On Second Thought
After being at or near the top of Gary Blackerby’s Million Dollar NFL Football Pool most of the time, I am now ranked incredibly close to the bottom - or as I like to call it, dead center.
Fact is, I have a 60.3 percent average this season, which is an F in my book.
My lack of formula is betraying me, or I’m losing my mojo or something. Turns out uniform colors and whether or not I like a team’s quarterback doesn’t matter after all.
It’s no secret I don’t watch much NFL football, save the Kansas City Chiefs. So when I very first began picking in the challenge, I developed a strategy that was so diverse, it changed every week.
I sometimes pick based on how angry their diehard fans are on a week-to-week basis, and that can be a remarkably handy system. It has worked for me for years with the Dallas Cowboys, with far more weeks of frustrated ‘boys fans than not, so I usually picked them to lose unless it was against the worst team in the league (if it wasn’t, in fact, the Cowboys that year). *
My firm rule is to always pick the Chiefs. Always. It’s my law. It’s my karmic reminder that ‘sometimes you win and sometimes you lose,’ with a smiling Patrick Mahomes giving the lessons each week. I can’t lose. I also usually don’t bet against Arizona because, Kliff Kingsbury. All roads lead to Texas Tech for me.
After that, it becomes a virtual free for all.
If I have no idea at all, sometimes I do pick the best uniform, and I can assure you I’ve never picked the New York Jets on a toss up with logic.
Sometime I pick the team where one of my best friends is from (Baltimore); sometimes it’s the team whose mascot is my childhood nickname (Tigers); or the state where my son-in-law is from (Tennessee). I love him that much.
Other weeks, like this one for instance, when I picked only five good games this past weekend, I have toyed with betting against myself on every one except the Chiefs, and probably the Cardinals.
Like I said, I don’t have far to fall or anything to lose except those people who actually watch football and hate it when I win against them because logic would say I shouldn’t since I may have based some of my picks on the fact that I like the linebacker’s pretty hair and they just hate that.
So this week, after I’m done writing this, I’m going to develop my strategy which may just combine picking the most humiliated team from the previous week to win, as well as a custom voodoo combo involving mascots that make me cringe and one of the teams from New York. Dunno.
*Do not send me hate email for that - I don’t watch pro football much so I have no idea if the Cowboys have, in fact, ever been the worst team in the league. I also thought Troy Aikman was short until my husband looked at me like I used his toothbrush, so there you go. He looks short on TV, but apparently only to me.
