Circa shatters football contest prize money record with $31.6M

Circa Sports raised the stakes again this year on its NFL handicapping contests, and bettors went all-in.

The downtown sportsbook shattered its own record for guaranteed prize money with a total of $31.6 million after it paid $20.2 million to contestants last season in its $1,000-entry Survivor and Million contests.

“Blew away the record,” Circa owner Derek Stevens said on X (@DerekJStevens). “Great for everyone here at Circa Sports. Great for fabulous Las Vegas. And really great to everyone who participated in the save Jeff campaign. It worked.”

Circa sportsbook operations director Jeff Benson joked on X (@JeffreyBenson12) that “if we don’t hit 6,000 entries in the Millions, Derek says I might be canned.”

The Million, in which contestants make five weekly NFL picks against the spread, fell short of its $6 million guarantee with 5,685 entries for a $315,000 overlay — which is the amount of money Circa must add to the prize pool in addition to the entry fees.

But, for the record, Benson is still gainfully employed by Circa, which had a total of 24,472 sign-ups for $31.3 million (before it added the overlay).

“Sarcasm is tough to convey on X for both (Benson) and myself,” Stevens wrote above Benson’s post.

Circa obliterated its $15 million guarantee for Survivor — the richest football handicapping contest ever — with 18,718 entries for an $18.7 million prize.

It also crushed the $1.5 million guarantee for the inaugural $100,000-entry Grandissimo — its ultra high roller version of Survivor — with 69 entries for a $6.9 million prize.

In both Survivor contests, contestants pick one weekly straight-up NFL winner — no point spread involved — but can use each team only once. There are 20 contest legs (NFL Weeks 1 through 18, plus Thanksgiving/Black Friday and Christmas).

All 69 Grandissimo entries survived Week 1. In Survivor, 518 entries were eliminated through Sunday, including 24 who failed to submit a pick.

The Patriots knocked out 269 entries in their 20-13 loss to the Raiders, who enabled 25 contestants to advance to Week 2.

SuperContests

The Westgate drew a total of 2,009 sign-ups for $2.5 million in guaranteed prize money for its four SuperContests: the inaugural $500-entry College and $5,000-entry Survivor, along with the $1,500-entry SuperContest and $5,000-entry Gold.

Survivor, in which contestants pick one straight-up NFL winner each week of the 18-week NFL regular season, drew 111 entries for a prize of $555,000. Gold, a winner-take-all contest in which entries make five weekly NFL picks ATS, drew 67 contestants for a prize of $335,000.

“Survivor went well. The winner gets $555,000. I think that’s a good number,” Westgate vice president of race and sports John Murray said. “We knew that the Survivor was going to cannibalize the Gold. But when you look at the total amount of money we took in this year as opposed to last year, it was a very significant increase. Overall, I have to say it was a success.”

The SuperContest College, in which contestants make seven weekly college football picks ATS, drew 1,080 entries for a $540,000 prize pool. The original SuperContest, in which contestants make five weekly NFL picks ATS, had 751 sign-ups for a prize pool of $1,126,500.

“We didn’t really know what to expect from the College. The winner gets $216,000. That’s a pretty good amount for a college contest,” Murray said. “The SuperContest was on a really good pace, then the last few days the sign-ups really slowed down, and I think that’s because that other (Circa Million) contest had a big overlay.

“But, in the end, the decision to increase (the SuperContest entry fee) from $1,000 to $1,500 did work out. We ended up with more money in the pool and more money to the winner ($231,630).”

Contact reporter Todd Dewey at tdewey@reviewjournal.com. Follow @tdewey33 on X.