How to Play NFL Pick’Em on Splash Sports

NFL Pick’Em Basics

NFL Pick’Em on Splash Sports puts your football knowledge to the test. Each week, you’ll pick a certain number of games either straight up or Against the Spread (don’t worry, we’ll explain Against the Spread in a bit). Your goal is simple: make as many correct picks as possible to rack up points and win cash! The person with the most points at the end of the contest wins, but make sure to check your contest details for specific payout details. 

Making Your Picks

Each week, you’ll be presented with a list of NFL games. Depending on how your Commissioner set up your contest, this can be every NFL game of the week, or it can exclude early games like those ever-thrilling Thursday Night Football matchups. No matter your settings, your job is to pick winners. Double-check your contest details to see exactly how many games you need to pick each week! If you’re under the expected pick count, we’ll give you a heads-up if you try and save your picks. 

Once your winners are selected, lock them in. Depending on your contest settings, you can edit your picks up to the start of each game. We get indecisive too, don’t worry. 

Settings to Consider

Against the Spread

The popular Against the Spread format has made its debut on Splash Sports for both NFL and NCAAF Pick’Em contests this season! Against the Spread, or ATS, adds a twist to your Pick Sheet. Instead of simply picking the winner of each matchup, you will make your selection Against the Spread. Every NFL game (and every sports matchup you can think of, for that matter) has a point spread. Let’s use the Browns and the Cowboys and their Week 1 matchup as an example. The Browns are -2.5 point favorites, and the Cowboys are +2.5 point underdogs. Any time you see the “-” it indicates the favorite, and the “+” means the underdog. The point spread is the anticipated final score between two teams. In this scenario, the Browns are expected to win the game by at least three points.

So, how does this impact making your Pick’Em selections? With ATS turned on, your pick not only needs to win, but they need to cover the spread. If you’re picking an underdog, they don’t necessarily need to win (though that’s always nice to not have to worry about the spread), they just need to cover! If you picked the Browns in our example, they would need to win by at least 3 points in order for your pick to earn points. If you picked the Cowboys, they would either need to lose by 2 or fewer points or win the game outright for you to get points.

That was a long-winded way of saying this: just cover, baby. The ATS setting turns every pick into a sweat all season long on Splash Sports. 

Weighted Scoring

Weighted Scoring simply assigns different point values to different weeks of your contest. For example, Week 1 selections could be worth 1 point per correct pick, Week 2 selections could be worth 2 points for correct pick, and so on. These are set by your Commissioner, so check your contest details page for the scoring settings!

Best Pick

Best Picks give you an option to designate your Best Pick of the week. If your Best Pick is correct, you’ll earn double points for that selection! You can only make one Best Pick per week, so use it wisely.

Conferences and Games Picked

Your Commissioner will decide which games you can select from throughout the season. In NFL contests, they can choose to exclude the early games (Thursday Night Football or some of the holiday games) or pick from every game each week. In NCAAF contests, Commissioners can choose from games from the Power 5 conferences (we swapped the Mountain West with the old Pac-12 because of their scheduling deal with Oregon State and Washington State) or you’ll be picking from the teams in the Top 25 each week. Note that any teams playing an FCS team will be excluded from the Pick Sheet in NCAAF contests.

Picks Per Week

The last setting to consider is how many games you’ll be picking from each week. The minimum amount of games you’ll need to pick is five, but double-check the contest details page to ensure you’re picking all of the games you need to! If you’re under the expected pick count, we’ll give you a heads-up in the Pick Sheet to let you know you need to pick more games. 

Start Playing

Join an NFL Pick’Em contest on Splash Sports today! We have guaranteed contests running all season long, plus, you can make a contest and compete against your friends throughout the season for cold, hard cash. Download the Splash Sports app and start competing!