field, the weather, injuries or the defense’s call. Results are drawn from plays grouped by field position, so the same pass call can have a similar result from your own 30 and your own 40. Near the goal line, plays that scored from farther out count only the yards that were available. With 1,000 simulations per call, two calls within about a point of each other are close to a tie. If you spot something that looks wrong, write to contact@dailyplaycall.com.

Data and credits

Play-by-play and win probability data: nflverse. Charting data (play action, screens, QB sneaks): FTN Data via nflverse, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Team names are used only to identify real games; this site is not affiliated with the NFL. Play today’s drive.