Guaranteed to Happen--Bet on It

You can bet me . . .

--The teams in the Super Bowl will have outstanding quarterbacks. Their running backs you won’t be so sure of.

--The golf tour will have 26 different winners, 10 of whom you will never have heard of.

--Larry Holmes will not pull a Sugar Ray Leonard, but will revive the old adage, “They never come back.”

--Someone will notice that, although 5 of the 10 teams in the playoffs in the NFL this year play in domed stadiums, there are only 6 domed stadiums, period. Home-noise advantage will creep into the language. Also the spread.

--The Dodgers will continue to get free agents nobody else wants but will be outbid for anybody who can really help.

--The batting titles will be won by Wade Boggs and Tony Gwynn. Again.

--The truce between George Steinbrenner and Billy Martin will last till the Yankees lose a game. It may survive a rainout.

--Dave Winfield will continue to be the most underrated player in the big leagues.

--Don Mattingly will continue to be the best player in the game and the best left-handed hitter since Stan Musial.

--Bo Jackson will hit 35 home runs, put the Kansas City Royals in the World Series and, by the time he joins the Raiders, they’ll be 0-6 and won’t care.

--Rodney Peete will win the Heisman Trophy.

--Maury Wills won’t make the Hall of Fame again, even though he deserves it as much as some who might and more than some who have.

--Kareem Abdul-Jabbar will turn out to be from another planet.

--The St. Louis Cardinals will win the pennant, proving again that the home run in baseball, like the long drive in golf, is nice but not necessary.

--Houston will get into the Super Bowl--but not necessarily this year.

--Mike Tyson, like Alexander the Great, will run out of people to fight by his 24th birthday. Unless there’s another Depression.

--What’s the difference between Tony Tubbs and Tony Tucker? That’s what I say, what’s the difference?

--The Dallas Cowboys will stage a dramatic comeback. Tom Landry will square his hat and not change expression.

--The Rams will be rumored returning to L.A. if the Raider shift is allowed.

--The Rams will find draft choices to be like IOUs from your brother-in-law. They look better than they are. The Colts gave up something they don’t have for Eric Dickerson, the Bills gave up something they don’t want for Cornelius Bennett and the Rams have a whole bunch of 25th draft choices.

--John McEnroe will announce his retirement from tennis. “You guys won’t have John McEnroe to kick around anymore,” he will warn, but the reality will be that John McEnroe won’t have tennis to kick around anymore. Which may be bad news for his cat.

--The guy who wins the Masters won’t win another tournament all year, maybe all century.

--The guy who wins the U.S. Open will announce that God picked his clubs and read the breaks for him. The USGA will hold up his purse to determine whether that was a violation of the rule that says you have to use local caddies.

--Michael Jordan will go up for a flying layup some night and never come down. The refs will decide it’s a three-second violation, no basket.

--Bobby Knight will eat a chair.

--Lots of countries want the Olympics now that L.A. has shown there’s big bucks in them, but if there had been any other bidders for ‘84, the IOC would have jerked the Games out of here.

--Anthony Carter is the best player, inch for inch, in the NFL.

--The Raiders will go someplace unless the Coliseum Commission turns over the facility to them and lets them run it. They could do worse. And probably will.

--The Boston Red Sox are really America’s team. Don’t ask me why, but everybody likes them.

--George Steinbrenner buying a first baseman, Jack Clark, is like North Africa buying sand. What’s he going to do? Platoon Don Mattingly?

--If the NFL is going to expand, why doesn’t it put a team in Atlanta?

--If a football team doesn’t get a good coach, it doesn’t matter what else it gets.

--If Magic Johnson isn’t the best player in basketball, I’ll give you the guy you think is and 10 points.

--Gary Gaetti must hate the Dodgers, all right. He gave up half a million dollars to stay in Minneapolis. He must hate sunshine, too.

--If Chuck Knox ever got a quarterback who was even average, he’d not only get in the Super Bowl, he’d win it. Twice.

--Tim Brown won the Heisman Trophy, but UCLA will miss Gaston Green more than Notre Dame will miss Tim.

--Never bet against the spread or on the “unders” in the Super Bowl. Or against anything that deals.

--That you’ll get a toothache on Saturday night or in a Holiday Inn in Arkansas--or both.

--That the way to make a line move faster is to join the other one.

--That the Olympic Games will turn out more baseball prospects than the Dodgers’ farm system. If you don’t think so, check the big league rosters for 1984 Olympians. Start with Mark McGwire.