2023-24 Circa Survivor Contest Crowns a Quartet of Champions

Four Winners Finish a Perfect 20-0, Each Pocketing More Than $2.3 Million

“The Final Four” has a whole new meaning in Las Vegas.

A quartet of happy winners carved up the whopping $9,267,000 prize pool in the 2023-24 Circa Survivor Contest. That meant each surviving entrant split the winner-take-all money pie four ways and collected $2,316,750 in winnings – not a bad return on investment for the initial $1,000 entry fee (per entry).

The four co-champions included the following names/teams:

Circus Master

IndianaJet

Jax Jags

LAJoneser

This year’s annual NFL handicapping competition hosted by Circa Resort & Casino in Downtown Las Vegas attracted a record number of entries – totalling 9,267.  However, when tasked with picking just one team to win the game each week (sounds so simple, doesn’t it?), most of the large field ran into trouble early on.  Due to an unusually high number of upsets, half of the initial starters were eliminated within the first few weeks, and by Thanksgiving the number of survivors was down to just over 100.  At year’s end as the holidays concluded, just four months into the contest, four finalists ended up with identical perfect 20-0 records.*

What an incredible season.  What a wild ride.

For those anticipating the possible drama of a $9.2 million game, most of the fireworks went off in December, in the midst of possible negotiations and lots of back and forth discussion.  In fact, the NFL season’s final week picks guaranteed a split of the top position no matter what happened.  There would be no single winner.  Two contestants selected the Cincinnati Bengals as their final survivor pick.  Two other contestants picked the Las Vegas Raiders as their team.  Everyone ended up happy.  Despite no postseason possibilities for either team, both the Bengals and Raiders breezed to relatively easy wins in their final game of the season, thus ending the record-breaking contest with little drama.  That said, the post-contest celebrations were epic.

IndianaJet, one of the co-winners, was seen on social media toasting the unlikeliest of victories with none other than “the man” himself, Derek Stevens, the Circa’s charismatic majority owner and the grand ringmaster of so many intriguing events promoting the sports gambling scene in Las Vegas, including his two primary attractions — Circa Survivor and Circa Millions (which also concluded on Sunday).

Here’s a look back at the highlights and most dramatic moments of this year’s Circa Survivor Contest:

Sept. 9 – Circa Survivor closes registration with 9,267 entries.  The actual number of individual entities totaled 2,853, with most contestants buying multiple tickets.  There were 353 entities who bought the max – 10 entries.  There were 1,167 entities who bought a single entry.

Sept. 10 – The most bizarre outcome from Week 1 was one contestant who bought ten entries, and placed all ten tickets on the Kansas City Chiefs, who lost the Thursday Night Football season opener vs. Detroit.  The same contestant reportedly rushed back to the Circa, and bought 10 more entries (which was legal) since the Sunday games had not kicked off yet and the contest was still open for registration.

Sept. 12 – Incredibly, more than 20 percent of the field (1,992 contestants) was eliminated in Week 1.  Doing the most damage was the Minnesota Vikings, who were upset by the Tampa Bay Bucs (that knocked out 1,044 tickets).

Sept. 19 – Week 2 wasn’t any kinder to the survivors.  There were 1,351 bust outs, which meant a third of all starters were gone within just two picks.  The biggest contest killer was Denver, which eliminated nearly 900 tickets.

Sept. 25 – Week 3 saw the biggest single collapse of the NFL season on any one team.  Houston upset Jacksonville 27-17, knocking out 2,421 entrants.  This would be an omen of things to come in a season of surprises.  Who could have predicted the Texans would go on to win the AFC South over heavily favored Jacksonville?  A staggering 3,400+ entrants bit the dust in this week’s slate of games, with several major upsets.

Oct. 2 – With 2,479 contestants still alive, Week 4 was a much-needed reprieve from chaos. Fewer than 100 entries exited this week despite a few close calls.  The carnage we saw the first month slowed down a bit.

Oct. 29 – Week’s 5-6-7 trimmed the field in half.  By Halloween, there were plenty of tricks but few treats left.  The contest was down to just 1,284 live tickets.  Another interesting development was the increasing public and player interest in the Survivor Sweat marketplace.  Some ticket holders began selling their entries which were put up for sale.  Figuring it was far better to pocket a sure profit rather than gamble on a longshot, one survivor ticket on the marketplace went for $13,000.  So far, the pace of eliminations surpassed what happened the previous year, as this chart shows:

Oct. 31 – In another sports gambling oddity (make that a hedging/investing opportunity), the Survivor Sweat marketplace listed a “10-pack” of Circa Survivor entries as all ten tickets eld by someone made it through to Week 9.  The asking price for all ten tickets:  $250,000.

Nov. 12 – Week 10 includes the next NFL massacre, and just like before, it involves the upstart Houston Texans.  Cincinnati is heavily favored, but loses to the feisty Texans on a late field goal.  The clips 422 contest entries, nearly a third of all survivors.  For the first time, the contest dips under 1,000.

Nov. 22 – With 93.4 percent of the field eliminated, survivors had to factor in the tricky special weeks of Thanksgiving (four games), followed by another week of scheduled games played on Sunday and Monday.  That required making two selections within just a few days.  This contest wrinkle was sure to trim the field down even further and when the Green Bay Packers upset the Lions in Detroit in the annual Thanksgiving Day game, 216 out of the remaining 371 contestants were left staring at cold turkey.

Nov. 28 – After Weeks 12 A and 12 B, the contest dips below 100 for the first time.  Survivors are beginning to dream the impossible and think winning is possible.  Last year’s co-champions Mike Buchmiller and Russ Rosenblum are not among them. The average contest entry is now valued at $115,000.  More sales happen and deals are made.

Dec. 14 – Down to 30 going into another slate of games.  Some entries are now selling for well over $100K+ on the marketplace.  The Pittsburgh Steelers fall in a major upset, and another third is trimmed away.  Down to just 13 after Week 14.  Due to the highly-volatile nature of the winner-take-all format, a deal (or save) is discussed. However, one entrant chose to reject the deal (agreed to by the other 12), which would have guaranteed each entrant $500,000 — with the upside of continuing to compete for the difference amounting to $2.3 million.

Dec. 24 – Down to 10 by Christmas Day.  The previous holdout on a deal gets eliminated when the Denver Broncos fall to the New England Patriots in a shocker.  Five others also fall, leaving just four survivors.  This is the final four.

Jan. 7 – Weeks 16 B, 17, and 18 result in a four-way stalemate.  All survivors win straight out, ending the season with perfect 20-0 records.  The 2023-24 CircaSurvivor contest comes to an end with 4 winning teams!

Congratulations to Circus Master, Indiana Jet, Jax Jags, and LAJoneser on the amazing run!  Each entry takes down $2,316,750!

Looking ahead to 2024, we expect an even bigger Circa Survivor contest field and larger prize pool.  The total money purse should exceed well over $10 million.  There’s also been discussion and debate about making the contest broader, with a flatter payout structure.  One popular proposal includes paying the top 10 or 20 (or more) survivors some guaranteed payout.  That all remains to be seen and is up to Circa and contest management.

Whatever happens, we expect possible new rules and announcements to come sometime in late spring.  Here at SurvivorSweat.com, we’ll be ready to cover the action, discuss strategy, and make Circa Survivor more fun and enjoyable for everyone.  We also expect to be the market leader in possible sales and transfers of contest entries.  Given the astronomical prize money up for grabs, many sports gamblers will be eager to know what options are open – and we’ll be here again in 2024.

Thanks to everyone for visiting and participating.

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Note:  Even though each team plays 17 games, and there are 18 NFL weeks, the contest included 2 added “weeks” of games, thus bringing the number of total picks to survive the entire season to 20.