The Football Pool

For more than 40 years my dad and his brother, my Uncle Dick, ran a family football pool. They took this contest very seriously.  So seriously, that even if you were terminally ill or no longer on speaking terms, you sent in your picks. 

My grandmother secretly feared that her sons' football pool actually was the genetic result of her late husband’s gambling addiction. Grandpa once literally bet the farm – and lost.  Still, the year that my husband and I won – and won big – she was the first to call and congratulate us.

There were rules, and both Dad and Uncle Dick held everyone to them—especially their children. We got the odds from the same online source (after decades of using a national newspaper) and had to send in our picks in a certain format and by a certain time. My Dad kept an elaborate, handwritten spreadsheet on each player. My uncle kept his own to keep his brother honest. 

There were opportunities if you were down a lot of games to make them up, or dig yourself a deeper hole. And if at the end of the season you lost big, you had until next season to pay off your debts.

Despite such generosity, more than one sister or cousin never paid in full and was therefore banned for years from participating. By this time last year there were only four of us playing: my dad; my uncle; me; and a previously exiled sister.

You’d think that the system would favor my dad and uncle, but the game was surprisingly egalitarian and why we all participated. Rarely did the same person or couple finish first two years in a row, and often last year’s winner was the next year’s cellar dweller.  My mother, in her last year battling brain cancer, finished first. That’s how wildly random and rewarding the football pool could be.

We on my dad’s side also had a secret second mission. My uncle was playfully obnoxious and would goad us when we were behind or send snide remarks with his picks when we were ahead. So, if there was no way to win outright, you’d best at least beat Uncle Dick. 

Last year, we all did beat our uncle. He called to ask if I would put him on a payment plan. I thought he was joking, and maybe he was, but when he called a few weeks ago to ask how much hospice costs, I worried. We were close and confided in each other, but, still, I wondered.  

Thursday night he left us, sooner than I expected but perhaps not to him. Dad's gone. Uncle Dick's gone. And now the family football pool is gone too. They both gave it their all when it was all they had. In the end, though, neither could cover the spread.