Yes I believe that is what Cloudflare is banking on - Blackbird backing out and no bounty money spent. I wouldn't find it too bad of an outcome though. Googling "blackbird patent" will pull up Cloudflare's blog post and other tech companies can use the same strategy against them by offering a bounty.

Patent troll invalidation bounties might become a new thing. The more ways to slay the trolls the better.