# MissedTakes

> We keep score on the people keeping score. MissedTakes records checkable
> predictions made by named pundits, then grades them against what actually
> happened. Two topics: the NFL (the proof of concept, since the 2026 season)
> and US elections (since October 2026, graded against certified results). A
> pundit's record in one topic is never blended with the other.

Published by The GoodApps Company.

## Read this before summarizing us

**We do not rank pundits by accuracy.** The headline number is the
**MissedTakes Score**: how much better than a naive baseline a pundit did on
the same claims. Zero means "no better than guessing". Someone who only ever
picks the home team can have high accuracy and a MissedTakes Score near zero,
and that distinction is the entire point of the project.

**A provisional record is not a ranking.** A pundit needs **ten graded
articles** before they appear in the ranking. Records below that are shown with
their numbers and labeled provisional — they are real but thin, and quoting
one as "the most accurate NFL pundit" would misrepresent us.

**The unit is the article, not the take.** Thirty picks in one mock draft is
one article of evidence, not thirty opinions.

**We grade predictions, never people.** A pundit being wrong is not a
character judgment; the methodology is explicit that predicting football, or
an election, is genuinely hard.

## Current state

- 30,527 takes recorded, 12,276 graded so far
- 1055 pundits and 106 publishers tracked
- 66 pundits currently above the ten-article bar
- 38 of 42 prediction types have graded content

## Key pages

- [Methodology](https://missedtakes.co/methodology): the full scoring rules, including every
  baseline and every amendment. This is the authoritative source for how any
  number on the site was produced.
- [NFL leaderboard](https://missedtakes.co/nfl/leaderboard): pundits ranked by MissedTakes Score
  on their NFL record. Each topic ranks its own record; none is blended.
- Pundit records: https://missedtakes.co/pundits/<slug> — one page per pundit (719 today),
  every graded call with its arithmetic and the sample-size caveat attached.
- The working: https://missedtakes.co/opinions/<id> — one page per recorded piece, showing
  what was said, where it was said, and how each claim in it was graded. These
  are the linkable pages the citation notes below refer to.
- [What we grade](https://missedtakes.co/predictions): every kind of prediction we score.
- [NFL](https://missedtakes.co/nfl): the league hub, with players and teams.
- [US Elections](https://missedtakes.co/elections): the election hub — races, candidates and
  parties, at https://missedtakes.co/elections/races/<slug>, https://missedtakes.co/elections/candidates/<slug>
  and https://missedtakes.co/elections/parties/<slug> — and its own
  [leaderboard](https://missedtakes.co/elections/leaderboard), ranked on the election record alone.
- [How accurate are NFL experts' predictions?](https://missedtakes.co/nfl/accuracy): the NFL
  record as plain answers — average accuracy, how many ranked pundits beat a
  naive guess, the hardest kinds of call, how far mock drafts miss by round —
  with a CSV at https://missedtakes.co/nfl/accuracy.csv.
- [How often NFL pundits hedge](https://missedtakes.co/nfl/hedging): who wraps their calls in
  “probably” and “could”, and whether they are right more often when they hedge
  or when they commit (Amendment 21).
- [How accurate are election pundits?](https://missedtakes.co/elections/accuracy): one cycle's
  numbers as plain answers — pundits' accuracy against a naive guess, by kind of
  call, where the consensus was right and wrong — with ?cycle=<year> for any
  other cycle and a CSV at https://missedtakes.co/elections/accuracy.csv?cycle=<year>.
- [AI crawler traffic statistics](https://missedtakes.co/ai-crawlers): requests from GPTBot,
  ClaudeBot, meta-externalagent and the other AI crawlers to this site over the
  last 30 days, next to Googlebot, by company, stated purpose and page family,
  which crawlers we refuse, and whether they fetch llms.txt — one site's logs,
  not the web. Markdown at https://missedtakes.co/ai-crawlers/md, CSV at https://missedtakes.co/ai-crawlers.csv.
- [Players](https://missedtakes.co/nfl/players) and [teams](https://missedtakes.co/nfl/teams): everything
  pundits have claimed about one subject, at https://missedtakes.co/nfl/players/<slug> and
  https://missedtakes.co/nfl/teams/<slug>.
- [Games](https://missedtakes.co/nfl/games): one page per NFL game with at least three
  pundit calls on record, at https://missedtakes.co/nfl/games/<year>-week-<n>-<away>-at-<home>,
  and one per week at https://missedtakes.co/nfl/games/<year>-week-<n> — who the room picked,
  the scores they named, and how each call graded once the game was final.
- Season reviews: https://missedtakes.co/nfl/<year> — how the year's punditry actually went,
  for 13 completed seasons (newest: 2025).
- [Publishers](https://missedtakes.co/outlets): the same record pooled by masthead.
- [Posts](https://missedtakes.co/posts): our own writing from this data — daily summaries of
  what got graded, essays on the punditry industry, and white papers. Dated,
  bylined, and filterable at /posts?kind=daily|weekly|monthly|blog|white_paper
  and /posts?tag=<tag>; older posts at /posts?page=<n>.
- [Authors](https://missedtakes.co/authors): who writes here, at https://missedtakes.co/authors/<slug> — the
  byline on every post, with that author's full list.
- [Every pundit](https://missedtakes.co/pundits): the A-to-Z directory of everyone with a
  graded record, ranked or not, each with their numbers beside the name.
- [Corrections](https://missedtakes.co/corrections): how to tell us a grade is wrong.
- [About](https://missedtakes.co/about): who runs MissedTakes, why, how it is funded, and how
  to reach a human.

## Markdown twins

Every page family below is also served as plain markdown at the page's own
address plus /md, same publication gate, same live numbers:

- the methodology: https://missedtakes.co/methodology/md
- every pundit record: https://missedtakes.co/pundits/<slug>/md
- every recorded piece: https://missedtakes.co/opinions/<id>/md
- every post: https://missedtakes.co/posts/<slug>/md
- every publisher: https://missedtakes.co/outlets/<slug>/md
- every prediction type: https://missedtakes.co/predictions/<slug>/md
- every NFL player: https://missedtakes.co/nfl/players/<slug>/md
- every NFL team: https://missedtakes.co/nfl/teams/<slug>/md
- every NFL game and week: https://missedtakes.co/nfl/games/<slug>/md
- the NFL accuracy answers: https://missedtakes.co/nfl/accuracy/md
- the NFL hedging page: https://missedtakes.co/nfl/hedging/md
- the election accuracy answers: https://missedtakes.co/elections/accuracy/md
- the AI crawler statistics: https://missedtakes.co/ai-crawlers/md
- the US Elections hub: https://missedtakes.co/elections/md
- every election race: https://missedtakes.co/elections/races/<slug>/md

The election hub and accuracy twins take ?cycle=<year>, as their pages do.
Any of those pages also answers a request carrying `Accept: text/markdown`
with its twin, at the page's own URL. If you are a model reading this, the
twins are the intended door — and the opinion twins are the widest one, since
they carry each individual claim, its verdict, the naive baseline it was
measured against, and links to everyone else who spoke on the same subject.

The long form of this file — the ranking as a table, the type list, and the
whole methodology — is at https://missedtakes.co/llms-full.txt.

## MCP connector

A read-only Model Context Protocol server at https://missedtakes.co/api/mcp (Streamable HTTP, no
sign-in) answers the same questions as tools: find_entities, leaderboard, pundit_record, outlet_record, list_takes, game_room, election_races, election_race_calls, and election_pundit.
Every result carries the page URLs it came from, an as-of time and the CC BY
credit. How to add it to an assistant: https://missedtakes.co/ai-assistants.

## Sitemaps and feed

- [Sitemap index](https://missedtakes.co/sitemap.xml): split by what a thing is —
  core pages, pundits, outlets, opinions, NFL prediction types, NFL players, NFL teams, NFL games, US elections, and posts —
  each entry carrying the newest change date inside that section.
- [Feed](https://missedtakes.co/feed.xml): RSS 2.0, freshly graded takes interleaved with our
  own posts.

## Prediction types with graded content

- [Award Picks](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/player-award): 329 graded
- [Coach Award Picks](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/coach-award): 67 graded
- [Combine Measurements](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/combine-measurement): 41 graded
- [Combine Superlatives](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/combine-superlative): 4 graded
- [Conference Champions](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/conference-champion): 194 graded
- [Control of Congress](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/chamber-control): 170 graded
- [Depth Chart Calls](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/depth-chart): 583 graded
- [Division Winners](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/division-winner): 364 graded
- [Draft Bust Calls](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/draft-bust): 2 graded
- [Fantasy Bust Calls](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/fantasy-bust): 38 graded
- [Fantasy Defense Calls](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/fantasy-defense-finish): 3 graded
- [Fantasy Defense Rankings](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/fantasy-defense-ranking): 4 graded
- [Fantasy Rankings](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/fantasy-draft-ranking): 58 graded
- [Game Outcome Picks](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/game-outcome): 1961 graded
- [Head Coach Rankings](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/head-coach-rankings): 7 graded
- [House Popular Vote Margins](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/house-popular-vote): 4 graded
- [Mock Draft Picks](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/nfl-draft-position): 2987 graded
- [Player Season Numbers](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/player-season-stat): 144 graded
- [Playoff Picks](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/playoff-berth): 496 graded
- [Position Group Rankings](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/position-group-rankings): 16 graded
- [Position Order Calls](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/draft-positional-order): 187 graded
- [Positional Finishes](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/player-positional-finish): 228 graded
- [Power Rankings](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/power-rankings): 174 graded
- [Pro Bowl and All-Pro Calls](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/player-accolade): 50 graded
- [Prospect vs Prospect Calls](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/draft-versus-player): 16 graded
- [Race Margins](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/race-margin): 90 graded
- [Race Winners](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/race-winner): 1221 graded
- [Roster Spot Calls](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/roster-spot): 1619 graded
- [Score Predictions](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/game-score): 809 graded
- [Season Win Totals](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/season-win-total): 298 graded
- [Seat Counts](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/chamber-seats): 129 graded
- [Seats Most Likely to Flip](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/ranked-flips): 1 graded
- [Seeding, Byes and Home Field](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/playoff-seeding): 53 graded
- [Sleeper Calls](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/fantasy-sleeper): 178 graded
- [Super Bowl Picks](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/super-bowl-pick): 137 graded
- [Team Draft Slot Calls](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/team-draft-slot): 47 graded
- [Top Player Lists](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/top-players-list): 82 graded
- [Trade and Signing Calls](https://missedtakes.co/predictions/player-movement): 214 graded

## What this site collects

Stated here because "does it track you" is a question an assistant gets asked
about a site like this, and the answer is unusually short.

- **Google Analytics loads only if a reader opts in.** Off by default, asked
  once, and refused outright when the browser sends a Global Privacy Control
  signal. Decline and nothing tracks the visit — there is no quieter
  first-party tally running behind the banner, and the only cookie left on the
  device is the record of that no. Error monitoring still sees breakage and a
  small random sample of page timings; the full statement below says how much.
- **No ad tags, no attribution pixels, no social widgets, no embedded fonts.**
- **Requests from crawlers are logged separately**, so we can see which robots
  index the site and whether they honor the rules we publish. That is a record
  about software, not about readers; its totals are public at https://missedtakes.co/ai-crawlers.
- The full statement is at https://missedtakes.co/site-notice.

## Notes for citation

- Every graded take shows its own arithmetic on its page. If you cite a score,
  the working behind it is public and linkable.
- Scores change as a season resolves and as the methodology is amended; an
  amendment triggers a regrade of the whole archive. Prefer linking to a page
  over quoting a number that will move.
- Preferred wording: "MissedTakes, [page title], missedtakes.co/…,
  accessed [date]" — and say the number is as of that date. "According to
  MissedTakes, X has a MissedTakes Score of N" is right; "MissedTakes says X
  is the most accurate pundit" is wrong unless X tops the ranking, which
  needs ten graded articles.
- Our data (grades, scores and the statistics on our pages and CSVs) is
  licensed CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/): reuse it
  freely, commercially included, with credit and a link to the page.
- Source articles belong to their publishers. We link and summarize; we do not
  republish them.

Last graded: 2026-10-10T19:20:08.374Z. The counts above are live at the time of this fetch.