Bye Week

The Steelers have their bye week this week, so my interest in the games on tap today and tomorrow is purely intellectual, as opposed to inspiring a deep emotional response from the darkest depths of my fragile psyche. Sure. it’ll be great if the Seahawks win and I’ll be pleased if the Packers prevail and the Browns and the Bengals both tank, but it’s a completely different animal than when the boys in Black and Gold are involved.

I try to make things more interesting by laying small bets on Sportsbook.com; I’ve had some success this season taking the underdog at home when it looks like the game might be closer than the oddsmakers predict. This week, for instance, I like the Jets and Falcons with points, and I even picked the Cowpokes plus 5 in their showdown against the Cheatriots; saying this, of course, will probably blow the whole strategy sky high, although an article in the Times Magazine last year did point out that, as a general rule, sports bettors are irrational given that, over time, taking the home underdog with points will tend to pay off, yet players fail to exploit that.

I myself am guilty of that failure, too, but only when the Steelers are favored away; I can never bring myself to put money down on their opponent although I could win money if they fall to my team; it seems wrong somehow to not want the margin of victory to be as large as possible. I have, in the past, bet against Pittsburgh to win, thinking that if they lose, at least my disappointment will be tempered by pecuniary gains; that doesn’t really work, though: I end up feeling guilty making a profit off the boys’ failure and with a nagging suspicion that their defeat is partly my fault.

So these days, I stick to the over/under only in Steelers’ games, with a bias towards the under until Hines Ward returns.