Matt Holthe's Fleeting Thoughts

Last night my wife and I are watching the Saints and the Vikings. As the game goes into overtime, she asks "would either one of these teams be a better match up for the Colts?". I say "it doesn't really matter." "What do you mean?" "No matter who wins, the line on the game will be Colts by 4 or 5". After the Saints win, the Las Vegas Sports Consultants (LVSC) set the line at Indy -4. The line has gone up slightly since then - several casinos have Indy -4.5 now and a couple even have -5.

Last night I went out to get dinner. It was towards the end of the Chargers/Jets playoff game, and San Diego was driving while down 10. I wanted to listen to the end of the game on the radio. I tried the local WJBC but they had a pre-game for ISU on. So I went to ESPN Radio 1050 out of Decatur. No reception - it was foggy out. I tried the two that I know of from Chicago - same thing... couldn't hear a word going on. So I started the scan going until the game came in pretty clear. I started listening, and then a minute or so later they broke for station identification. The station I was listening to was out of Dallas, TX! I couldn't pick up the Decatur station, but Dallas had no problems. Kind of like the time I flew from Dallas to LA and got in my rental car in LA and ended up picking up KOA out of Denver crystal clear to listen to the Rockies.

Let me dream for a bit.... Major League Baseball splits into two divisions - call them whatever you want, but I'll call them "top" and "bottom". The top division is made up of 16 teams, the bottom division is made up of 14 teams. Each division has their own playoffs and champion (maybe 2 rounds of playoffs instead of 3 as there are now). At the end of each season, the worst team (by record) in the top division is replaced by the champion of the bottom division. There is revenue sharing within each division, but not across divisions. To start, the top 16 teams in terms of payroll make up the top division. Yankees, Red Sox, and so on. The other teams (Pirates, Royals, etc) are in the bottom division. Think about it - teams that are in the top division want to stay there, so even if you're having a bad season you don't want to tank it because you'll be dropped - incentive to win every game for the entire year. If you're in the bottom division, you w...

Something I almost never see with the way that I use my AmEx card when I travel so much: No balance. Guess my 2009 reimbursements went the way they were supposed to.