My bizarre fascination with gambling seems to exhibit a certain infectious quality. For starters my posts on the topic have come to comprise a substantial chunk of this blog's content. I would contend that these posts tend to reflect my humorous outlook on sports betting more than they display the kind of half-baked, over-thought advice typical of degenerate gamblers. However it still may look a little suspicious that I type up so many words dissecting Vegas lines, even if just in jest.
Naturally my obsession with wagering and all the pseudo-science it entails has found other vectors along which to spread, victimizing not just unsuspecting Technorati users, but now my family as well. Over the past several years, my bad influence has started to steer conversations to the theory and practice of gambling, especially during the NFL play-offs. This slow moral decline of my family has prominently featured an annual ritual of exchanging possible proposition bets before each Super Bowl. As with my blog posts on the topic, these are principally tongue-in-cheek items meant to highlight some of the funnier storylines and odd quircks of the particular game. To help demonstrate what I mean, I'll share some examples from my own proposals of previous years.
From Super Bowl XLI:
-The number of Super Bowl commercials for beer that feature animals will be over the total number of Super Bowl commercials featuring Peyton Manning.
-Odds that a black coach will win the Super Bowl: Even
-Odds that no one outside of the sports punditry will care about this: Even
From Super Bowl XLII:
- Mentions of the Patriots possibly going undefeated: over/under 41.5
- Mentions of the Patriots using cameras to spy on opponents earlier in the season: over/under 98.5
- Uses of the word "history" and all variations during the broadcast (including "historic", "historical", and "histriatoric" by Terry Bradshaw): over/under 26
In order to share the fun and innanity of this tradition with those few random folks who will read this post, I decided to make my personal selections of proposition bets for Super Bowl XLIII publically available on this blog. If anyone had any ideas of their own they would like to share, I invite you to write them up in the comments section below.
Now, for your enjoyment, I present the proposition bets I would post if I ran my own Las Vegas casino.
-Total in game promotions of shows premeiring on NBC's primetime lineup mid-season: Over/Under 6.5
-Number of time a prickly Al Michaels will make a point of mentioning which college a player attended after they refuse to mention it in the starting lineup introduction: Over/Under 3.5
-Times John Madden mentions Brett Favre favored -3 over Times John Madden mentions Neil Rackers
-Odds of someone making a comment about Troy Polamalu's hair during the broadcast: 3-1
-Total fumbles committed by Kurt Warner favored -2 over Total fumbles by entire Steelers team
-Comments made by announcers concerning Hines Ward having to play through an injury favored -5 over Actual minutes played by Hines Ward in this game
-Number of commercials for NBC's Heroes favored -3 over Total non-offensive touchdowns scored by the Steelers
-Number of interceptions thrown by Kurt Warner favored -2.5 over Number of commercials for NBC's underappreciated and underpromoted Life
-Odds that Steeler fans will comprise a majority of the stadium audience: 1-2
- Total catches by Larry Fitzgerald: Over/Under 6.5
-Total catches by Larry Fitzgerald that go for more than 20 yards or a touchdown: Over/Under 6.5
-Total compliments payed to Mike Tomlin by the announcing crew: Over/Under 5.5
-Total times the announcing crew mentions how much Tomlin resembles actor Omar Epps: Over/Under 0.5
-Total compliments payed to the city of Tampa Bay by the announcing crew: Over/Under 0.5
-Number of highlight reels about the Steeler's history of greatness shown during the game favored -1 over the number of highlight reels about the Cardinal's history of ineptitude
-Odds that the Cardinals will beat the spread and impress the announcing crew: 5-1
-Odds the Cardinals will actually win: 10,000-1
-Odds that you will see someone wearing a piece of apparel related to the winning team tomorrow: Even
I hope you enjoy those propositions bets. Remember always gamble responsibly, and never trust me to get any of these close to right. Enjoy the game!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment