How to Bet on the NFL Draft

On the heels of Butler showing why I should never ignore the Logical Betting rules of gambling, and an email from my dad asking me to help out with a draft pool for his Browns Backers Fan Club, came up with a cool way to gamble on the first round of the NFL draft. Now that the first round is on a Thursday night, with only 10 minutes in between picks (and a lot of teams taking less time than that), what better place to expand upon sports gambling than the NFL Draft. The Logical Betting NFL Draft Pool is brought to you unofficially by Planet Hollywood, Las Vegas, one freaking great deal in the middle of the strip. You should unofficially check out Southwest.com for vacations packages to Vegas if you're going.

1. This is done pool-style, so one time payment for entry. Let's say, $20 for the hell of it. This is done live, so you need to be present to play. Get a bunch of your friends over, or in the Browns Backers' case, head to the local watering hole that sponsors your club.

2. Before each pick, each participant predicts what position will be drafted by the team. For example, this year the Rams have the 1st pick. If you say QB, and they take Gerald McCoy (which they should), then you get nothing. If they take Sam Bradford (bad mistake), then you get the assigned point total (more on that in a second). And so you go for the 32 picks.

3. 1st, 2nd, 31st, and 32nd picks are worth 3 points each. The last two because they're usually the hardest to get, and the first two, well, just to add more points to the pot. Then, designate the "favorite team" of those in attendance, and designate their pick or picks worth 5 points each. So in my dad's case, the Browns are worth 5. If you played in St. Louis this year, they have two first round picks, including the first pick. So as you down a Busch beer with some good BBQ, you get 8 points for the first pick overall and 5 points for their other pick. All other picks are worth 1 point each. This places a premium on your team, the first couple picks, and gives people incentive to stick around to try and make up the last 6 points at the end.

4. There are 9 possible positions to choose: QB, RB, WR, TE, OL, DL, LB, CB, and S. No designating along the lines in my rules, just to keep it simple, but if you're playing with a bunch of die-hard draft followers, go ahead and make it tougher and designate specific positions. I suggested 2 points for a correct TE pick, but the wife said that the position wasn't as rarely chosen in the first round as I thought. I say otherwise, so that rule is optional, too.

5. For payouts, I suggest winner take all, but if you don't want everyone to leave halfway through the draft when they could be out of it, then do something like a 70%/20%/10% payout or a 2nd gets their cash back payout. Or come up with your own system, I'm not gonna tell you what to do with your money.

Anyways, if anyone in the Philly area is game for trying this out, I'm here on that Thursday night. Shoot me a call or email me at the personal email or logicalbetting@hotmail.com. I'll consent to letting the Eagles be the designated "favorite team," just so you all can feel happy about them before they go 8-8 this year. Cheers, and Happy Birthday to my favorite 5 year old buddy!