I am really enjoying this because when the Panthers do surprisingly well, like they did against the struggling Detroit Lions last week, I am not upset that I lose the $10 or so, I am happy that the team that I like the most is performing well - which after being a fan for more than 20 years is not a sensation that Panther fans get to feel very often.
I'm sure there are some Lions' fans out there that feel the same way about their team as I do about the Panthers: You are just constantly waiting for them to screw it up no matter how much money they invest or how much hype is surrounding the roster. You just know something is going to go wrong because it always does!
In this game Detroit was favored by 4.5 points on the Vegas gambling lines and I picked that the Lions would win by more than that.
Man was I ever wrong
I don't know if the Panthers were trying to make up for the absence of 2nd half play that they have been criticized for during this season but they came out of the halftime locker room absolutely screaming as they took a tie game from the half and managed to go up by 13 points.
However, they are still the Carolina Panthers and they did seem to be actively working towards bumbling it in the 4th quarter but at this point they were already far enough ahead that they could afford to make some mistakes and still emerge victorious, which they did. When the Lions got their late TD in the 4th, this was a "gimme" and Carolina maybe could have stopped it if they had been trying 100%.
Although it may not look like it to the uninitiated, American football is a game of chess and sometimes letting up on certain parts of the defense in order to waste the clock is exactly what the leading team is trying to do. They don't actually mind if the other team scores a TD, they just want to waste as much of the clock as possible while they do that. When the Lions scored with just over 2 minutes remaining in the game to make the score 32-26, all the Panthers had to do was not fumble the ball on the next possession while doing running plays and victory was assured.
They pulled if off. I'm in a bit of state of shock because I didn't think they had that in them.
SO I lost the $10 on the bet but my team got a win that I really didn't think they could pull off. I expected a blowout by Detroit. Hell, even teeny-tiny Bryce Young looked like he belonged out there and was sort of worth the huge money they are paying him.
I still can't get over how tiny he looks compared to the other players though.
The Panthers have a bye week this week so there will be no betting on my part this week. Although I do have to say if there was a way to pull off a loss during a bye week, the Panthers would be the team to figure out how to do it.
I think the gambling world shares my pessimism because the betting lines for the upcoming month has the Vegas lines predicting Carolina to lose to the Eagles, the Packers, and even to Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who have only one win on the season.
