A confidence pool is pick'em with a second decision: after you choose the winner of every game, you rank the picks. Your rank is the number of points a correct pick earns. This page is the rulebook: how the points are assigned, what happens once games start, and how the common settings change the scoring.
For the format in one page, and how it compares to survivor and margin pools, see Pool Formats: Explained.
The standard rules
- Each week, you pick a winner in every game on the slate. Every game is required.
- You then rank your picks, from your most confident to your least.
- The week has a scale of point values, one per game. Your most confident pick takes the top value and your least confident the bottom.
- A correct pick earns the points of the rank you gave it. A wrong pick earns nothing.
- Your season score is the sum of every week. The highest total wins, with optional weekly prizes along the way.
How the point scale works
Each game on the slate gets one value from the week's scale, and no value is used twice. In a 16-game NFL week the scale is 1 through 16, a perfect week is worth 136 points, and putting 16 on a game that loses costs you more than any other single mistake.
Weeks with fewer games raise a question, since NFL byes shrink the slate. The commissioner picks how the scale is anchored:
| Setting | Scale for 14 games | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Max to Min | 3 to 16 | The top value is always 16, so a bye-week slate is worth more per pick. |
| Min to Max | 1 to 14 | The scale always runs from 1 to the number of games, so every week is worth the same. |
This choice applies to NFL pools. College football and basketball slates have no fixed size to anchor against, so those pools always run from 1 to the number of games.
What happens when games start
A game locks at its own kickoff, or at the pool's weekly deadline if the commissioner set one that comes first. When a game locks, the point value on it is pinned for good. You can still move your remaining picks around, including above a locked game, but they can only use the values the locked games have left over.
A pool that locks the whole slate at the first kickoff makes this simpler: you rank everything once, before any game starts.
Missed picks
If a game locks and you never picked it, the game still takes a point value from the week's scale. It scores nothing, so the question is which value it uses up. The commissioner chooses:
- Min. Points. The missed game takes the lowest value still available. This is the forgiving setting, because your real picks keep their high values.
- Max. Points. The missed game takes the highest value still available and pushes every pick you did make down the scale. This is the punishing setting.
A pool can also offer missed-pick insurance, which fills the empty game with a team chosen by a rule, so you still earn points on it. The commissioner picks the rule for the whole pool: the favorite or the underdog in each missed game (straight up, or against the spread in a spread pool), a random team, or the most popular pick in the pool. With no policy, a missed game is simply scored under Missed Picks Scoring above.
Straight up or against the spread
In a straight-up pool you pick winners. In a spread pool you pick against the point spread, which makes a big favorite much less safe than it looks. NFL and college football confidence pools can use either one. Basketball confidence pools pick winners only. Spread confidence pools use a spread that is set for the week, not one that moves with the market.
A straight-up pool can also turn on Show Point Spreads. The pool is still picked and graded straight up, but the current spread is displayed beside each game so you have the market's read in front of you while you rank sixteen games. It is display only: it changes nothing about how a pick scores, and the commissioner can switch it on or off at any time.
See the glossary for what the spread, a push and a hook mean.
NFL playoffs
An NFL confidence pool can extend through the playoffs. The problem is the scale: a playoff round has far fewer games than a 16-game week, and the Super Bowl has one. The commissioner chooses how the points are set for those rounds:
| Setting | Top weight in a round | Super Bowl pick |
|---|---|---|
| Keep the Anchor | A full NFL week's top weight of 16 | Worth 16 |
| Match the Slate | The round's own game count | Worth 1 |
| Scale by Multiplier | Match the Slate's scale, times a factor the commissioner sets | Worth 1 × the factor |
Keep the Anchor makes the playoffs worth as much per pick as any other week, so they're a big swing. Match the Slate makes them small, so the playoffs can't overturn the regular season. The multiplier is the dial between the two.
Ties and pushes
A tie, or a spread push, has a Tie Rule that the commissioner sets. In a confidence pool the default is a loss. The other two options are a win, which pays the full weight, and a half point, which pays half of it.
The most common way to avoid the question is to use Force Hooks in a spread pool, which moves a whole-number spread half a point so every game has a winner against the spread.
Prizes and ties on the leaderboard
A confidence pool is won on total points, which is why two entrants rarely finish level. Commissioners may add weekly prizes to keep entrants engaged all season. How the prize is divided if entrants finish tied is a setting chosen with the pool's prize structure.
Play a confidence pool
ALA hosts confidence pools for the NFL, college football, the NBA and college basketball. To set one up, see the settings in Pool Settings, or go straight to Create a Pool.
Keep reading
Ready to set one up? Create a pool. Creating one is free, and the commissioner's pool fee is due 7 days after the pool starts.