MOCKSLATE

Schedule Release Draft — Official Rules

Rules version: games-release-draft-2026.draft-1

Working draft — subject to attorney review before the contest opens. The scoring rubric is published and frozen before entries are accepted.

Entry

  • Free to enter — no purchase necessary. MockSlate Pro is not required and never affects prize eligibility or odds.
  • Entrants must be 18 or older with a MockSlate account, US only at launch. Void where prohibited.
  • Your entry in a public league is your prize-eligible entry. Prize eligibility counts once per person regardless of how many leagues you play — league count affects fun, never prize odds.
  • Drafts run from schedule-release day until a Week 1 lock; your roster locks the moment your league drafts.

How to play

  • Leagues of 16, snake draft, 17 rounds — 272 picks — drafted from the pool of all 272 actual games.
  • You draft the matchup, not the broadcast window. If a game gets flexed to another week, it stays yours (the deliberate inverse of Slot Draft).
  • Public leagues are open to everyone and prize-eligible. Pro users may additionally create private friend leagues — glory only, never prize-eligible, and MockSlate hosts no buy-ins, pots, or payouts of any kind.

The draft & autopick

  • Drafts are a snake order with a 30-second pick clock. Empty seats in an under-filled league are filled automatically.
  • Can’t make the draft live? Set an optional personal draft board beforehand — your own ranked list of games.
  • If your pick clock runs out, we autodraft for you in this order: (1) the highest still-available game on your personal board; (2) if you have no board or every game on it is already taken, the default ranking (best available by projected interest). Empty (unclaimed) seats always use the default ranking.

Scoring — Best Game

  • Each week, only your single highest Game Score among the games you own counts (weeks with no games score 0). Season total is the sum of your weekly bests.
  • Game Score = combined final points + (combined net yards ÷ 25) + 5 per combined defensive/return TD + 10 if the game goes to overtime. Big totals and wild games score big.
  • Leaderboards show a “Games Left” count — how many of your games haven’t been played yet — so standings are visibly not final until everyone’s games are in.

Winner, prize & tiebreakers

  • Highest season total wins each league. Public league winners rank on the national leaderboard; the top of that public board wins the $100.
  • Private friend leagues crown their own winner for bragging rights only — no MockSlate prize.
  • Tiebreaker: the earliest-submitted entry wins the tie. Sponsor: MockSlate (finalized in the attorney-reviewed rules).

MockSlate's prize games are free-to-enter skill contests — no purchase necessary. Pro-exclusive games are prize-free and carry no cash award. Not affiliated with the NFL or any team.

MockSlate is an independent fan tool and is not affiliated with, sponsored by, or endorsed by the National Football League, Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association, FIFA, or any team or national federation. Team names are used for identification purposes only.