Sunday, January 18, 2004

Leave All Emotions at the Door: NFL's Final Four

That saying was on a sign that hung up on the trading desk of a fellow Wall Street broker. He needed to remind himself that, when dealing with ridiculously huge sums of money... you need to be calm, cool, and decisive. That mantra seeps into the gambling world. When betting... without a severe detachment from your feelings and emotions... you are doomed to become a loser.

Now it's Sunday morning and there are four teams left, all vying for a shot at the Super Bowl. I have to remind myself that saying when looking at today's NFL playoff matchups. I fuckin' hate the NE Patriots. I despise them. But on paper, all signs point to: bet on New England. My head tells me to bet on the PATS. My heart tells me to take Indy. And my gut says... stay away from pro football and stick to poker, where I have more control over the outcome!

Alas, when I took Indy this year, they covered for me, plenty of times. I dunno how many times I chatted with Chicago Bob this past season, minutes before Sunday kickoff, and marveled at the line in the Indy games. Week after week, the Colts managed to cover game after game. Do you see a trend here? Well, I do.

To hell with the weather, it's not as cold as it has been in the past few days. I don't give a shit about all this "dome" vs. "outside" crap... (although it does matter when coming down to field goal kickers!)

Should I worry about the coach? New England has the edge there. How about the defense? NE has the edge there too. How about the QBs? Peyton Manning has been unconcious the last two weekends. I have not seen a performance like that out of a QB in sometime. The last player I saw get that hot in the playoffs was in hockey & baseball... the Dominator in the late 1990s (Hasek got hot that one NHL playoffs for Buffalo) and Will Clark for the SF Giants against the Cubs in the late 1980s, when he hit everything pitched to him out onto Waveland Avenue.

This past season, although I came in third place in the spread pools, I picked more winners this season than the previous two (53.2% in 2003 vs. 51% in 2002). With parity running rampant through tthe NFL, like SARS spreading through a remote Chinese village, I thought that this year was the toughest in a decade to pick winners with the spreads. So why did I end up with a high percentage? Late in the year (after Turkey Day)... I seemed to finally pick up on betting trends and I kicked ass. I took Home Dogs in December, bet heavily on hot QBs, and stuck to the favorites during division matchups. And I jumped from the middle of the pack up to the front and had a chance to win it all! Should I apply those same tactics to the playoffs? I did last week and finished 3-1!

Today, I'll go with the better QBs... Peyton Manning and Donovan McNabb... and bet my farm and racehorse on both games!

Pauly's Picks:
Indy + 3 1/2 at New Enlgand
Philly -4 vs. Carolina

Rib Boy likes New England & Philly... because they are "the two best teams."

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