Just a reminder that my team name is a reference to the greatest Swayze movie ever, Roadhouse. Although this year, it takes on a double meaning with #22 Andrew Wiggins.
QB- Aaron Rodgers- I've always wanted him on my squad, and now I've got him. Also, Teens will love this pick, since she is constantly eye-humping the shit out of him when he's on TV. And if we're being totally honest with ourselves here....if he and I are out together in a cozy restaurant, having a nice dinner and some good conversation, and after dessert, the lights are turned down low and the wine is hitting me just the right way, if all of a sudden he tilts his head and leans in close....I'm not sure that I'm turning away.
RB- Chris Johnson- I'm smelling a comeback year from my boy CJ. I took a little bit of shit for this pick, but I've been right on him before, a couple of times.
RB- David Wilson- From the guy who gave you the breakout years of CJ, Doug Martin, Trent Richardson, Clinton Portis, and more...allow me to present to you David Wilson!
WR- AJ Green- I don't have the amazing crop of WRs I had last year, so AJ needs to be a horse for me this year.
WR- Dwayne Bowe- We finally get to see what he can do with a decent QB/coach combination.
WR- Steve Smith- As my third WR, I love him. If he was my second, not so much. At one point in the draft, I was starting to not love my team, but then I got Wilson as my RB2 and Smith as my WR3 in back-to-back rounds, and then I was back in liking my squad. But then I followed that up with...
TE- Kyle Rudolph- My first (and only this year, thankfully) panic pick. I definitely yelled 'DAMMIT FUCK SHIT' as I clicked the 'draft player' button.
K- Sebastian Janikowski- Here's why it's awesome having Bassy, and I try to draft him every year: the Raiders shitty offense stalls out on a lot of drives, and with his big leg, they'll attempt ANY length of field goal. He always gets a ton of shots at 50+, which is almost worth as much as a friggin' touchdown. One of these days he's gonna kick a 72-yarder or something stupid like that, and I'll leap off my couch yelling and celebrating and kicking an imaginary football, and I'll completely shatter my foot on the coffee table, but it will be worth it.
D/ST- Bengals- Normally every year I draft my entire bench before my defense, and just add/drop defenses throughout the year, and it goes about how you would expect it to go. This year, for the first time, I committed to drafting a good defense. We'll see how it goes. I'm pretty much over it already.
BENCH- Vincent Brown- Someone has to be the Charger's #1 WR.
BENCH- Malcolm Floyd- See Brown, Vincent.
BENCH- Eli Manning-
BENCH- Le'Veon Bell- I'm hoping somebody emerges from Pittsburgh's triumvirate of mediocre running backs to be something slightly above mediocre.
BENCH- Shonn Greene- Handcuffing CJ here, but if it comes to that, I'm fucked anyway.
BENCH- Brent Celek- Whatever.
Now on to the gambling portion of this post, and my favorite type of bet there is: NFL season wins over/unders. Here are the bets I loved the most:
Patriots under 11
It's never a great idea to bet against Belichick & Brady, but I think both the Bills and Dolphins will be tougher this year (oops), and the Pats let every decent WR on their roster go in the offseason, and Aaron Hernandez (in Ron Burgundy voice) probably should have found a safehouse or a relative close by and laid low for awhile. I still think the Pats will win the division, and I might be headed for a kiss-your-sister push at 11-5...but it's tough to get to 12-4 in the NFL these days.
Bears over 8.5
Fuck I hate cheering for the Bears. There are lots of things I dislike about Jay Cutler, not the least of which is that he's married to my boo Kristin Cavallari. But I think they're gonna be decent this year, and there's money to be made. I hate to be a sell-out here, but Cash Rules Everything Around Me, C.R.E.A.M, get the money, dolla dolla bills y'all!
Panthers under 7.5
I can't see how Carolina gets to a .500 record with their schedule and division. Atlanta, New Orleans, Tampa? Figure they go 2-4 there, 3-3 if we're being generous, which means they need to go 6-4 or 5-5 against everyone else. Except they also play Seattle, the Giants, New England, at Miami, and at San Francisco. So they basically need to pull a couple of upsets, or else win every single coin-flip game and avoid being upset once all year. Like Stevie Wonder and the most glorious rainbow in the world, I'm not seeing it.
Redskins over 8.5
There's always one bet every year that makes me feel squeamish literally two seconds after I place it. Just instant regret. I've often wished that gambling websites would offer you a similar message to what happens in Word or Excel when you try to close a document without saving, and it asks you something like "Are you sure you want to exit without saving changes?" I need something like that for win total over/unders. "RGIII is banged up, the league had an entire offseason to try and figure him out, the schedule got tougher, the division ostensibly improved, they're probably due for some regression in the turnover differential department....are you sure you want to exit without saving changes?"
Chargers under 7.5
It feels like Phillip Rivers has been the Chargers' QB for like 25 years instead of seven, and they still haven't won anything with him. At this point, I feel like he needs to hear a slightly adjusted version of the speech that Happy Gilmore's girlfriend gives him as she's breaking up with him. "All you ever talk about is winning a Super Bowl, but there's a problem: you're not any good!" Continuing with the Happy Gilmore parallels, if there was one QB that would take off his skate and try to stab somebody, my money would be on Rivers. Or Cutler, dammit I hate that douchebag.
Stephen from Laguna Beach > Brody Jenner > Jay Cutler
Jets under 6.5
I already thought the Jets would struggle to get to 7 wins...and then this happened. And this happened. And this happened. Today on my gambling site, in the 'bet amount' box for the Jets, I tried typing in "4 bedroom, 3 bathroom house w/ 2 car garage, good neighborhood, Golden Tee NOT included"...but when I tried to submit the bet, it told me that was an improper value. So yeah, I don't think the Jets get to 7 wins.
Bengals over 8.5
Similar to the Jets, I already had an opinion on the Bengals, and had it confirmed by recent events. I thought they would finish with a winning record, and more likely than not make the playoffs....then I watched a bunch of episodes of Hard Knocks at BroMo's place (side note: I had never watched that show before, no HBO and all, but holy hell it is awesome.) Now I think Cincy might go 14-2 and roll through the playoffs with their third stringers, then win the Super Bowl by 87 points while playing with only seven guys per side. Giovani Bernard might run for 3,500 yards this year; you heard it here first, folks.
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One more thing: this year I've decided to fulfill a lifelong goal and bet on every single game all season long. I've always flirted with this idea and never done it.
Maybe it's because I'm a little flush in my account right now since I had a good year last year, then didn't touch my account all summer except to bet on the season overs for the Braves and Royals (which should both be winners, knock on wood.)
Maybe it's because I watched Two for the Money the other day and I completely and totally missed the point of that movie. I mean, yeah, Matthew McConaughey got assaulted and got his face pissed on by gangsters, and Al Pacino had a heart attack every other day....but it still made gambling on sports for a living look pretty sweet.
Maybe it's because I'm married now, and within a couple years we'll be trying to have kids (by which I mean I'll be trying to convince Teens that we should adopt a black kid), and there won't be many more opportunities to do something this selfish. I can sense my own single-guy mortality or something.
Or, maybe it's just because Gamblor has finally taken over the last vestiges of my soul, and it's all over now. Move over Wooderson, time for me to get my face pissed on.
Whatever the reason, it's finally happening this year. Sure, there will be some games where I'm not laying more than $10 or $15 (all Ravens/Steelers games, every time I bet against the Titans, any time Michael Vick is within 100 miles of the stadium, etc.) But the point is, if you're sitting at home wondering if anyone you know has money on the game you're watching, the answer is yes. Your ol' boy Jum Hammonds does. Holla at me.
