As a person who only gambles as part of a horrifying addiction to fantasy football, forgive me if I’m a little misogynistic here. I don’t mean to be, because I’m a classic gentleman, born and raised with southern elegance and hands as soft as a cloud shaped like a polar bear cub. That said, some broad made a $5 football bet on a 15-team parlay through Las Vegas-based Station Casinos, and thanks to the New Orleans Saints’ 28-13 victory over the Philadelphia Eagles on Monday Night Football, this anonymous woman is now $99,995 richer.
It turns out that this lady – obviously withholding her name from the media so the government won’t catch on, so get on that IRS – managed to pick both NFL and NCAA football victories correctly, even including one hell of an underdog.
She picked all 13 NFL games and two college games, beginning with Nebraska as a 2-point favorite over Michigan State. The Cornhuskers covered when Taylor Martinez threw a five-yard touchdown pass to Jamal Turner in the final seconds for a 28-24 victory.
Nebraska trailed 24-14 in the contest with eight minutes to go. Most of her games weren’t nearly as nerve-racking.
The biggest underdog, San Diego State +15, won outright 21-19 at Boise State. (Via the Las Vegas Sun)
This victory may seem like just another feel good story for some nickel slots loser who finally hits the jackpot, but it marks something much bigger than just a happy ending for Marge and the bingo hall gals. This $100,000 victory was the cherry on top of what the Sun also reported was the “worst ever” NFL week for the Vegas sports books. Is this just hyperbole? Probably. But let’s panic and overreact anyway.
William Hill spokesman Jimmy Vaccaro said his sports books paid off more 10-team parlays than he can remember in a single week of NFL action. Another William Hill patron spent $3 and cashed out for $9,000 after all 12 legs of a parlay came in.
“More and more people are wanting to bet a little to make a lot with parlays,” Vaccaro said. “In parlays, bookmakers have the best of it, but it turns very quickly when they get on the right sides. That’s what happened yesterday. You have to accept it and move on.”
Poor bookies. How will they ever survive after such a beating? Oh, that’s right. Easily. Because they’d been killing the past 8 weeks.
“We actually probably had the best eight weeks I’ve ever been involved with leading up to this,” Vaccaro said. “So everyone was feeling good about themselves, but you knew there was going to be a day when you were going to get a preponderance of favorites. But this wasn’t only favorites, it was the right favorites.”
So wherever you are, unnamed woman, I beg of you this – keep pushing those 15-team, $5 parlays. Milk these damn vampires for all they’re worth. And then marry me once you get really rich, because daddy wants to be a lazy bastard.
