I’m really really sorry. I apologize unreservedly … for being a dumbass and betting on my favorite team

19 March 2019

Advisory: The following has nothing to do specifically with the NFL or NFL betting, but a lesson is reiterated which is of valuable use to the NFL bettor. If only I’d remembered at the time…

Sometimes we all do stupid s*** in Las Vegas. Last time yours truly was out there meeting with El Jefe and assorted sordid types that congregate there every so often, we made a bet. As a Denver Nuggets fan armed with irrational confidence and Nikola Jokic, the bossman bet l’il ol’ me on the relative fortunes of his team against the team of my boyhood fandom, the Los Angeles Lakers.

Through sheer embarrassment, the terms of the wager won’t be detailed here, but the bet involved relative numbers of wins, with a cap on a 10-win difference. The cruel fact that I’ll be paying the maximum has been evident for at least a month now, a bad four weeks filled with nearly daily trash-talking from El Jefe on the subject of my folly.

(Whatever happened to “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas,” anyway…?)

The prospect of an imminent fat payout apparently isn’t enough for El Jefe, forever, and he’s now demanding an apology appearing here on the pages of NFLbets. He claims that I called him “out of his mind” for backing the Nuggets in the bet, tossing in a characterization of the man as “congenitally insane” to boot.

This is clearly a distortion, NFLbets argued, as I’m clearly one of the most peaceable and uncontroversial folks you’ll meet. And why should I apologize when he’s set to win actual cash? Whereupon the conversation that followed went pretty much precisely like this:

Hey, NFLbets’ll admit that getting hung out a high window was deserved for forgetting an absolutely crucial tip for gambling success: <strong>Never play favorites when the goal is winning money.</strong>

Naturally on that dark day in Vegas was I deceiving myself into thinking that I was thinking objectively about the Lakers. I justified making my fanboy bet with arguments that only Laker fans who’d somehow managed to watch this team eyes uncovered for the past three seasons knew how good these young guys were/are: Brandom Ingram, though slight of build so fearless at driving the paint; Kyle Kuzma, the late first-round sensation with five different shots in his arsenal; Josh Hart, a sneaky sharpshooter coming in off the bench. Hell, I was (and still am) a defender of Ivica Zubac, a guy who came up playing on Team Croatia youth sides with Dario Saric and Mario Hezonja.

As for Lonzo Ball, a player who has attracted a disproportionate amount of vitriol from haters on all sides, the truth is that the lad’s shooting numbers are up while his defensive and passing sills are indisputably top level.

Adding Lebron James – even with ancient Rondo and a grab bag of C-listers joining him in lieu of a second marquee free agent – to this roster alone should have been worth a playoff spot, not to mention hitting the over on the preseason over/under line of 49½ wins. Hell, King James got the Cleveland Cavaliers well far many times with worse rosters than this, right?

Except a not-so-funny thing or 12 happened on the way to the 2018-19 NBA Finals. James Harden and Chris Paul managed to set a speed bump directly in front of the starting gate, getting Rondo and Ingram suspended for several games each after some grade-A trolling from the Rockets.

Then Lebron gets injured – Merry Christmas, Lakers Fans! – and as it turns out, Luke Walton’s miracle run at the helm of the record-setting Golden State Warriors taught him f***-all about coaching defense. As it turns out, having Andre Iguodala and Draymond Green at your behest isn’t actually a strategy. On this, Javale McGee’s 5-foot jumper was left behind in 2018 (if it ever made to, likesay, 2014-15, in the first place, that is), Zubac was traded for nothing and the other young ‘uns may as well have been traded with all the psychological good the Anthony Davis speculation did this team.

As this stifling snowball of death steadily rolled downhill into the fifth level of Lakers hell, well, let’s just say I saw a lot of Ls on the forehead from El Jefe – and said letter did not stand for “Lakers” or “Los Angeles.”

I should have, for I deserved it absolutely and thoroughly. NFL bettors, please remember the simple fact that it literally just does not pay to be a fan, and my frivolous, stupid loss will not have been in vain. So here’s your apology, boss, and I think I’ve learned my lesson.

Unless, of course, you want to go double or nothing on the Butt Nuggets advanced out of the first round of the NBA playoffs…