This may come as a shock to those of you who knew me back in my lost youth, but I don’t make sports bets…
I know, shocker.
But during a friendly phone call earlier this evening from Uptown Theater main man Larry Sells I let my guard down and allowed him to goad me into betting 100 bucks on the Chiefs.
To be clear, he didn’t exactly goad me into betting on the Chiefs, he let me pick which team I wanted to lose my hondo on, and I chose KC.
Which for those of you who like to telll me I don’t know diddly about sports do the trick.
Then again, what was that crazy dude’s name that ran a comedy club and used to lose his you-know-what here on KC Confidential every week each fall?
Yeah, that guy.
So if the shoe fits – and apparently it does – guess I’ll have to wear it..sans the bluster and bravado.
Almost forgot, I took the Chiefs even.
Geez HC, there is this thing called a “line” on games. I’m sure you have heard of f it. For the Chiefs it was + 3 1/2. You should have won.
In past Falls I enjoyed watching Craig try week in and week out to post a winning record with his teases. Funny thing is he would often try and sneak in a point on the current lines. Still didn’t help him post many wins. But man that guy just kept trying no matter how bad a beating he took each week. It was impressive and I miss it!
Yeah, outside of that one season – was it like three or four years ago? – he pretty much took it up the you-know-what…
Of course I knew the spread and that the Chiefs were underdogs, but this was a friend bet I got shamed into and I had my choice of both teams even.
What would you have done?
Well in hindsight I’d have taken Pats or kept at $5!
Thanks David…
Believe me I thought about the former and tried to maintain the latter. In the end, I just wanted to be a good sport and was hoping not to have to root against or lose if the Chiefs one.
Not very smart, I know.
Chiefs (-3.5) as Vegas had it would have put $100 in your pocket. ALWAYS take points when you can!
I knew the Chiefs were the underdog, but this was a “friendly” bet – and one that I wanted to put just five bucks on for the fun of it – but got bullied / shamed into making it a hondo/ And again, to be fair, I could have picked New England, but how much fun would that have been.
Oh well.
Meh – it was always going to come down to who had last possession of the ball, neither defense being that much to talk about (esp. given Chiefs’ injuries.)
You could just as easily have won.
That I know…unfortunately it’s of little consolation!
“I let my guard down and allowed him to goad me into betting 100 bucks on the Chiefs.”
– ‘When I was one-and-twenty I heard a wise man say, “Give crowns and pounds and guineas but not your heart away; give pearls away & rubies, but keep your fancy free.” But I was one-and-twenty, no use to talk to me.” ‘ ~ A.E. Housman
Let alone 67 seasons yours HC, nod Housman’s tale of woe… Kerouac keeps tellin’ all ya alls again, and again, and again – save your heart – NEVER bet on the swiss chiefs – you’ll lo$e every time. Half an century ‘this is our year’ long ago replaced “tickets, get your swiss chiefs Superbowl tickets!”, PT Barnum hooking the suckers by the neck.
Upshot: they (again) just ain’t got the horses. On pace give up the most yards defense E-V-E-R history, their offense can not and will not spare them (history considered as well, their offense pales comparison the truly great and legit offenses yesteryear.)
Alex Smith threw 5 ints all of 2017, had the swiss off to a 5-0 start and managed beat the Patriots. Comparison ‘Choke’ Mahomes (a “star” according to one of the half wits on KCC, discovered the big stage and bright lights of New England too much for him.
Looking like a deer caught headlights, the ‘great overhype’ threw 2 more ints (that makes 4 in just the last games now), overthrowing wide open receivers. As if being outplayed by Paxton Lynch in DEN last year wasn’t bad enough, yesterday ‘Choke’ was bested by a 41 year old greying relic named Brady.
Stats? Like the game itself, totally meaningless in 2018. 6 td passes in one game? So did Mitch Trubisky, Bears QB (second to only Deshaun Watson as best young QB in the game, the best duo to come out of the 2017 NFL Draft.) Now two words for you: Joe Kapp. He of the end over end shot puts in lieu passes, tossed 7 in a single game. Daryle Lamonica tossed 6 – also 6 more a post season game in just his third year as starter. Difference, those days the game/stats were legit, unlike today where rules/ advantages conspire as they proliferate give offense the edge. Everyone’s a star, and yet no one really is. It’$ all marketing and PR… cha – cha – ching!
sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss sound of all the air coming out the swiss chiefs balloon, an annual rite. No player theirs on offense tops the chart at what he does. All trail a host of other NFL players at their positions. Also clear: when the game’s on the line, the ‘best TE’ on the field a guy whose name rhymes ‘Gronk’. ‘Saddest’ face to exit gridiron: kelce the klown, seen lugging his two left feet and dour mug off the field (no pansy dancer to suffer my fellow swiss chiefs fans, the man-child in red. Yet, media & fan ‘hype’ wishes you believe swiss chiefs players are ‘the best’, and that they’re ‘great’; they are not.
‘Choke’ Mahomes has one move: chuck a long ‘wing and a prayer’ and hope someone in red (hopefully on his team) catches it. As ‘Choke’, Tyweak Hill, the second fastest player the NFL, has one move too: run fast as he can and hope one those ‘incoming!’ grenades find the mark. This is not the type of offense that wins games, any import; augmented their 32nd ranked defenseless bunch teammates – ‘wait till next year’ is right on track, MLB’s Cubs 108 year dry spell moving ever closer Kaycee, a bell that has been tolling so long local fandom has become tone deaf to it. Oh well… ‘wait till next year’, part 2019, verse 50!
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The big question of the day is this????????
Did you learn your lesson?
Of course not…
I knew it was a pretty dumb deal going in!
To Nick’s point, NFL defenses are a total joke and have been rendered so by the NFL rules. No hitting the quarterback, no smashing receivers over the middle, hell no touching receivers in coverage at all. It’s almost unwatchable. Good hard hitting defenses are a thing of the past. Pathetic.
You make a good point but as well defenses of the past didn’t have the size of players you see today either.
If allowed under old rules most quarterbacks wouldn’t last the first few games. The ole kill the quarterback defense would be in place and reality would take place.
Unlike the WWF the hitting on a football field isn’t fake.
But I will agree that the call of pass interference is a joke. That should be the whole idea of the defense to stop the passing from being completed. I think the powers that be allowed that rule so it would make for higher scoring games. Fans love high scoring games and not games where the teams slug it out back and forth on the field for 3 to 10 points every week.
Outside of blind hitting a quarterback who is not moving from behind most other hitting, grabbing or batting at the ball and arms of players should be allowed.
“defenses of the past didn’t have the size of players you see today either.”
– in any era, do all players get bigger (including QB’s) or just those on defense trying assault those offense? Is it relative, or an ‘everything’s bigger, better, stronger, faster’ fait accompli modern pass rushers would kill QB’s today, even moreso the ‘weakling’ QB’s past than present?
A few pro football players of size Kerouac recalls defense 1950’s/60’s who knocked out QB’s large and small (weight variable/often understated in official rosters) d-lineman:
Doug Atkins (‘only’ 6’8 260), Gene Lipscomb 6’6 285 / 310, Ernie Ladd 6’9 325 / 350, Buck Buchanan 6’7 285 / 300, Roger Brown 6’5 300 / 310, Rosey Grier 6’5 285 / 305, Ben Davidson 6’8 265 / 280, Richard Sligh 7’0 300 / 320, Ron McDole 6’3 290 / 300, Jim Dunaway 6’4 295 / 310, Ron Billingsley 6’8 265 / 290, Bubba Smith 6’7 295 / 305.
Any of the aforementioned guys would play today and dominate same, my opine. How can I be sure? Same way those enamored with modern day player(s) believe can be no way yesteryear’s players are as big, strong, fast, good or better. Which reminds me too:
John Ross, NFL’s fastest and Tyweak Hill, second fastest, today. Three words: ‘Bullet’ Bob Hayes, ‘World’s Fastest Human’ at 9.1 then, still the fastest player in NFL history. despite entering the league more than half a century ago.
“If allowed under old rules most quarterbacks wouldn’t last the first few games.”
– if QB’s played under the old rules and most wouldn’t last the first few games, how did most the old QB’s who did play under the old rules not only survive, but thrive for long as they did?
Despite the (as listed) wide array big, strong, fast defensive players who intended (and were allowed by rule) to fold, spindle and mutilate QB’s yesteryear? Lilliputians all the QB’s the 1950’s/60’s:
Len Dawson 19 years – Fran Tarkenton 18 years – Bart Starr 16 years – Bob Griese 14 years, measurables 6’0 190, 6’0 190, 6’1 200, 6’1 190 – all Hall of Fame QB’s. Larger QB’s had lesser careers/results in general than smaller ones: Roman Gabriel, Daryle Lamonica, Bobby Douglass and Greg Cook were big at 6’5 230, 6’3 220, 6’4 225 and 6’4 220 yet failed to win or enter the Hall of Fame… go figure.
Even today rules having been manipulated, a little guy like 18 year vet Drew Brees (6’0 only if he stands on two copies of Steven King’s ‘Sleeping Beauties’, 209 lbs. if carrying a 16 lb. bowling ball in his shorts) has excelled and began playing 2001, when the NFL was already a joke but before became the total joke is today; appears he’s done alright.
Fred ‘The Hammer’ Williamson was an 6’3 215 CB for the Chiefs the late 1950’s/60’s. Name a current swiss chief CB who can match? Or one any better? Lemme help: isn’t one. Packers had a trio LB’s 6’3 235 – 250, 1960’s… today the NFL refers (in actuality DE’s playing LB) as ‘LB’s’. Yet, of the swiss chiefs 4 starters last game one (Hitchens) is actually smaller and two others (Ford and Ragland) no bigger than any the Packers 1960’s starting trio.
As history shows, none the ‘swiss chiefs defenders’ is as good the Packers trio was (two Hall of Famers and a third just about as good.) What was that about ‘modern’ players being bigger, stronger an faster, not to mention oh so much better than yesteryear’s?
So much for a players size, speed, strength advantage being foregone conclusion the superiority inherent the modern era, and their danger to QB’s any.
Every era, let ’em hit or let ’em knit (former Steelers LB Jack Lambert – “it might be a good idea to put dresses on all of them.” Lambert was a Hall of Famer… who went all of 6’4 220 at MLB, by the way.)
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