March Madness has ended, so it is time to roll out our next contest. The 2026 MLB Survivor pool.

Buy in/Prize pool: Initial prize pool of 5k sats donated by @grayruby. Buy in will be 1k sats and the prize pool will be total buy ins collected plus all sats (minus fees) zapped to related pool posts.

Rules: You may only use each team once.

Participants pick one team per week. That team must win at least 50% of their games played Monday through Sunday that week. If they play 5 games (rare) they must win 3, if they play 6 games they must win 3 and if they play 7 games they must win 4. Due to the length of the season, and the nature of baseball where it is common for bad teams to beat good teams, elimination will work on a three strikes and you are out model. A strike will be issued if a participant's team fails to win at least 50% of their games that week. Winner will be the last participant standing who has not stuck out.
*If the pool is still going at that point the week of the all star game will be skipped

Rainouts: Games will occasionally be postponed due to rain. Games that are made up during the same series as doubleheaders will be treated as normal games with the win or loss counting to the team's total for the week. Games that are postponed and rescheduled later in the season will be treated as follows: If the game would not impact the participants ability to move onto the next week (for instance a team is scheduled for 7 games but plays 6 and wins 4 out of the 6) then the player moves on and the game is ignored. If the game would not impact the the participants ability to avoid a strike (for instance a team is scheduled for 7 games but plays 6 and wins only 2 out of 6) then the player is issued a strike and the game is ignored. If the game is relevant to the player's ability to move on (for instance a team is scheduled for 6 games and plays only 5 and wins 2 of 5) then it will go to team run differential for the week. If the chosen team has an equal or positive run differential for all games played that week the player moves on. If the chosen team has a negative run differential for that week the player gets a strike.

Tiebreaker: If the final two or more players are eliminated with 3 strikes the same week the tiebreaker will be best run differential for the chosen teams.

Tiebreaker 2: If we are still tied after run differential we will go to an additional week of picks between only the tied participants. If both players survive that week we go back to the tiebreakers until someone is victorious.

Deadlines: Even though games from the previous week will still be going on, I will do a post on Fridays opening up picks for the following week. Pick submissions will be open until 12pm et on Mondays. You may pick your team in advance of the current week's games being completed provided you don't select a team you have already chosen and are not at risk of being eliminated from the pool. If you have two strikes and may be eliminated prior to the next week's games you must wait until your chosen team has secured your advancement to the next round before entering a submission for the next round.

Pool Posts: I will keep track of all participating stackers, what teams they have chosen, how many strikes they have, if they have entered their picks before the deadline, if a rainout provision needs to be invoked and do a weekly post reviewing the previous week results, announcing any strikes/eliminations, and a weekly post opening up Pick submissions for the following week but I will not be posting schedules like I do for NFL/March Madness. The onus will be on the participants to check the weekly MLB schedule and chose the team they think gives them the best opportunity to move on.

If you are interested in joining, please reply in the comments and I will send you an invoice for 1k sats. Once paid, you are in. Buy ins will be open until 12pm et on Monday April 13. If players want to buy in after the first week has begun they still can but will receive a strike for week 1. After week 1 no more buy ins will be accepted. I will open up week 1 pick submissions tomorrow.

Let's play ball!