The odds are not against you if you are not against the odds.

Over to your right is a small list of links that I need badly to expand and plan on doing so today sometime. Through links that others have included on their pages, I have found some fantastic blogs. The one non-blog link here is to the Chuck Klosterman archive of page2 columns. EPSEM ESPN, while despicable for continuing to push Chris Berman at us during events least needing witless self-pleasing statements, has collected a supremely talented group of writers for the page2 section of espn.com. And Scoop Jackson, unfortunately.

At the top of that list of great writers for me is ChuckK. On June 5th, a new Chuck piece was posted to page2 for the first time since the final game of the NCAA tournament. His column discusses how the All American Football League (AAFL) plans for success by catering to hardcore fans of college football. The basic idea is for the teams in the league to play games in the stadiums of colleges like Tennessee and Alabama, where the Spring game usually draws more fans than there are seats. The teams would be required to maintain a certain percentage of players that played for the school belonging to the stadium. All players would have to have a college degree. There will be no tv deal.

The AAFL is not the only new league hoping for great success. The United Football League (UFL), which has already secured multi-million dollar investments from Mark Cuban and others, hopes to succeed playing games on Friday nights during the usual football season, giving football fans an alternative to watching pimple faced teens bumbling around at the local high school. They see fans owning shares of the teams as well, which will help create loyalty.

As a lover of the sport of American football, I hope at least one of these two leagues succeeds, but they are ignoring the one thing that would guarantee survival.

Gambling.

An AAFL game sounds like a fun way to spend a Spring afternoon or evening, especially if coolers were permitted as they are at NASCAR events, but just imagine if they had a window to walk up to and place a wager? You could bet on who would win, who would cover the spread, the total, the spreads and totals for the quarters, and any number of props. That, in my estimation, would be the shiznit. The colleges are sure to reject this idea so they should build their own stadiums and take investments from the Public to do it. I can buy stock in Harrah's, so why not the AAFL? They should change the name of the league to something else though, such as the Mother Fucking Football League (MFFL). If the AAFL is too lame to try to make this happen, I hope the UFL is not. Mark Cuban has made it clear how he feels about sports gambling.

While the NFL pretends to not want anything to do with gambling, we all know that it is one of the major reasons why the league is so popular. Just go sit at the bar at any sports bar with Sunday Ticket in a big city on a Sunday during the season and listen to the conversations and look around. The guy with the Bears jersey isn't jumping up and down pumping his fist in response to the touchdown just scored by LaDainian Tomlinson when the Chargers were already up by five with thirty seconds left because his sister lives in San Diego. He either has him in his fantasy league or has money on the Chargers to cover the points spread.

If States other than Nevada have a problem with it, why not put the whole league there? Put a team or two in South Lake Tahoe, put another couple in Reno, and put the rest in Vegas. If you put them attached to the Casino, they will pay for the stadiums. This will give men a way to take a break from the tables without resorting to Cirque du Soleil.

Oh, and you could have topless cheerleaders.

Bon Weekend!