NYT Spelling Bee drives me crazy

I needed help to get picnic, which was sad.

I nearly always miss that word.

Does anybody else feel that MINICAMP isn’t a real word?

Yes! I had never heard the word before, and only got it because I was combining random four-letter words to get a compound eight-letter word.

It’s a term used in NFL football. Rookies report before regular players report to the regular preseason camp. I had definitely heard of it but did not find the word.

It was the first word I got. Not exaggerating. I couldn’t see the pangram at first, so I took the longest word I’d spotted. That was it.

Why not EBOLA?

It’s a proper noun, named after the Ebola river.

But PANAMA is accepted.

Why not COPAL?