Boy, did we fool 'em

Let me set the scene. Jericho and I have gathered in his backyard on an uncharacteristically balmy Sunday afternoon. We’ve got sausages on the grill, cold beers in our hands and the Patriots and Colts are about to kickoff. And where are our ladies?…. They’re in a heated discussion trying to figure out how many touchdowns Peyton Manning and Tom Brady will combine to throw in the game. Incredible isn’t it?

It all started innocently enough. We knew what we’d be facing: a four-hour block of intense playoff caliber football and the potential for bored, tired or otherwise uninterested significant others. Normally we would just let it go. We’d watch our game and let the girls do their thing. They’d feign interest early on and then resort to their trashy magazines. (Ok fine, I’ll admit it, I too love US Weekly, Star and OK Magazine…but not when there’s football on damnit!) But today something unusual happened; the girls cared about what was going on. You don’t usually find this sort of interest from girls in a football game unless it’s the playoffs, the local team or their alma matter who’s playing. But Manning vs. Brady piqued some interest. The GQ cover boy vs. the All-American goody-two-shoe commercial whore. We had the bait now we just had to hook ‘em.

We decided to set some spreads and place some bets and surprisingly the girls got really into it. We had the normal bets; over-under, overall winner and overall quarterback performance. But then as a group, we decided to mix up the propositions just a bit:

• How many references of Gisele would there be? (1.5 was the spread, 0 was the actual.)

• How many QB comparison charts would be shown during the game? We set the over under at 4.5 it turned out to be 3.

• How many times would Eli, Archie or their nameless brother be shown on camera? 1.5 was the spread, 0 was the actual.

• How many one-handed grabs would Moss make? (0.5 was the spread, you won if you took the over.)

• How many times would a microphone catch Wes Welker yelling obscenities at the opposition? You won if you said more than once. That little man needs to take some anger management courses.

All-in-all the bets kept everyone involved. My wife won the competition correctly picking 5 out of the 8 bets. She was even itching to set some bets on the Sunday night game. This may seem silly and it may seem obvious but give it a shot. Pick a game, research some good story lines, try to interweave something in with an US Weekly headline and set some propositions. It’s fun for the whole family and best of all it leads you straight to the couch all-day-long.

Side note: I’ve got a nickname for Adrian Peterson. Robocop. He looks superhuman when he runs. He looks like a younger, faster, more evolved Eddie George. He looks like he could come out next Sunday with a late 80s space age helmet on and nobody would ask questions. Robocop. Let’s see if it sticks.