Editor’s Note: The following is an excerpt for the book The History of the World from a Gambler's Perspective by Mason Malmuth and Antonio Carrasco. The book is now available on Amazon.
The authors would like to give gambling authority David Sklansky recognition for many of the ideas that appear in this chapter.
In 1960, the American Football League played its first season and was immediately in direct competition with the well-established National Football League which began in 1920. At first, attendance was poor but a generous television contract with the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) assured they would stay in business, and in 1965 the ABC contract was followed by a contract with the National Broadcasting Company (NBC).
The AFL featured more offense than the NFL, and by paying top dollar for the best college players they could get, the AFL began to attract top talent and became a legitimate competitor to the NFL. The NFL, of course, had to match the salaries that the AFL was willing to pay. Thus, fierce competition began between the two leagues leading to a merger in 1966. But even though a merger had taken place, it was decided that the two leagues would still play separate schedules through the 1969 season with the only exception being the championship game that would feature the league champion from each of the two leagues, and this game became known as the Super Bowl.
The first two Super Bowls played in 1967 and 1968 were easily won by the NFL team, the Green Bay Packers, as they defeated the Kansas City Chiefs 35 to 10 in 1967 and then the Oakland Raiders 33 to 14 in 1968. And one of the things that these wins did was to confirm to most everyone that the NFL was the better league and that the AFL teams had a lot of catching up to do. But then, in 1969, came Super Bowl III, the first championship game to actually bear the name Super Bowl.
The game was won by the New York Jets of the AFL and their charismatic quarterback “Broadway Joe” Namath as they defeated the Baltimore Colts 16 to 7 despite being an 18 point underdog. This game is considered to be “one of the greatest upsets in both American Football and in the recorded history of sports.” So, how could this happen?
One of the things that occurred is that the week before the game, Joe Namath was seemingly everywhere. This included an appearance three days before the Super Bowl at The Miami Touchdown Club (the game was held in Miami, Fla on January 12, 1969) where he guaranteed that his team, the New York Jets, would win, and that’s exactly what happened.
The next year, 1970, Super Bowl IV took place between the NFL’s Minnesota Vikings and the AFL’s Kansas City Chiefs, with the Vikings being a 13 point favorite. But what about Super Bowl III? Didn’t the AFL win? Yes, but that was Namath and all his talking. He had managed to single-handily psych out the Baltimore Colts and an upset like this could never happen again. Thus, the Vikings should easily win Super Bowl IV, and this wasn’t just the opinion of the large majority of fans, most sports writers and other commentators, the so-called experts of the day, felt the same way. Kansas City should easily be beat.
But this wasn’t accurate. Anyone who understood football and had carefully watched Super Bowl III, would have realized it wasn’t Namath, though he did play well, that had psyched out and beaten the NFL team. It was simply the fact that the New York Jets were the better team in most every aspect both offensively and defensively. Even the final score of 16 to 7 was misleading since the Colts didn’t score until the end of the game and were losing 16 to 0 well into the fourth quarter. Hence, in Super Bowl IV, Kansas City, which many people considered to be a better team than the New York Jets from the year before, should have been a big favorite, and not a 13 point dog.
So, on January 11, 1970, at Tulane Stadium in New Orleans, La, Super Bowl IV played out just like it was supposed to with the Kansas City Chiefs defeating their NFL opponent the Minnesota Vikings by the score of 23 to 7, very similar to the score of Super Bowl III. It was a great victory for Kansas City Head Coach Hank Stram and his multiple formation offense including the “moving pocket,” and showed that the betting line could have been off by as much as 30 points, which is as close to a sure thing that you can get on an NFL football bet.
To finish, you may be wondering why an analysis of a football game that was played over 50 years ago is contained in the front of a book that’s supposed to be about world history. The answer is simple. This example shows how expert gamblers think. Now when we say expert gamblers, we’re not talking about the coaches or the players, or even most of the people who bet on the game. We’re talking about that small group of people who are able to take into account the details of the situation at hand, are able to analyze these details properly, and then to sometimes make a surprising decision and pull off a successful gamble when most others will fail.
But remember, there’s still that luck factor, and even though the bet the expert makes may be a positive expectation bet, it doesn’t mean that it will win. So, even though in reality Kansas City was a big favorite over Minnesota in Super Bowl IV, it was not a guarantee that Kansas City would win.
