A weekend of fantastic football and bad bets by the coaches.
Two great teams faltered and were eliminated. Baltimore had the best team in the NFL this year. Lamar Jackson will be the league MVP, yet his coach, John Harbaugh, did not let him play his game. He has become a solid passer, but his greatness is still as a runner who can pass. But his coach called a game filled with passes, and Kansas City rushed him ferociously. The Ravens’ best receiver was coming off injuries and was limited in playing time. The Ravens committed too many key penalties, and a sure touchdown was fumbled just before the runner reached the end zone and recovered by the Chiefs.
The best team was out-coached and the amazing Patrick Mahones made no critical errors. KC knew how to win, and they are going to their fourth Super Bowl in six years.
In the second game, Detroit, finally in the playoffs, overwhelmed San Francisco in the first half, only to fold in the second half. The biggest mistake–which Detroit’s coach Dan Campbell will live with for the rest of his life–was choosing to go for the touchdown late in the game, down 10 points, rather than taking the sure field goal which would have enabled the Lions to have enough time to go for a TD to tie if they could stop the 49ers on their next set of downs. They failed to make the TD, and San Francisco ran out the clock. Nevertheless, it was a wonderful season for the Lions.
***
I don’t know about you, but I hate the prevalence of organized sports gambling. I can tolerate fantasy football–barely–but the omnipresent huckstering of sports gambling on radio and TV ruins the broadcasts. People who cannot afford it are invariably the losers. And to me, the NFL’s embrace of big-time gambling undermines the game’s integrity. I am surprised point-shaving seemingly has not yet happened.
A quarterback overthrows an open receiver. A kicker misses a field goal he can make in his sleep. An offensive tackle allows a rusher to smear the quarterback in a key situation. It will happen. Just a matter of when.
***
It is baseball season soon, and teams are taking huge gambles with trades and free agent signings. Fans wait with bated breath to see if big-name players will come to their team.
The Dodgers, with their seemingly endless funds, signed the Babe Ruth of our day, Shohei Ohtani, for $700 million, and most of it is deferred. Ohtani cannot pitch this year, but he should hit 40 homers to go with Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman at the top of the lineup.
LA wins 100 games year after year yet rarely goes to the World Series. The beauty of sports is that the best team often does not win the championship. Last season, Atlanta and LA were the best teams, yet Arizona got hot late in the season and went to the World Series. Even signing the fabulous Ohtani and Shinobu Yamamoto, the best Japanese pitcher in years coming to America, the Dodgers are no cinch to win it all. Odds by ESPN BET currently have them as a favorite at +450.
It’s a long, long season.
And I can’t wait.
Go Cubbies! (Odds makers have them at +2500)
They say they have great young players on the verge of the Majors. I live in hope. It’s Baseball.
Questions: If you bet on sports, why?
What was the greatest bet you ever made? (doesn’t have to be about sports)
5 Comments
No betting here. Unless you count buying a fixed rate CD, hoping the rates go down. Though I go to Vegas for a show once a year, nothing goes into the gambling funnel. I agree on the future issues. Does this mean Pete Rose will finally be let in? As far as Baseball, my favorite two teams are the SF Giants, and whoever is playing the Dodgers.
In my late teens I was working the summer at a machine shop making minimum wage…maybe $2.25/hr at the time…I forget.
I went with my parents to the horse track and placed a $2 bet. I lost. In the course of a 2-minute horse race, I lost an hour’s worth of wages. I thought then that gambling is a losing proposition. Now, had I won I would have tripled my $2 bet in 2-minutes of racing. I think I would have been hooked for life.
Years ago when Mohammed Ali was preparing to fight Michael Spinks I had a co-worker who kept running his mouth about how Spinks would not last more than a few rounds. I had watched Spinks fight in the Olympics and knew that he had a right cross that could fell a 2000 lb Bull and I made the mistake of argueing that Spinks had a chance even though I had been a fan of Ali all the way back to when his name was Cassius Clay. After being hounded to make a bet and being offered 10 to 1 odds, I finally took the bait and made a longshot bet of $20 on Spinks to win. The result doubled my salary for the week, and I have not bet over a nickel on any sporting event since.
The best gamble I ever made was telling the 18 year old Freshman woman I had met out of a thousand people that I was going to marry her after six weeks. That was 55 years ago. B’shert.
I Bet on the Islanders Stanley Cup “Drive for Five” back in the day.
All my friends made a killing in the previous Stanley Cup Series.
Kept doubling down to recoup my losses.
At the end I was betting money I didn’t have.
They obviously didn’t get the fifth Stanley Cup, and I was on the hook to the local bookie…
Thinking back now, that was one of the best bets and greatest lesson in my life.
As President Donald John Trump said in his book “The Art of The Deal”:
Some of the best bets and investments are the ones you don’t make…
(paraphrased)
The money I have saved by not betting or gambling throughout my life when compared to what I see friends and colleagues and strangers playing endless scratch-offs, throwaway and lose…
Now that I am successful and financially secure, I have disposable income, I only bet on charitable endeavors. The Church, Knights, Lions, Little League, etc…
Chances, raffles 50/50s etc…
When I hit on a 50/50 I most always donate it back, since I considered it a donation from the start, with no expectation of return. And everyone appreciates it, except the few degenerate gamblers that will never learn!