Now this might come as a shock to some of you, but I love gambling. Casinos, scratch tickets, sports. You name it, and I’m down. Most people refer to the desire to gamble as an “itch”, that sort of comes and goes. But for me, it’s like more of a chronic case of gambling poison ivy that covers every inch of skin on my body, and it leaves me scratching myself like Tyrone Biggums at his dealer’s house

As easy as it would be for me to talk about gambling completely unprompted, that isn’t the case this time. I’m writing this blog because of a big story that broke earlier this week involving Calvin Ridley, a wide receiver for The Atlanta Falcons. The NFL announced that Ridley has been suspended for 1 year after they discovered he gambled on NFL games in November of 2021

There’s a lot to break down here, so let’s start with last fall. Following The Falcons’ Week 5 victory against The Dolphins, Ridley announced he would be taking a step back from football due to “mental health issues”. It was then discovered by the league that Ridley made a few parlays that totaled $1500 dollars, which violated league police for obvious reasons and lead to his suspension

First things first, let’s talk about the whole mental health thing. As easy as it would be to try to discredit the validity of these mental health claims, I’m not gonna go that route. I should clarify that my reasoning for not doing that isn’t because I’m a good person or anything like that. Instead, it’s because of the fact that these parlays Calvin Ridley made included The Atlanta Falcons, which is arguably the craziest thing somebody has ever done. Anybody that puts The Atlanta Falcons into a parlay is clearly sick in the head, so maybe his mental problems are even more serious than we previously thought

I’m often guilty of hyperbole because I usually exaggerate things for comedic effect, but I’m dead serious in saying this: Were these the worst bets of all time? Falcons inclusion aside, he now has to forfeit a year of his salary because of the suspension, which means he bet $1500 and lost $11,001,500. Not to throw stones from a glass house, since I’ve never been the best at bankroll management, but that is some terrible ROI. This is how I imagine Calvin reacted to this particular negative transaction of funds

I’ve seen people online trying to defend Calvin Ridley for betting on games, and that’s wild to me. Do they really not understand why players aren’t allowed to bet on games? Does it really need to be explained? How about the simple fact that they can literally change the outcome of games and have insider knowledge of the gameplans and whatnot beforehand. Did you ever think of that guys? Obviously he deserves a suspension, but that brings me to my next point

This whole situation is just another glaring example of how stupid and inconsistent the NFL is when it comes to suspensions. Players that beat their kids or wife get suspended for a few games, but players that smoke weed or make a parlay get suspended for longer. There’s zero rhyme or reason to their punishments. Like I said in the last paragraph, no shit he should get in trouble for betting on games, but there’s no possible excuse for why he should be getting punished more than players that have done unquestionably worse things

I never thought I’d say this, but Calvin Ridley and I are basically the same person. Mental health problems? Check. Gambling? Check. If news comes out that he also drinks like a fish and eats way too much takeout, this is gonna be us running into each other

At the end of the day, tough break Calvin. When it comes to losing large amounts of money on parlays, we’ve all been there. I know in your heart of hearts you’re thinking about quitting gambling altogether, but that’s loser talk. It’s time to battle back, put $3000 dollars down this time, and fire off some more parlays like a man

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