Woody Marks — Week 2: Eight Carries for Eight Yards
2026 NFL Season · Half-PPR Scoring · Monday, Sep 21
Marks carried 8 times for 8 yards and was stopped for no gain on third and one at the Cincinnati 40 with 8:19 left in the third quarter, before a missed 58-yard field goal. He caught 5 of 6 targets for 27 yards, including 12 on third and twelve, and his 13 touches were five more than David Montgomery's, in a 20–6 loss to the Bengals.
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10 to three, Bengals, eight 19 left in the third quarter, third and one at the Cincinnati 40. Woody Marks went behind the right guard and gained nothing. −2.7 expected points added — expected points added is what a play was worth given down, distance and field position — and −6.5 points of win probability, the chance of winning the game after the play against before it. The snap before, on second and one, a short throw to Marks had fallen incomplete. Houston sent out the field goal unit from 58 yards and the kick was short. Cincinnati scored a touchdown on the possession that followed.
The line on the ground: eight carries, eight yards, none of the eight worth positive expected points, −6.7 in total. The carries went −2, nothing, two, three, three, three, nothing, −1. One first down, three yards on second and one earlier on that same third-quarter drive. Four carries before halftime, four after.
The catches were the better half. Six targets, five catches, 27 yards, −0.1 expected points. The best of them: third and 12 at the Cincinnati 34 with 41 seconds left in a scoreless first quarter, short right, 12 yards to the 22, +2.5 expected points and 5.9 points of win probability. The worst: second and seven at the Cincinnati 13 with a minute 34 left in the half, a throw behind the line that lost six, and Houston kicked a field goal two snaps later. Three third-down targets, three catches, one conversion; the last, eight yards on third and nine with three 40 left, came up a yard short, and the fourth-down throw went elsewhere and fell incomplete. A five-yard catch in the first quarter came back on a holding penalty. He also returned two kickoffs, for 22 18 yards.
Marks had eight of Houston's 15 designed runs to David Montgomery's six, and all four after halftime. 13 touches to Montgomery's eight. Six targets were fourth on the team, behind Dalton Schultz's 14, Xavier Hutchinson's nine and Jared Wayne's seven.
Back in June the preview had Marks as a back whose rookie value came from steady opportunity and receiving work, and said Houston's trade for Montgomery made the distribution the open question. Week 1 answered 20 carries to nine, Montgomery's way. Sunday it was eight to six the other way, with six targets on top — the pass-catching role the preview described, in a game that asked for it. The opportunity moved toward him; the production did not come with it. Two games, two different splits. Houston is at the Colts on Sunday the 20-seventh.
_Data via nflverse._
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