The odds are against understanding football betting

When the Cleveland Browns and New York Jets kicked off the NFL exhibition season last week, two amazing things happened. The first amazing thing, of course, is that the Browns won.

The second was that people actually gambled on the outcome.

What makes that so amazing is that, in football, betting on an exhibition game is like betting on a Harlem Globetrotter’s game. They’re games that don’t count featuring players who may never play in games that do. None of the participants — players, coaches, cheerleaders — cared much about who won that game.

Just about its only significance was that it signaled the official opening of football-betting season for its fans. Of which, by the time it ends, an estimated 46 million will have wagered $250 billion.

They’ll be betting on pro games, college games and high school games. If I search hard enough I might find action on my grandson’s flag football games. Instead of “Did they win?” the big question after every game will be, “Did they cover?”

And I don’t get it. Maybe that’s because, of all the popular addictions, gambling is my least favorite. I tried it twice and didn’t like it.

Once was at a race track, where I risked two bucks on a horse to show. Which is what he did. Unfortunately, he showed 20 minutes later than the other horses.

On a business trip to Vegas, I wound up $35 ahead at the slot machine in my hotel. When I went up to my room and called home with the good news, my wife said, “Go back down there and bet it all.” So I did. And lost it all. Plus another $25.

So there’s a lot I don’t understand about gambling. Especially about sports gambling, which once was handled by surreptitious phone calls to shady characters, but now has shed its unsavory reputation and is legal in 37 states.

I can understand betting on, say, horse racing; without betting, the only horse race most of us would even know about is the one in Kentucky where the women wear funny hats.

But why do millions of football, basketball, baseball and hockey fans feel the need to bet on those games?

Is it the stimulant they need because the games themselves are so boring? Are the dancing girls, blaring music and exploding Jumbotrons not enough to keep them from dozing off in the middle of the game? If I needed to have a bet on a game to make it interesting, I think I’d find some other means of entertainment.

Maybe I’ll understand it all some day. But I won’t bet on it.