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NFL Survivor Rules

Pick one NFL team each week. Stay alive. Never use the same team twice on one entry.

One team each week

A win or tie keeps the entry alive. A loss, missed pick, or invalid pick eliminates it.

No team reuse

A team becomes used for that entry when the pick locks, regardless of the result.

$20,000 starting floor

Entries cost 50 USDC. Every eligible entry fee stays in the prize pool, with no entry cap.

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The Format

NFL Survivor covers the 18 regular-season weeks. Each entry makes one straight-up team pick per week while it remains alive. Point spreads do not apply.
  • Win: the entry survives.
  • Tie: the entry survives.
  • Loss: the entry is eliminated.
  • Missed or invalid pick: the entry is eliminated.
  • Bye teams cannot be picked.
  • Each team can be used only once per entry.
Each entry is independent. If one wallet owns several entries, each entry has its own picks, used-team history, vote, status, and possible claim.

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Entry Price And Prize-Pool Floor

Each entry costs 50 USDC. The starting prize pool has a 20,000 USDC guaranteed floor, with 0% platform fee or rake. The guarantee is a floor, not an extra 20,000 USDC added on top of entry fees. Before strategy gains or losses and any refunds, the starting principal is the greater of:
  • 20,000 USDC; or
  • 50 USDC multiplied by the number of eligible paid entries.
At 400 eligible paid entries, entry fees equal the guarantee. Entry 401 and every later eligible paid entry adds another 50 USDC to the pool. There is no total entry cap and no per-wallet entry cap while entry sales are open.
The prize-pool floor describes starting principal before strategy performance. The pool may rise or fall while the contest is live.

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Week 1

Week 1 picks and voting open with registration. Bald’s Week 1 contest slate includes Sunday and Monday games only. NFL games played on Wednesday or Thursday that week are outside the contest slate, cannot be picked, and do not consume either team for later weeks.
  • Entry purchases close Sunday, September 13, 2026, at 11:30 AM ET.
  • Week 1 picks and voting close Sunday at 12:00 PM ET.
  • The first eligible games begin Sunday at 1:00 PM ET.
Always follow the exact timestamps shown in the app.

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Weekly Picks And Locks

Beginning with Week 2, the next week’s picks and voting open Sunday at 1:00 PM ET, even while the current week is still being completed. The main pick and vote deadline is Sunday at 12:00 PM ET. Teams playing Sunday afternoon, Sunday night, or Monday must be selected by that deadline. Picks involving earlier Thursday, Friday, Saturday, holiday, or international games lock five minutes before that game’s scheduled kickoff. If you do not choose an early-game team, you may keep choosing from eligible later games until the main Sunday deadline. A pick can be changed before its applicable lock. After it locks, it is final and that team counts as used.
If the prior week’s result is still pending, the app may accept the next pick or vote pending eligibility. It counts if the entry survives and is ignored if the entry is eliminated.

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Pick Visibility

An early-game pick cohort stays hidden in the Bald app until that game begins. The remaining pick distribution stays hidden until the Sunday 12:00 PM ET deadline. Accepted picks and votes are published after their applicable lock. An early cohort may be discoverable onchain during the five minutes before kickoff even while the Bald app keeps it hidden.

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Results And Team Use

Each game grades independently when its result becomes official. Bald does not wait for every NFL game that week before updating affected entries.
  • An official win or tie keeps the entry alive.
  • An official loss eliminates it.
  • An official forfeit follows the winner and loser declared by the NFL.
  • A team remains used after a win, tie, loss, official forfeit, or Safe Harbor ruling.
If a locked game cannot receive a normal result in its original official NFL week, an affected entry may receive Survivor Safe Harbor. The entry survives that week, but the selected team remains used.

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Winning

The last entry alive wins the distributable prize pool. If one entry is the sole survivor before Week 18, gameplay ends immediately, although claiming still waits for final settlement. If multiple entries remain after Week 18, they split the distributable pool equally. If every entry alive at the start of a week is eliminated in that same week:
  1. If at least one of those entries submitted a valid pick, only the valid pickers split the pool.
  2. Missed or invalid picks do not share when at least one valid pick was submitted.
  3. If nobody submitted a valid pick, all entries alive entering that week split the pool.
The order in which games finish does not change this fallback.

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Prize-Pool Voting

Eligible entries vote on four scheduled strategy options in Weeks 1–17. The winning strategy receives the full prize-pool allocation for that week. Week 18 has picks but no strategy vote. Voting and picking are separate actions. Missing a vote does not by itself eliminate an entry. If the contest ends early, unopened future ballots are canceled.

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Entry NFT

Each entry is represented by an NFT. Entry NFTs are non-transferable at launch, so they cannot currently be sold, transferred, or moved to another wallet. While transfers are disabled, picks, votes, used-team history, winner status, and claims remain tied to the wallet that entered.