Wanna Bet?

I’m writing this on the Friday before the big fight between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Oscar De La Hoya. By the time you read this, the bout will be in the history books. So here is my pre-fight prediction: De La Hoya wins in 12 rounds on a split decision. See what I’ve done? I’ve made a bet, a prediction with consequence. The consequence is that I may sully my priceless reputation as an international boxing expert.

This is also the weekend of the Kentucky Derby. Horse racing is yet another area where I have awesome acumen. My prediction: Queen Elizabeth II by a nose.

Speaking of handicaps, until she was voted off “Dancing With the Stars” recently, you could bet on whether Heather Mills’ artificial leg would go flying during one of her dance routines. This was one of the betting “props” --propositions--available at bodog.com, the online home of the hydra-headed gambling/entertainment concern and one of the Internet’s busiest gambling parlors. I had visited to see what the line was on the Mayweather/De La Hoya fight and the derby, but found myself drawn toward the pop culture corner. There you could bet up to $50 on whether Eddie Murphy would prove to be the father of Melanie (Scary Spice) Brown’s baby. Larry Birkhead was odds-on baby daddy before a DNA test confirmed that indeed he, not Howard K. Stern, was the father of Anna Nicole Smith’s daughter Dannielynn.

While Las Vegas and London bookmakers have long offered peculiar betting lines on just about anything--the date of the first manned spacecraft landing on Mars, or the odds that O.J. will find the real killers--the advent of online betting has revolutionized the science of squandering money. It’s so easy! Over on betUS.com, the odds were 3,000 to 1 that Alec Baldwin would be nominated Father of the Year (this would be a smart bet if the year were 1860). BetUS.com currently has 20 betting lines on Britney Spears, under the portentous headline “What will be the outcome of Britney?” It was roughly 2 to 1 odds that she would be arrested for a DUI and/or come out as a lesbian. Britney OD’ing and/or being declared an unfit mother was getting 7 to 1 odds. It was 150 to 1 that she would marry Michael Jackson--long odds, surely, but Jackson himself is pretty unlikely.

Here are some bets I’d like to make. I’d like to bet that David Hasselhoff explodes in a blaze of burger. I’d like to bet that Fergie is really a guy. I’d like to bet everything I own that I will never see “Celtic Woman” in concert.

These betting sites, the repositories for the nation’s hunches and ESP, are fascinating windows on our trashy and cluttered consciousness. After all, wagering on an outcome has cash-on-the-barrel potency that mere polling or Nielsen ratings could never have. It’s one thing to think Paulie Walnuts will whack Tony Soprano. It’s another to put money on it. By the way, on bodog.com, Paulie was a 14 to 1 underdog to kill the boss; meanwhile, it was 5 to 1 that Paulie would sleep with the fishes. It’s goombah roulette.

Reality TV has driven online betting into what’s called “prop culture.” Competitions such as “American Idol,” “Dancing With the Stars” and “Survivor” are self-evidently like sports (on bodog.com, it was even money Jordin Sparks would win “Idol”). What’s strange is that betting wars should be waged over questions such as: “If Sam Raimi does not sign on to direct ‘Spider-Man 4,’ who will be the new director?” Here are some directors and odds: Tim Burton, 6/1; George Lucas, 8/1; Quentin Tarantino, 15/1. I’d actually like to see a Tarantino “Spider-Man,” in which Tobey Maguire becomes a bad cop/callboy turning tricks and selling his radioactive blood for smack.

Only a handful of people could have an informed opinion about this “Spider-Man”/director question, and they aren’t talking. So what we have here is a wager known in gambling’s patois as a “stupid bet.” We don’t even know if there will be a “Spider-Man 4.” At least with the lottery, we know there will be a winning number.

It was to prevent lambs going willingly to the fleecing that last October Congress passed a ban on Internet gambling services. The ban created havoc in the industry, led to the arrest of two company execs and prompted many online gambling operations to pull out of the U.S. market. Other sites soldier on with offshore electronic fund transfer services. Last month, Democratic Rep. Barney Frank of Massachusetts introduced a bill to legalize online gambling and to regulate it, which is to say, tax it. According to Frank, revenues from the global online gaming market in 2005 amounted to about $12 billion, roughly half of which came from U.S. customers.

Anyone want to wager on the fate of Frank’s bill? The odds should be roughly the same as Rosie O’Donnell joining a Trump organization (a mere 5 to 1, according to betUS.com).

Boy, talk about killjoys. I want to bet on what Tiger Woods will name his first child (“Nike” was a 100 to 1 bet). I want to bet if Paris Hilton gets a jailhouse tattoo. I bet Mischa Barton will be killed by a falling leaf. I wager Victoria Beckham cannot slather on any more fake tan.

On second thought, make it Mayweather in a 12-round split decision.

Any takers?