Week 7 · Monday · Time Card

Week 7 Time Card

DK main slate · graded Oct 26, 2026

Every Monday we punch the Time Card: what the Clock Out Model said before kickoff, what actually happened, and what we're changing. Wins and misses both go on the card.

Projections are the final Clock Out numbers published before the main slate started (Oct 25, 11:49 AM CT). Actual points are DraftKings scoring computed from nflverse box-score stats. 'Proj own' is our own large-field ownership projection; real contest ownership isn't available from free sources, so it isn't shown. Monday night (Cowboys @ Eagles, Oct 26) hasn't been played yet, so it isn't graded here. Steelers @ Saints (London, 8:30 AM CT) and Chiefs @ Seahawks (Sunday night) weren't on the DK main slate.

The model's week

0.56How closely projections tracked actual points (correlation, 1.0 = perfect)

5.7Average miss, in DK points

167Players graded (projection over 3 and played)

On average players scored 0.5 points less than projected. By position:

Position	Players	Correlation	Average miss	Scored vs projection
QB	20	0.25	5.9	+0.0
RB	36	0.42	6.4	+2.6
WR	65	0.59	5.7	-1.7
TE	26	0.47	5.4	-0.9
DST	20	0.09	4.5	-2.2

The league-winner call: Cam Skattebo

On Saturday I said Skattebo was a league-winner if he starts. The model had him as a committee back at 5.0 points. Here's what he did.

22.1 DK points · 17 carries, 124 yards, 1 TD; 1 catch on 1 target, -3 yards, 0 TD

Player	Salary	Proj	Actual	Proj own
Cam Skattebo RB NYG	$5,100	5.0	22.1	<1%

Punching In

Core plays everyone's on. 0 of 5 went our way.

Player	Salary	Proj	Actual	Proj own	Call	Result
Jahmyr Gibbs RB DET	$9,800	30.9	21.3	57%	Play	Fell short
Jordan Love QB GB	$6,000	23.2	18.0	8%	Play	Fell short
Matthew Golden WR GB	$6,000	19.8	9.9	14%	Play	Fell short
C.J. Stroud QB HOU	$5,700	20.6	16.5	8%	Play	Fell short
Vikings DST MIN	$3,500	10.6	10.0	16%	Play	Fell short

Love-Hate Relationship

High-variance plays I hate but can't quit. 3 of 4 went our way.

Player	Salary	Proj	Actual	Proj own	Call	Result
Jonathan Taylor RB IND	$8,000	17.0	19.0	8%	Play	Beat projection
Braelon Allen RB NYJ	$5,900	13.5	22.4	4%	Play	Beat projection
Jahan Dotson WR ATL	$3,700	8.7	1.6	3%	Play	Fell short
Ollie Gordon II RB MIA	$5,500	12.8	20.3	3%	Play	Beat projection

I'm Clocking Out

Popular plays I'm fading. 2 of 3 went our way.

Player	Salary	Proj	Actual	Proj own	Call	Result
Jalon Daniels QB TB	$4,500	1.0	-0.3	<1%	Fade	Fade worked
Jared Goff QB DET	$6,800	20.7	22.0	16%	Fade	Fade missed
Keenan Allen WR IND	$4,800	13.8	6.1	6%	Fade	Fade worked

Saturday Thoughts calls

The named plays and fades from Saturday Thoughts. 10 of 16 went our way.

Player	Salary	Proj	Actual	Proj own	Call	Result
Jahmyr Gibbs RB DET	$9,800	30.9	21.3	57%	Fade	Fade worked
Jordan Love QB GB	$6,000	23.2	18.0	8%	Fade	Fade worked
Matthew Golden WR GB	$6,000	19.8	9.9	14%	Fade	Fade worked
Bijan Robinson RB ATL	$8,500	22.0	17.2	22%	Play	Fell short
Malik Willis QB MIA	$4,700	15.4	26.0	1%	Play	Beat projection
Malik Washington WR MIA	$4,900	12.5	6.5	3%	Play	Fell short
Geno Smith QB NYJ	$5,100	14.1	24.5	2%	Play	Beat projection
Omar Cooper Jr. WR NYJ	$4,100	12.5	25.5	5%	Play	Beat projection
Bryce Young QB CAR	$5,900	18.0	8.4	5%	Play	Fell short
Jalen Coker WR CAR	$6,100	15.4	1.9	9%	Play	Fell short
Ashton Jeanty RB LV	$6,500	16.0	21.6	9%	Play	Beat projection
Kirk Cousins QB LV	$5,800	16.4	20.4	4%	Play	Beat projection
Brock Bowers TE LV	$7,700	16.6	13.3	9%	Play	Fell short
Tucker Kraft TE GB	$4,700	10.5	14.8	6%	Play	Beat projection
Trey McBride TE ARI	$7,400	17.1	30.1	7%	Fade	Fade missed
Cam Skattebo RB NYG	$5,100	5.0	22.1	<1%	Play	Beat projection

Sunday cores

Core	Salary	Proj	Actual
Core 1: Kirk / Bowers / Watson / CMC / Bucky	$34,200	90.4	93.4
Core 2: Bryce / Coker / Bijan / Texans D	$23,900	62.6	30.5
Core 3: Kyler / Jefferson / London / Kraft	$24,900	59.8	56.7
Core 4: Geno / Garrett / Nabers / Chase Brown	$25,000	61.9	60.0

Biggest hits

Our named calls that went best (a play that beat projection, or a fade that fell short).

Player	From	Call	Proj	Actual
Cam Skattebo	Saturday Thoughts calls	Play	5.0	22.1
Omar Cooper Jr.	Saturday Thoughts calls	Play	12.5	25.5
Malik Willis	Saturday Thoughts calls	Play	15.4	26.0

Biggest misses

Our named calls that went worst.

Player	From	Call	Proj	Actual
Jalen Coker	Saturday Thoughts calls	Play	15.4	1.9
Trey McBride	Saturday Thoughts calls	Fade	17.1	30.1
Matthew Golden	Punching In	Play	19.8	9.9

Where the model missed most

Scored well above projection:

Player	Salary	Proj	Actual	Proj own
Tony Pollard RB TEN	$5,300	10.0	39.5	2%
Mason Taylor TE NYJ	$2,800	7.6	25.2	2%
Cam Skattebo RB NYG	$5,100	5.0	22.1	<1%
KC Concepcion Jr. WR CLE	$4,400	10.7	26.2	3%
Tee Higgins WR CIN	$6,600	14.7	29.8	9%

Scored well below projection:

Player	Salary	Proj	Actual	Proj own
Jalen Coker WR CAR	$6,100	15.4	1.9	9%
Nico Collins WR HOU	$7,200	15.6	2.6	12%
Isaiah Likely TE NYG	$5,300	15.2	3.2	6%
Derrick Henry RB BAL	$7,900	17.3	5.9	20%
Panthers DST CAR	$3,000	7.3	-4.0	6%

Shift Sim boom check

A boom is the sim's own line: at least 4 times salary (for example, 24 points at $6,000). Shift Sim numbers are from the last run published before the main slate started (Oct 25, 11:27 AM CT). Across 167 players the sim expected 20.8 booms and we got 22.

Sim boom rate	Players	Sim said	Actually boomed
Under 10%	72	6%	7% (5)
10-20%	68	15%	16% (11)
20-30%	25	25%	24% (6)
30%+	2	35%	0% (0)

Published list, 'boom plays at $6,500 or less': 2 of 10 boomed.

Player	Salary	Sim boom rate	Boom line	Actual	Boomed?
Jordan Love QB GB	$6,000	38%	24.0	18.0	No
C.J. Stroud QB HOU	$5,700	33%	22.8	16.5	No
George Kittle TE SF	$5,700	30%	22.8	15.8	No
Raiders DST LV	$2,000	29%	8.0	1.0	No
Bengals DST CIN	$2,500	27%	10.0	10.0	Yes
Vikings DST MIN	$3,500	27%	14.0	10.0	No
Matthew Golden WR GB	$6,000	26%	24.0	9.9	No
Kyle Pitts Sr. TE ATL	$4,000	25%	16.0	13.2	No
Buccaneers DST TB	$2,200	25%	8.8	19.0	Yes
Matthew Stafford QB LAR	$6,400	25%	25.6	18.5	No

Every boom on the slate:

Player	Salary	Proj	Actual	Sim boom rate	Proj own
Tony Pollard RB TEN	$5,300	10.0	39.5	4%	2%
Zay Flowers WR BAL	$6,900	16.7	30.7	12%	17%
Trey McBride TE ARI	$7,400	17.1	30.1	11%	7%
Tee Higgins WR CIN	$6,600	14.7	29.8	10%	9%
Joe Burrow QB CIN	$6,900	19.6	28.9	16%	11%
Bucky Irving RB TB	$6,100	14.0	27.0	9%	5%
KC Concepcion Jr. WR CLE	$4,400	10.7	26.2	13%	3%
Bo Nix QB DEN	$5,000	15.8	26.2	23%	3%
Jameson Williams WR DET	$5,800	12.0	26.1	9%	9%
Malik Willis QB MIA	$4,700	15.4	26.0	24%	1%
Omar Cooper Jr. WR NYJ	$4,100	12.5	25.5	23%	5%
Mason Taylor TE NYJ	$2,800	7.6	25.2	17%	2%
Geno Smith QB NYJ	$5,100	14.1	24.5	14%	2%
Tre Tucker WR LV	$5,200	11.2	24.3	8%	4%
Quinshon Judkins RB CLE	$5,400	13.8	23.4	13%	3%
Deshaun Watson QB CLE	$5,200	15.1	22.2	16%	2%
Cam Skattebo RB NYG	$5,100	5.0	22.1	0%	<1%
Caleb Douglas WR MIA	$4,000	9.3	21.0	12%	2%
Buccaneers DST TB	$2,200	6.1	19.0	25%	3%
Greg Dulcich TE MIA	$3,200	8.9	13.6	18%	2%
Falcons DST ATL	$2,200	5.5	11.0	22%	3%
Bengals DST CIN	$2,500	7.4	10.0	27%	11%

Thursday night: Patriots @ Bears (Showdown)

Final Showdown numbers from Oct 22, 6:22 PM CT. Correlation 0.72, average miss 5.8 points across 19 players.

Player	Flex salary	Proj	Actual	Proj own
Drake Maye QB NE	$10,600	23.7	31.4	65%
Caleb Williams QB CHI	$10,400	18.1	25.1	60%
D'Andre Swift RB CHI	$9,800	17.3	19.0	56%
A.J. Brown WR NE	$9,000	17.0	7.8	63%
Luther Burden III WR CHI	$8,400	12.3	26.7	21%
Hunter Henry TE NE	$6,200	10.8	14.1	24%
Colston Loveland TE CHI	$6,400	10.1	19.9	18%
Rhamondre Stevenson RB NE	$7,800	9.9	22.5	12%
DeMario Douglas WR NE	$6,600	9.0	5.3	12%
Cairo Santos K CHI	$5,000	8.4	15.0	17%
Roschon Johnson RB CHI	$4,400	8.1	1.3	19%
Rome Odunze WR CHI	$7,400	8.0	10.9	8%
Andy Borregales K NE	$4,800	7.1	7.0	11%
Bears DST CHI	$4,000	7.0	4.0	15%
Patriots DST NE	$3,800	6.6	2.0	14%
Efton Chism III WR NE	$2,800	4.7	2.6	10%
Eli Raridon TE NE	$2,200	4.6	14.6	17%
Kalif Raymond WR CHI	$3,400	4.5	0.0	7%
TreVeyon Henderson RB NE	$5,800	4.2	4.3	3%

What we're changing in the model

New lead running backs need their own baseline. Lead backs with 3 or fewer games in the lead role beat their projection by +10.3 points on average (5 players: Tony Pollard 10.0 to 39.5, Quinshon Judkins 13.8 to 23.4, Braelon Allen 13.5 to 22.4, Ollie Gordon II 12.8 to 20.3, Woody Marks 13.0 to 9.1). Lead backs with 4+ games in the role were -2.7 vs projection. The small-sample pull toward each player's older, smaller role is too strong for RBs, because RB volume tends to stick once a back takes over. Proposal: for any healthy RB1 with fewer than 4 games in the lead role, blend toward a league-typical lead-RB baseline scaled by team total, instead of his own backup-era numbers. This applies to every team, not one player.
Committee backfields: don't shrink the pie with the team total. The Giants backfield was split as a committee pool worth 16.8 points off a low team total. Giants RBs actually scored 45.3 combined. Proposal: when a team has no clear lead back, size the RB pool from that team's season RB average and only lightly scale it by team total. Then split it by recent snaps.
New wide receivers go the other way. Lead WRs with 3 or fewer games in the role were -3.7 points vs projection on average (14 players), while WRs with 4+ games were -0.9. For WRs the small-sample number should lean harder on the prior, the opposite of RBs. Proposal: make the small-sample weight position-specific (RB lighter, WR heavier).
Re-cut team totals when a starting QB is ruled out. Our Ravens team total stayed at 26.75 after Lamar Jackson was ruled out, while the public game total and spread in the nflverse schedule file had them at 21.75. They scored 13. Proposal: when the live injury report rules out a starting QB, pull the latest public game total and spread before the final run, and apply the existing QB-change discount to the whole offense automatically.
Defenses: check the baseline over more weeks. Defenses averaged 6.5 projected and 4.3 actual, and the projection-to-actual correlation was 0.09. One week of defense scoring is noisy, so this isn't a change yet. We'll backtest the DST baseline on Weeks 3-7 and lower it only if the over-projection holds.
Shift Sim boom list: rank by position, not raw boom rate. Overall the sim's boom rates were close: it expected 20.8 booms across the slate and we got 22. But the published 'boom plays at $6,500 or less' list went 2 for 10, because ranking by raw boom rate fills the list with cheap QBs, TEs and defenses. Proposal: rank that list by boom rate compared with the average for each position, and show the slate-wide boom check on the sim page every week.

These are proposals. Nothing in the model changes until each one is backtested on Weeks 3-7 and approved. Everything here is a model-wide rule. Nothing is a one-player override.

Data: nflverse (CC-BY 4.0) player and team stats, snap counts and schedule. DK points are computed by Second Shift DFS; D/ST points allowed use the final score.