I’ve never been one to buy into get-rich-quick schemes (see: choosing journalism as a career path). I rarely frequent casinos, I’ve never traded stocks and alarm bells go off whenever I hear the phrase “investment opportunity,” which I immediately translate to “pyramid scheme.”
When it comes to sports betting, however, more specifically the NFL, I’m one of the biggest suckers out there.
Year-after–year, I look forward to the start of the NFL season, half of me is excited to watch the games themselves, the other half is buzzing with the prospect of a big score on PRO·LINE and POINT SPREAD.
Every year I fail, I mean miserably. I convince myself time and again that this is the year I’ve got it all figured out, this time I’ve got a system; I’m going to read more injury updates and watch more highlight packs and do more stat crunching than ever before and I’ll give myself the edge to ensure I come out on top. Wrong again.
The thing is that after all these years of ripping up losing tickets and cursing teams for costing me hundreds of dollars that were never mine to begin with, I still maintain this almost smug sense of knowing exactly what I’m doing. How stupid can I get?
I stand at that little lottery table on Sunday morning at the gas station, or corner store or mall kiosk alongside the two, three or more fellow hopeful sports gamblers, sneaking peaks at their picks to see how I stack up.
“That guy is picking the Bills to cover eight points against Pittsburgh? What a moron!” Then I proceed to pick Pittsburgh as if I’m proving something to this strange man in a Buffalo Bills sweater whom I’ve never met. Sure enough Buffalo will go on to cover the eight points and I’m left seething and wishing I’d trusted that strange Bills fan’s blind (but apparently correct) faith in his team.
All the evidence that I’ve been presented with in terms of sports gambling is that it really is a game of chance. The amount of research and knowledge you have is almost arbitrary. Sure, having a bit of an understanding of the game and teams can help to an extent, but even PRO·LINE’s slogan for a time was, “because anything can happen, anyone can win.”
If that’s not a backhanded way of saying, “stop pouring over stats you idiot, it’s all luck,” I don’t know what is.
Heck, take a very recent example from the opening Monday Night Football game of this year between the Philadelphia Eagles (the team I’ve supported for years) and the Washington Redskins.
All of my football knowledge and analysis told me Washington was the smart pick, but my gut and allegiance to my team told me to pick Philadelphia.
My heart sank a little in the pre-game show when the entire panel of “experts” except for one, picked Washington to win the game. The Eagles went on to dominate the game and win in convincing fashion.
It was a small moral victory for me that I had been right and 90 per cent of the analysts on television were wrong.
I’m not sure how much of a victory it really is though, those guys still get paid when they’re wrong while I’m left with a pile of ripped tickets and an empty wallet.
Sports gambling is so much fun.
