Steve Brownlee

OK, so you need a lot of money fast.

Really, what you need is A LOT of money FAST.

So do I have a proposition for you, or to be exact, a Super Bowl proposition bet.

If you have inside information, or maybe you just think you have inside information, bet $1 and win $100,000 that there will be an alien invasion of Las Vegas during Super Bowl LVIII and it ends in a tie.

That’s what was in an email I received from what is claimed as “leading sportsbook” Bovada Communications the other day.

From the sportsbook point of view, that’s a pretty good proposition to let people bet on.

That’s because if the aliens don’t land, that’s easy money they’re pocketing.

And if the aliens DO land, we’re going to be so preoccupied about it as a planet that no one will be worried about paying off Super Bowl bets anyway.

Or even better, Bovada will just claim the Chiefs are ahead by three points when the aliens invade, negating the payoff since the score wasn’t tied.

If you’ve read my Armchair Quarterback column in past years, you know I like to take a look at these Super Bowl “prop” bets — the usuals like how fast the Star Spangled Banner will be sung or what kind of score will be the first of the game, or my all-time fave, the color of the Gatorade dumped on the winning coach.

I kind of gave it up around the time the coronavirus pandemic hit in favor of other things, but now that we’ve got some crazy — and really long odds — for some of these props, I figure now is a good time to take a look at them again.

So clicking on Bovada’s link — oops, that’s what we’re taught that you’re not supposed to do — it took me to their website, www.bovada.lv with a lot of other characters that I think take you to their sports betting area.

By the way, I did a check and the internet suffix “lv” (the letters after the last dot in the internet address) stand for Latvia, so I guess if I wanted to bet I’d have to change my dollars to euros. Just one more reason not to actually go through with any of these bets.

The website has a whole bunch of very specific and long-odds props.

Here’s a look a representative sampling:

≤ The shortest odds I found under the Requested Specials section of Special Bets was quite a long one, even though the odds are listed at minus-250, meaning they’ll only pay you $100 on your $250 bet. It’s that Patrick Mahomes (listed as “P.Mahomes”) will have 10 or more rushing yards AND he’ll have one passing touchdown AND Christian McCaffrey (“C.McCaffrey”) will have 49 or more rushing yards AND he’ll have 10 or more receiving yards AND Travis Kelce (“T.Kelce”) will have at least four pass receptions.

Even though each of those props has a pretty good chance of happening, only missing on just one of them submarines your whole bet. So I’d be willing to bet $2.50 to win $1, but certainly not $250 to win $100.

• It’s even odds ($100 to win $100) for “Patrick Mahomes” (they do know who P.Mahomes is!) passing for at least 262 yards. Seems all right.

• There’s odds of plus-1,000 ($100 bet to win $1,000) for “SF 49ers -20 to win,” which I think means San Francisco will win by at least 20 points. Maybe if this was a ’70s or ’80s Super Bowl, somebody might win by that much, but looking at the last 20 Super Bowls, only two have been decided by more than 14 points. No dice.

• It goes up to plus-7,000 if Brock Purdy throws at least four interceptions, and plus-7,500 if either quarterback catches their own pass.

I actually like the odds that EITHER QB could throw four picks, since I don’t think Purdy or Mahomes would get pulled if they really struggle, and to exacerbate the situation, that QB would be forced to go for broke if they get in a big hole and throw even more picks.

But the catching their own pass is really unusual, not withstanding that the answer to the trivia question about who caught Brett Favre’s first pass when he was with the Packers was Brett Favre.

• It starts getting really specific as the odds increase. There’s plus-15,000 if the exact score is “49ers 34, Chiefs 37” or another at plus-15,000 if the exact score is “49ers 24, Chiefs 23” AND Christian McCaffrey is MVP. Give me the one without the extra caveat, but really, I’ll pass on these.

• When we hit plus-50,000, there’s some really strange specific scores — 49ers 35, Chiefs 5, and also 49ers 54, Chiefs 23. What?

• Finally, the longest odds, and deservedly so, is at plus-500,000 but is so specific I’d rather just spend my whole paycheck on Powerball tickets — “End of quarter scores: 1st quarter, 49ers 3, Chiefs 10; 2nd quarter, 49ers 10, Chiefs 16; 3rd quarter, 49ers 20, Chiefs 23; 4th quarter, 49ers 30, Chiefs 26.”

There’s another bet with identical odds for a whole different set of quarter scores with the 49ers winning, 33-30.

• And right between the plus-50,000 and the plus-500,000 is the Vegas alien invasion, or course with the extra caveat that the game ends in a tie.

OK, now that we’ve made enough money to buy the entire city of Marquette — heck, maybe the entire county — and have chocolate-flowing fountains at every street corner, let’s get serious and look at Sunday’s game:

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Super Bowl: NFC No. 1 seed San Francisco (15-4) vs. AFC No. 3 seed Kansas City (14-6), 6:30 p.m., CBS — This is an intriguing matchup, though I would’ve been just as interested — OK, certainly more — if it was the Detroit Lions having a rematch from Week 1 with the Chiefs.

I’ve been listening to the ESPN and Fox pundits on their daytime sports talk shows on and off for almost two weeks, and not surprisingly, the more I hear, the more confused I get.

The only time when things seem to clear up for me is when I hear arguments that seem so obviously ridiculous. Then I know whoever they’re arguing for must be WRONG.

One of them is that the Chiefs have such lousy stats compared to the 49ers this season. Well, does it really matter that KC looked lousy for a major part of the regular season, considering they’ve been the superior team in the playoffs?

I think not. Even with two weeks off, I’m not counting on the Chiefs to lose all the momentum they’ve gained throughout January, or that the 49ers will some suddenly find theirs again.

You can say that Brock Purdy made some amazing second-half comebacks against the Packers and Lions, but he and his teammates’ struggles are what put them in the holes they had to dig out of in the first place.

I also don’t put full stock in San Fran’s potent offense in those games, considering that the Pack and Detroit both have what are considered below-average defenses.

So you can probably see where I’m heading with this — give me the Chiefs, 29-24.

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Last round of playoffs — 1-1, 50 percent. Playoff total — 8-4, 67 percent.

Steve Brownlee can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 552. His email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.