With apologies (again) to Armand Schaubroeck for the above headline, have you recently wanted to place a wager on whether or not Florida skipper Jack McKeon, 81, might not survive the end of this baseball season? Even before the Marlins were throttled by the Phillies this evening, Miami New Times’ Rich Abdill quizzed a few Vegas bookmakers on whether or such a bet would be entertained (link swiped from Repoz and Baseball Think Factory)
We called the sports bookie at Bill’s Gamblin’ Hall & Saloon (if anyone would let us bet on someone dying, it would be “the wildest hotel and casino in Las Vegas,” right?) The bookie was not particularly happy with our inquiry. “No, sir… no one’s going to take a wager on that, no,” he said.
Then we rang Andrew, an oddsmaker at a prominent Las Vegas firm, who originally said he couldn’t help because “somebody [in the front office] has independent control over what happens.”
No, Andrew, not will he survive with the team. It’s will he survive with a heartbeat.
It was at that point Andrew asked us not to use the name of his company. “I couldn’t, to be honest with you… I couldn’t even start to… ” he said. “I guess we could do something.”
Though he couldn’t actually run the numbers for us, he said everything is based on mathematical models. “The numbers kind of depict themselves,” he said, adding that, were he inclined to calculate such odds, he’d look at factors that affect life expectancy and extrapolate from there.
“Maybe he’s outlived his life expectancy as it is,” Andrew suggested. “Maybe baseball keeps his ticker going… I think [college football coach] Joe Paterno passes away the second he leaves Penn State.”