NFL · Week 5 ·
Will the Cowboys beat the Buccaneers?
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Cowboys win chance
79%
Typical margin: Cowboys by 10.5
Market 15%
Buccaneers 21%Cowboys 79%
In short
- Buccaneers QB Baker Mayfield is out
- The market (Polymarket) has the Buccaneers at 85%, and it carries 85% of our number
- Our ratings favor the Cowboys by 7.1 points, home field included
Why this number
PremiumSee every step from 50% to our Cowboys 79%.
The range
In 9 of 10 simulations, the result lands between Buccaneers by 33 and Cowboys by 11.
What if he's out?
PremiumSwitch a player off and we rerun the game without him.
Cowboys win chance
21%
Buccaneers 79%Cowboys 21%
- Starting QBQB · Buccaneers · Already out, in our number
- Starting QBQB · Cowboys
In our model a starting quarterback out costs his team 3 points.
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Our number over time
Down 57 from 78% to 21%
Oct 6Oct 8
Buccaneers -7.5Our chance they cover the spread59%
Buccaneers win by 10+ pointsOur chance52%
Buccaneers win by 14+ pointsOur chance40%
Injury report
Buccaneers
- Baker Mayfield · QBOut
- Benjamin Morrison · CBOut
- Antoine Winfield Jr. · SOut
- Billy Schrauth · GOut
- SirVocea Dennis · LBOut
- Luke Haggard · GOut
- DeMonte Capehart · DTOut
Cowboys
- Camden Brown · WROut
- Cobie Durant · CBOut
- Ajani Cornelius · OTOut
- Joey Porter Jr. · CBOut
- Drew Shelton · OTOut
- DeMarvion Overshown · LBOut
- James Houston · LBOut
- Jonathan Bullard · DTInjured Reserve
Our method
- We simulate the final margin 40,000 times from our team ratings (margin-aware Elo, fitted on nflverse 2015–2025) and the injury report.
- The win chance is the share of those simulations each team wins.
- When the market has a price (Polymarket), it gets 85% of the say and our ratings the rest: over the last ten seasons that mix picked 66.8% of games right, more than either alone.
- Model nfl-v1.2.0, updated Oct 9.