Meaningless

Occasionally, when the mercury is high and the mind is blank and the seediness from The Night Before is setting in, I try to lock myself down into some form of nothingness. Serious nothingness. Sometimes, it’s the only option.

I look to avoid reality and heat and random thought. Really throw myself into some harmless activity that will not affect me in anyway outside the standard deviation.

Fantasy World Cup with Skinner and Badiel re-runs.

All time Canterbury-Bankstown teams.

Wrestlemania VI.

Finding that Rolling Stone with the extraordinarily hot photo of Alicia Silverstone in a tidy little school uniform.

Yesterday, it was Madden 2003.

I’m a rube for it. I have been locked into only two computer games in my lifetime. I’m not a child of The Computer Age…I can’t figure the pricks out and to be honest, I was a much better journalist on the typewriter. But that’s neither here nor there. Madden 2003, aside from At The Races (a horse racing game of the highest order), can sometimes get me by the bollocks and have me squealing like that strange old Piglet, so to speak.

Locked into a playoff run with my Drew Bledsoe-led Seahawks, I was in a state of absolute focus. I needed to win two from two to clinch the last wildcard spot. My high powered offense was still firing but my inability to defend was really getting exploited and to make matters worse, Shaun Alexander went down with a season ending knee injury.

It had my full consideration.

Andrea, my young assistant, was in quite a state. The phones were ringing…the banging on the door got louder and more intense…the mail remained unopened…my French toast had gone cold and inedible…

And I sat in a state of Capuchin focus, the events of the outside world suddenly very unimportant. The only concern was how to recover this onside kick.

She was in tears, but what could I do?

Somewhere around five-my breakfast still uneaten and Andrea curled in the foetal position gibbering about important meetings and Super Bowl related expenses that need to be paid before further action is taken-there was some form of commotion outside that seemed to have involved The Fuzz.

But I wasn’t too worried about that. My emotional energies were focussed on my 4 point loss to the Bucs that knocked me out of the race. It was a cruel blow, one that I pontificated over for many hours. The savagery was overwhelming, the brutality unbearable. As evening fell, I howled at the moon and called for redemption…

After drinking heavily for a number of hours in an attempt to dull the pain, it occurred to me that it was all meaningless. It was only a goddamn game. There was nothing at stake. Lives would not change, for good or ill, on the coat tails of the outcome.

When the outcome is unimportant, the game is meaningless.

And there is nothing more dangerous than betting on something meaningless.

We can all bet with a high degree of confidence that most AFL teams will be trying to win each week and we can bet with that same degree of confidence that a Test cricket side will be pursuing a positive outcome. That is because these games have meaning. The outcomes are important and thus, the intentions are clear.

But there are sporting contests-plentiful in number- that are meaningless. And, fellow punter, this is where caution is required; discipline is needed and common sense compulsory.

Unless you can ascertain clearly that the outcome has some importance to the combatants and there is a real desire and effort on at least one team to win, you cannot bet. You cannot bet.

I lost heavily once to an old literary associate of mine betting on the Pro Bowl. It was 1994 and I was sure we were set for a shoot out. The final score was 17-3 and after paying my colleague, I skulked out and vowed to Mars that I would never bet a meaningless game again. And I haven’t.

You can’t bet in games like the Pro Bowl or the Charity Shield or the NBA All-Star game or exhibition matches or many hundreds of other sporting events that have no real reason for players to really put in and for participants to desire victory. On some visceral level, they will try but they won’t give their all and when it becomes difficult, they’ll pull back.

If you bet on one of these gigs, you may as well head down to Randwick on a Tuesday morning and start betting the barrier trials.

It is also important to be very wary of end-of-season fixtures that involve teams out of the finals chase. Too many funny things go on. Just look at the betting on the Bulldogs-Roosters round 26 clash last year, then watch the game and tell me there was nothing at all suspicious about the game. I’m not firing of accusations, but it all just seemed a little funny, a little off.

With these match-ups be careful. Very careful. When you see one of these fixtures, strap on your running shoes and get some fresh air…clear the sinuses…open up the lungs…and think long and hard about what you’re doing because in the end, it’s probably not going to end all that well for you. Financially, at least.

And that, loyal reader, is that.