No One Wants To Hear Your Gambling Stories … Except This One

So on the Sunday of the NFL’s Week 4, I put down a little $5 wager on the Colts’ Adonai Mitchell to have fewer than 2.5 catches, more than 29.5 receiving yards, and a touchdown. This was a parlay. It was at +2549 odds.

He finished with three catches, so the bet lost anyway, But at one point, he had one catch, and this happened:

All wasn’t lost, though. Earlier that morning, as soon as Jaylen Warren was ruled out for the Steelers, I ran and bet Kenneth Gainwall overs and —

And nobody wants to hear my gambling stories.

And nobody wants to hear your gambling stories. Not your big win, not your bad beat.

Nobody.

Not your friends. Not your spouse. Not the guy sitting next to you at the bar.

And definitely — definitely — not me.

As much as you couldn’t give two shizzes about my Kenneth Gainwell call or my near-bad beat on Adonai Mitchell, I promise you that I don’t care about your story. Please do not call to tell me your story. If you see me on the street, I’m begging you to not tell me your story.

No one wants to hear your gambling stories.

But why?

Which is weird, right? Because you’d think fellow gamblers would be the exact right audience for these tales. We speak the language. We understand the stakes. We know what a three-team parlay feels like when two legs hit and the third one loses by half a point in garbage time.

But here’s the thing: We don’t want to hear it.

Trust me on this.

I’ve been gambling forever, perhaps much like you, and this is the big unwritten rule that so many of us can’t help but break almost daily: Keep your mouth shut about your results.

Big win? Shut up. Bad beat? Shut up. That unbelievable parlay that would’ve hit if only the Adonai Mitchell blah blah blah? Shut. Up.

And I mean that in the nicest way possible.

Here’s why: When you tell me about your big win, you know what I’m thinking? I’m thinking about my losses. I’m thinking about how I’m down for the week. I’m thinking about the DFS lineup I almost played that would’ve cashed huge. I’m not happy for you. I’m annoyed at the universe.

And when you tell me about your bad beat? You know what I’m thinking? Join the club, pal. Because here’s the secret that every single gambler knows but won’t admit: We all think we’re the unluckiest person alive.

Every. Single. One of us.

Mine’s worse

You think you took a bad beat? I took a worse one. You think that three-leg parlay dying on the last leg was brutal? Let me tell you about my three-leg parlay. Mine was worse. Mine was more improbable. Mine was more painful.

Who wants to hear this crap? Nobody. That’s who.

Bottom line, sad but true, cliche over cliche, is simply this: Gambling stories, the ones that focus on wins or losses, are boring. They’re all the same story with different numbers. “I won money.” “I lost money.” “I almost won money.” “I almost lost money.”

And yet, gamblers can’t help themselves. You know why? Ego. Validation. Camaraderie. We think because the other guy speaks the same language, he’ll be riveted by our tale of heartbreak or triumph.

Wrong. He’s busy replaying his heartbreaks and triumphs in his head. He’s comparing. He’s one-upping. He’s bored.

It’s like showing baby pictures. You love yours, couldn’t care less about anyone else’s.

How to tell a good gambling story

So are there any good gambling stories? Of course there are. But it’s never about the outcome. It’s about the stakes, the story, the unintended results.

Like Brian Zembic, who won $100,000 by … getting breast implants.

Or more recently, Jason Bales’ 6-12-18-24 challenge, in which he had to attach one of each number to (his choice) miles run, donuts eaten, beers drank, and times … well, times he took care of himself. (My god, please read the back-and-forth between him and Adam Levitan to book this bet. It reads like Abbott and Costello, assuming Abbott and Costello were insane.)

Those are good gambling stories. You know why? Because they are actually stories, not “I almost won a bet.” 

Those stories have stakes beyond money. Those stories are about humanity.

“I hit a five-team parlay last week for $3K”? That’s not a story. That’s a brag.

“My quarterback threw a pick-six with two minutes left and I lost by half a point”? That’s not a story. That’s just complaining. And nobody wants to hear complaining. We’ve all been there, most of us within the last 12 hours or so.

So here’s my advice, from one gambler to another: Keep your wins and losses to yourself. We’re all out here playing the same stupid game, fighting the same stupid odds, making the same stupid mistakes.

We get it. We’ve been there. We are there.

And we really, really don’t want to hear about it.

Anyway, Adonai Mitchell: So there I was …