Gamblor was correct in both of the games last week, going 2-0, but unfortunately it wasn’t confident enough in either pick to wager any money, so it’s take for the week was absolutely nothing. Of course, as I keep mentioning, Gamblor’s picks are only theoretical during the postseason. Which is rather unfortunate because it has done quite well, having put together a record of 7-3 so far for a weighted win percentage of 84.1% and a theoretical profit of $456. However, considering its performance last year during the playoffs (I don’t have the numbers in front of me, but trust me, it was bad) I’m not quite ready to let it off the leash in January just yet.
The only true guarantee in sports gambling is that there’s no such thing as a sure thing. Time and time again this has been proven to us by the casinos, as teams that seem like guaranteed locks somehow find a way to shit the bed and fail to cover – or lose outright. Unfortunately, that’s the way the system works – or there wouldn’t be a system at all. If you’re like most gamblers out there, including me, you’ve ended the season down a few chips thanks to all those sure things that turned out to be duds. I’m convinced that this year’s Superbowl will turn out to be yet another cautionary tale of how the house always finds a way to win. We’ll probably see Peyton Manning deliver a stellar performance but get handcuffed by shady officiating, and the Saints will score a late touchdown to cut the Colts’ margin of victory to just less than the spread. That kind of shit happens all the time when Vegas is involved. But occasionally, every once in a blue moon, the tables turn, and the casinos are the ones who watch in horror as a single freak bounce of the football costs them millions and millions of dollars in the span of a few horrifying seconds. Which brings me to my feature for the week: (more…)
NEW YORK JETS
PHILADELPHIA EAGLES
BALTIMORE RAVENS
GREEN BAY PACKERS
INDIANAPOLIS COLTS
JACKSONVILLE JAGUARS
CHICAGO BEARS
ATLANTA FALCONS
NEW ORLEANS SAINTS
NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS
SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS
PITTSBURGH STEELERS
NEW YORK GIANTS
KANSAS CITY CHIEFS
WASHINGTON REDSKINS
TENNESSEE TITANS
BALTIMORE RAVENS
CINCINNATI BENGALS
SAN DIEGO CHARGERS
BUFFALO BILLS
SEATTLE SEAHAWKS
BALTIMORE RAVENS
TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS
CAROLINA PANTHERS
DENVER BRONCOS
DETROIT LIONS
NEW YORK JETS
DALLAS COWBOYS
MINNESOTA VIKINGS
INDIANAPOLIS COLTS
CLEVELAND BROWNS
CHICAGO BEARS
5. Kendra Wilkinson. Based on her sunny disposition and willing accessibility to fans, Kendra Wilkinson seems like a genuine sweetheart. The San Diego native made her first appearance at the Playboy mansion as one of the “painted girls” at Hefner’s birthday party, lived in the mansion as one of Hefner’s girlfriends and charmed viewers of the reality show The Girls Next Door well enough to earn her own spinoff show, Kendra. Kendra is a faithful Chargers fan who married NFL receiver Hank Baskett in June and is due to give birth to her first child in December. Baskett was best-known as an Eagles receiver but has recently been engaged by the Indianapolis Colts to help fill a void in their roster caused by an injury to Anthony Gonzalez. Unfortunately, sweetness aside, Kendra also seems incredibly dim – so much so that she makes Kelly Bundy seem like a Rhodes scholar by comparison. Hugh Hefner described Kendra as having a “distinctly unintellectual charm” and possessing a “dazed personality and a limited vocabulary.” When confronted with any situation more mentally challenging than, say, making dinner reservations at the Olive Garden, Kendra’s laudable response is to get drunk and cheerfully take her top off.
5. Bubba Smith as Moses Hightower in Police Academy (1984): In his short-lived career in the NFL, the massive Bubba Smith was an incredibly dominant player. After a distinguished college career at Michigan State University where he helped the Spartans win a pair of co-national championships and recorded a pair of sacks in what is referred to in the Big 10 annals as the “
4. Jim Brown as Robert T Jefferson in The Dirty Dozen (1967): Jim Brown is considered by many to have been the finest football player in the history of the NFL. He played exclusively for the Cleveland Browns, and averaged 5.2 yards per carry and over 100 yards per game, amassing 12,312 yards in just nine seasons of play, during which he never missed a single game. In 1966 he was cast to play Robert T Jefferson, a militant black soldier who had been imprisoned for killing a white soldier in self-defense. Jefferson was inducted into “The Dirty Dozen,” a crew of convicted soldiers who were trained and sent on a suicidal mission into Nazi-occupied France. The film featured an all-star cast, including Lee Marvin, George Kennedy, Ernest Borgnine, Charles Bronson, Telly Savalas, and even Donald Sutherland. And Jim Brown was perfectly adequate in his role, but it was the film’s effect on his career that made his performance so memorable. Production during the summer of 1966 ran behind schedule, and Browns owner Art Modell insisted that Brown report to training camp or risk suspension. Jim Brown responded to the ultimatum by announcing his retirement from professional football. The fiercely violent film was released in 1967 and enjoyed massive success at the box office, earning a net profit of $18 million (the year’s highest take) and establishing Brown’s place in movie history.
3. Alex Karras as Mongo in Blazing Saddles (1974): Alex Karras might have eventually destroyed all of his credibility as a tough guy by playing a sitcom dad for years in TV’s Webster, but in his youth he was a phenomenal athlete, playing on both sides of the ball at the University of Iowa and finishing second in the balloting for the 1957 Heisman trophy – as a defensive lineman! He played for 12 seasons for the Detroit Lions, and was named to the pro bowl four times before retiring in 1971 and devoting his full energy to acting. In 1974 he was cast in the classic western comedy “Blazing Saddles” as the dimwitted henchman Mongo. Mongo was initially in service of the film’s antagonists, having been sent to harrass the town’s newly appointed black sherriff, but ultimately befriends the man (Cleavon Little) after he is bested by the clever sheriff. Karras had few words to speak as Mongo (example: “Mongo like candy…”) but made the most of his physical attributes, staging several entertaining fight scenes and in one of the most famous sequences of the film punching out a horse.
2. John Matuszak as Sloth in Goonies (1985): Like Bubba Smith, John Matuszak was also a #1 pick in the NFL draft. “The Tooz” spent much of his football career as the most notoriously degenerate member of the the most notoriously degenerate team in football, the Oakland Raiders. Although he appeared on the silver screen a few times (in North Dallas Forty and Caveman) before his retirement from football after winning his second Superbowl ring in 1981, Matuszak was best remembered for his portayal of the grotesquely deformed Sloth in Goonies (1985). Although the extensive makeup and prosthetics (which took five hours to apply) rendered Matuszak unrecognizable, his massive physique, his booming voice, and the simplicity of his character’s motivations charmed viewers of the adventure movie. Sloth used his massive strength to pull chains out of walls, singlehandedly conquered a pirate ship, and supported a boulder over an escape passage long enough for the gang to escape. A victim of his own excesses, Matuszak died of drug-induced heart failure in 1989 at the young age of 38, but Sloth’s catchphrase of “Baby…Ruth?” will live on in movie memory forever.
1. Carl Weathers as Apollo Creed in Rocky (1976): Carl Weathers had a short career in the NFL – he played under coach John Madden for the Oakland Raiders in seven games in 1970 and just one in 1971. But his career as an actor has been much more successful, as he’s played major (and hugely popular) roles in Predator and Happy Gilmore, and portrayed a hilarious version of himself on TV’s Arrested Development. But by far his most memorable role was also one of his first, as Apollo Creed in the 1976 film Rocky. Weathers played the brash and cocky nemesis to Sylvester Stallone’s Italian Stallion, bringing an incredible amount of charisma to the character. As the current heavyweight boxing champion whose legitimate opponent had been sidelined due to injury, Apollo Creed selected the amateur Rocky to take his place in what he considered to be little more than an exhibition match. The story, of course, was a prototype for true underdog stories as Rocky rose above himself and proved that he was capable of competing at the same level as the champion. Apollo Creed fought Rocky again in the second movie, returned in the third as Rocky’s trainer, and was finally killed in the ring by Ivan Drago in Rocky IV.
