Drew Magary’s Thursday Afternoon NFL Dick Joke Jamboroo runs every Thursday at Defector during the NFL season. Got something you wanna contribute? Email the Roo. And buy Drew’s book, The Night The Lights Went Out, through here.
You’re in a casino. It’s early in the morning, but it could be any time of day. There are no clocks here. No windows, either. Surrounding you is nothing but the strangely cheery hum of the casino that occupies the main floor of this hotel: bright and colorful screens, verdant felt gaming tables, cartoonish bloops and farts emanating from all of the machines, even the ones not being used. The playlist is solid but also relentless, following you anywhere you walk. You’re one of the few people here right now, but the ambience of the casino doesn’t make it feel that way. The place feels alive, even though it’s only artificially so. Fake life will have to do for now. It’s early and you haven’t had your coffee yet, so you’re not ready to confront reality yet anyway.
If there’s an exit to this building, it’s not conspicuously marked. You’re in no shape to step out into the harsh daylight, so it’s a relief when you spot a Dunkin Donuts opposite a barely manned reception desk. This Dunkin takes comps, so you might even be entitled to a free cruller if you, quite literally, play your cards right. But again it’s early, so you’re happy to pay out of pocket for a small breakfast.
While in line, you notice an opaque half-moon up in the corner. The eye in the sky is watching you. It’s hardly the only eye on you in here. But you’re just getting some food, so you’re not terribly bothered that someone is watching you perform a banal, and wholly legal, task. So you ignore the surveillance. Frankly, it’s a surprise that you even bothered to notice it. Everyone’s watching everyone here, which means that no one has anything to hide.
The line is slow, which is bothersome. Even worse, you finally make it to the counter and you don’t have enough cash on hand for a coffee and a donut, and your credit card is already maxed out. A comped donut would have come in handy. Shit. You grab a coffee with the little money you have, because priorities. And the Chili’s inside the casino is offering pre-approved Chili’s cards—ones that have the imprimatur of Mastercard, a credit card brand you trust because you’ve known of its existence since you were born—which means that you can get a new line of credit and instant access to some money. Even better, the gift shop in the lobby offers up to $100 cash withdrawals on any purchase, provided you’re willing to eat the $8 convenience fee.
You’re willing.
Now flush with someone else’s money, you buy a granola bar and get a fresh stack of bills from the cashier. This money could help you pay for gas, more food, even your rent. But you’re in a casino, so why not try to get a little lucky before you deal with all of that boring shit?
You sit down at a slot machine. There’s only one other slot jockey in your row: an old man who doesn’t look like he’s gotten up from that stool in 30 years. He’s got one leg full of edema, so maybe he can’t leave that stool. Maybe his skin has grown around the top of it, like a tree branch slowly growing over a powerline. You feed a dollar bill into the machine, push the button, and lose instantly. You didn’t even have time to get excited to win, which is the best part of gambling, regardless of the stakes. You feel more cheated out of time than money, which irritates you. You feed another bill into the machine and the same thing happens again. Edema guy next door just had his machine spit out a shitload of coins, so you know that someone out there is getting theirs. You’re pissed that it’s not you.
The bar opens. You order a screwdriver. This is a bad idea so early, but this place is full of itches that you know you shouldn’t scratch. Wanna gamble? The tables are always open. Need sex? There are plenty of hookers (you can call them that instead of “sex workers” here, no one bothers with manners in a casino) roaming the floor if you need company for half an hour. Drugs? Shit, they sell joints in the souvenir shops here. You can do anything you want in this place, even if it hurts someone. Even if it hurts you. Nothing is off limits, provided you’re willing to pay for it. Isn’t that great? Isn’t that how everything should be?
You know it’s a bad idea to spend your money this way. Then again, how exactly is it a “good idea” to give all of your money to your asshole landlord every month? Fuck that guy. You don’t owe him shit. In fact, win enough at the tables and YOU’LL get to be someone’s landlord one day.
So you sit down at a blackjack table. It’s a $15 minimum, the lowest stakes table in the place. Everyone else at the table has been there all night, and they’ve got the Red Bull and vodkas on their breath to prove it. You sit down and put in for $100 in chips.
The couple next to you won’t stop fighting. The man next to them periodically screams out, “I was a fucking veteran, and look where the fuck I am now!” The dealer goes on a run, showing face card after face card. You know the blackjack chart from memory. You know how to make the odds as close to even as possible. You still lose half your money, so you move to a different table to change your mojo. This new table is full of Eagles fans, and they’re somehow even more annoying than the last group you found yourself in. You hit blackjack while all of them bust, and you give them a playful, “How bout that?” to rub it in. They don’t like that. Not one bit.
You leave and go to another table. This one is empty. You go on a small run and find yourself up $50. The pit boss sidles up to you and makes friendly chitchat. He’s not really your friend. You know that. He’s here to be the cooler. But he just offered you a comp, so you can’t help but like the fucker. Even trust him. He also says he's tight with the floor manager. Maybe he can hook you two up. Maybe the manager'll have a job for you.
You lose the $50. You knew you would. You could have cashed out while you were up, but that was never your intention. You have a nebulous, hypothetical win total that could leave you satisfied enough to stop playing, but it’s not $50. It’s far more than that.
Past the tables and out of the pit is the sportsbook. It’s clean and well-furnished. It even has betting kiosks so that you can place your bets without having to face down another human being. You think the kiosk will let you bet on anything, but it only offers bets on the games happening right now, which include some European soccer and some horse races being run across one of the oceans (you can’t tell which from looking at the screen). You put a small bet down on a Bundesliga team that’s favored by half a goal, 20 minutes into a scoreless draw. They go down a goal 10 minutes later, which puts you in a bind. But the kiosk also offers in-game props on that same game so that you can hedge your original bet.
You hedge. You lose. You’re gonna have to buy another granola bar. You grab another screwdriver while you’re at it.
You don’t really like this place. Every casino screams glitz and glam, because the gambling industry has projected that image to you your whole life. But the dream of a casino and the reality rarely, if ever, match. There’s a special room of high limit tales off to the side. The people in there are living the dream, but you can’t afford to join their company. You’d like to shoot them all dead, actually. This casino probably has a gun store inside of it to aid you in the task. But that would require more walking around, and something about the buzz of the casino floor keeps you firmly in place. You don’t like it, but you’re still drawn to it. This place has everything you want, even if that everything is zealously patrolled by casino goons who don’t want you to have any of it. Something about the lights, the chips, the cards, the cash … you can’t just leave all of that treasure alone. It's right there in front of you, and treasure is the greatest thing in the world. Every childhood story told you so.
The floor grows more crowded. Here are more grumpy old folks uninterested in chitchat. Here’s a bachelor party that’s already in pregaming mode. Here’s a family chilling out at the Johnny Rocket’s off the lobby. What is that family doing here? Are they a happy family? They don’t look it. A gaggle of Florida State fans also shows up, which makes no sense. It’s getting crowded, and you’re chafing at having to rub elbows with all of these freaks. This teeming mass has the energy of a party, but little of the camaraderie. Any party that runs all day, every day, isn’t really a party at all. As more customers pack into the casino, more security guards and pit bosses materialize. They’re watching you. They’re all watching you, waiting for you to do something they won’t like. Waiting to punish you.
You crave space, so you head for the bathroom. Along the way, everyone wants something. A greeter wants to offer you 10 percent off at the hotel grill. A drunk lady wants to bum a cigarette off of you. A man with a swastika tattooed on his bald pate wants to offer some literature that will open your eyes to how the world REALLY works. There are already 20 staffers up and limber at the casino’s Apple store to help you find a charging cable for $32 if you need one. And there are ads everywhere—for overpriced restaurants, for gaming apps, for banks offering generous home loans to qualified buyers, for anything you want. Everyone here’s gotta have something to sell, even if they’re not here in person.
On your way to the bathroom, you fall and split your forehead open. Not a full gash, but still a nice amount of blood. No one rushes to your aid. You walk into the bathroom still bleeding, but all of the people using that bathroom pretend not to notice. Offering you help isn’t worth it for them, because they don’t know what kind of person you are. Maybe you’re the kinda person who deserved a smack on the head, nuh mean? It’s not worth helping you. It’d cut into their time back out on the floor.
You lock yourself inside a stall (the toilet is broken) and seethe. You’re now deeper in debt than you were a few hours ago, and the screwdrivers haven’t been much of a relief. You feel groggy, nauseous, and broke. You hate yourself, and you realize that you’re not the only one. All of that raucous energy from the casino floor is the sound of distraction: a shiny toy that every customer can stare at because, just like you, they also hate themselves. This whole place hates itself, and it hurts others to make that self-loathing go away, if only for a moment.
And yet, people are still coming in to play. If they can’t have anything, they can at least live inside the illusion of winning big while they’re in here. That illusion is all that many of them have, and they’ll kill you if you dare take it away from them.
You can’t take being here one second longer. You can barely take being inside your own skin. You have to get out. You need a fresh start out there in the real world. You need LIFE, not whatever mutant form of life this place has to offer. So you leave the bathroom, ask the gift shop clerk where the exit is, and then follow the signs as best you can, traversing a maze of twisty little passages. You see a series of glass doors at the end of a wide hallway and you can sense you’re close. The exit. Sunshine. Fresh air. Normal people doing normal things. The world as it should be, waiting for you.
You push open the door, ready to live again.
Once you pass through the door, you find yourself on the floor of another casino. You charge across its floor to another set of glass doors, only to enter a third casino. You climb a flight of stairs and step out onto a terrace, grateful that you’ve at least found yourself outdoors, if not out altogether. But when you look out from that terrace, you realize that every other place around you is also a casino. Every building. Every house. Every storefront. Was it like that when you got here, or did all of these places spring up overnight? Where did, you know, the world go?
Everywhere you look, someone wants you to risk it all. You look to the boardwalk and see nothing but hustlers and claw machines. You gaze at the ocean and see a Cessna dragging a FanDuel banner along the coastline. You see billboards with toothy celebrities telling you that fortune favors the bold. You start to shake. You don’t want anyone to see you crying, but you can’t hold your despair back. You can run 1,000 miles away and you’ll still be right here. This is your home now. This is your life. Get too angry about it and a cop will subdue you with a whole toolbelt full of weaponry.
You crumple to the ground: drunk, lonely, and hopeless. You came into this place with nothing, and now you have even less. You don’t even know why you came here in the first place, but now you’d give anything to leave. You’d even kill yourself if you knew it was a guaranteed way out, but you’re not even sure that’ll do the trick anymore. Are you even alive right now? Are you human? You don’t feel human. You feel like a slab of red meat that turned brown. You have nothing, which means you are nothing.
Then you hear a cheery ding-a-ling from behind the glass doors. You hear the crowd growing livelier. You think you can even make out the sound of a blackjack table that’s gone on a run. Yelps. Cheers. Boisterousness. You stand up and see, through the glass, all of the lights flashing. Glowing. Beckoning. It gives you energy, enough energy to make you think that maybe one more trip to the tables will finally do the trick. Shit, maybe you’ll even do better than breaking even. Maybe you’ll luck your way into a few grand. Maybe you’ll be comped more than just a donut. Maybe fortune will favor you this time, since it seems to favor everyone else so lavishly. You’re not crying anymore. You’re composed. Determined. You know what you have to do now. You know that the only way out of this is to win.
You head back inside, knowing that you won’t.
The Games
All games in the Jamboroo are evaluated for sheer watchability on a scale of 1 to 5 Throwgasms.
Five Throwgasms
Commanders at Eagles: Another good Thursday night game! They can’t keep getting away with this. When I tune into TNF, I expect a desultory 20-9 game between two South division teams with a combined win total of 0.6. Anything better than that is an insult to tradition.
Chiefs at Bills
Four Throwgasms
Ravens at Steelers: We have a set of car keys that has a little pepper spray keychain attached to it. Those are the keys that my wife or my daughter take with them if they’re heading out to town. Well my 15-year-old, fresh with a learner’s permit, didn’t know that this keychain contained pepper spray, so he sprayed it on his hands because he thought it was hand sanitizer. NOPE. So if you have pepper spray (and you’ll need it in this new America), make sure everyone in your house knows what it is.
Three Throwgasms
Bengals at Chargers: You won’t notice the Chargers until they’re in the playoffs, at which point you’ll say to everyone else, “Wait, they’re good?” Probably not, but the Harbaugh effect is all too real.
Seahawks at 49ers
Falcons at Broncos
Two Throwgasms
Texans at Cowboys, Colts at Jets: In a rare bit of good news, neither the Cowboys nor Aaron Rodgers are good enough to merit the world’s attention anymore. You and I can ignore both of them, because the greater football culture has already written them off. Maybe Rodgers will be appointed Secretary of the Holistic next month, but for now he could tell Pat McAfee that he healed his bum ankle thanks to a nitrogen enema and no one would bother aggregating it.
Also, one of C.J. Stroud’s own linemen stripped him of the ball last week. Weirdest goddamn thing I’ve ever seen.
Packers at Bears
Rams at Patriots
One Throwgasm
Browns at Saints: You know how Deion is already warning the NFL that he’ll only let certain teams draft his kid? I think we all know the motive here. This is a package deal. If you wanna draft Deion’s asshole kid, you also have to hire Deion as your head coach. This is a disaster waiting to happen, and at least half a dozen teams are gonna be willing to try it.
Jaguars at Lions
Raiders at Dolphins
Vikings at Titans
Pregame Song That Makes Me Wanna Run Through A Goddamn Brick Wall
“Big Sky Theory,” by Dozer! From Jordan:
Not only will this song fuck your earholes, this band is fronted by a very large, very wet man who fucking ROCKS. p.s. Bonus points because they're from Sweden.
Love my large wet Swedish men.
Fire This Asshole!
Is there anything more exciting than a coach losing his job? All year long, we’ll keep track of which coaches will almost certainly get fired at year’s end or sooner. And now, your potential 2024 chopping block:
Robert Saleh—FIRED!
Dennis Allen—FIRED!
Mike McDaniel
Todd Bowles
Brian Daboll
Dave Canales
Doug Pederson*****
Kevin Stefanski
Mike McCarthy*****
Matt Eberflus******!!!****!!!!!!!!****
Shane Steichen
Antonio Pierce*
Brian Callahan
Zac Taylor
(*potential midseason firing)
Caleb Williams is now missing basic throws as a matter of routine, so Matt Eberflus’s continued employment is officially an emergency that needs addressing (by firing him). I can’t have yet another promising QB ruined by a dogshit coach. Save this poor bastard before Eberflus cuts his brakes.
Great Moments In Poop History
Reader Jamie sends in a story I call ANAL ADVENTURELAND:
I was an amusement park caricature artist all through high school and college and, in my 20s, I worked in management for the same art concessions company, which basically meant less time on the easel and more time yelling at college art students. One year, my boss/best friend/occasional roommate decided to rent a vacant furnished condo in his apartment complex so people could crash there after our holiday party, which seems like a good idea until you remember that everyone at said party was at peak binge-drinking-insanity age.
That night, one of our caricature artists decided to double-fist Colt 45 and Southern Comfort before he disappeared into the night. Our Portraits supervisor told me that she had found him shuffling around the parking lot like a George Romero zombie, so she had taken him to the condo and put him in bed with all of his clothes on. I didn't think about any of this again until 3:00am, when it was time to find a place to sleep, so I headed into the condo.
Turning the corner into the hallway, I don't think I noticed the footprints on the carpet before the smell hit me, and I realized that something absolutely terrible had happened in this place. I followed the footprints (very carefully) from one of the bedrooms to the bathroom, where I slowly opened the door to the horrific sight of this employee--my friend--sitting on the toilet with his pants on, head slumped forward, hands on his knees, palms facing up, and, between his feet, a single turd that he was seemingly praying to. This fecal misadventure wasn't exactly a JFK path-of-the-bullet scenario; clearly he had pooped in bed, became semi-conscious while pooping in bed, stood up, stepped in his own shit with one or both feet and tracked it into the bathroom, where he lizard-brained his way into sitting on the toilet, presumably shaking a deuce out of his pant leg in the process.
There are friends who would take it upon themselves to help their poor, stupid drunkass friend clean himself up, spray some Resolve into the carpet and maybe salvage some of his dignity along the way. I am not one of those friends. Ears ringing, either from whiskey shots or the horror of what I was witnessing, I slowly closed the bathroom door on Poop Buddha and got the fuck out of there.
I hightailed it back to my boss's apartment where everyone else was asleep and snuggled my way into three other people on a pull-out couch. When I woke up, the poopetrator was smoking a cigarette outside the door in the snow because, upon visual inspection, no one would let him into the apartment. My boss opened the sliding door, threw a bucket of toiletries and cleaning supplies at him, told him to make it right, apologized for his shitty luck and slammed the door in his face. Being the unhelpful asshole that I am, my only contribution was patting my boss on the back and saying, "Sorry dude, there's no fucking way you're getting that deposit back."
I’d chastise you for your negligence, but that’s exactly what I also would have done in my early 20s. I never bothered to clean up my own messes, much less someone else’s.
And Now Let’s Go Down To The Sideline And Check In With Charissa Thompson
“Drew, I just finished talking to Jon Gruden after he signed a new deal with Barstool and I asked him, ‘How’s it feel to be part of that organization?’ Drew, Gruden told me that he felt ‘strongey,’ telling me he’s discovered that sprinkling crystal meth into his morning coffee allows him to skip sleeping at night altogether. Then his nose started bleeding controllably and I began to feel unwell just looking at him. Back to you, Drew.”
Thank you, Charissa.
Gametime Cheap Beer Of The Week
Mulyubiere! I think that's what the label says! From Kurt:
I always pick out a new beer when I shop at the international supermarket. At 1.5 L, this was the biggest boy on the shelf. A price of only $4 intrigued me. But a promise of the "original taste of beer" sealed the deal. I felt powerful gripping this plastic bottle in my alley where I drank it as quickly as one can drink a 1.5L plastic bottle of beer. My wife was not interested in helping. The taste started out fine when cold. Standard light macro lager. However, as the day and the bottle warmed up, I learned how the plastic itself tasted. It was a rough last few swigs.
I bet it was. Kudos to you though for exploring the deepest recesses of the international grocery store. I love ogling strange tins of Russian fish at those places, right before I turn coward and grab some Ritter Sport instead.
Gameday Movie Of The Week For Raiders Fans
Free Fire, a nasty little movie I didn’t even know existed until a friend directed me to it a few months ago. Free Fire stars Cillian Murphy, Brie Larson, Sharlto Copley, and a pre-cancellation Armie Hammer as low-level gangsters in 1970s Boston (I’ll allow it) who meet up in a warehouse for an arms deal, only to have everything go to shit. A 90-minute firefight ensues. Everyone bleeds, everyone betrays each other, and everyone screams bloody murder. I couldn’t ask for more. I don’t know if the indie crime drama will ever thrive again, as it did in the 1990s, but I’d welcome its return like it was my dog coming home. Three and a half stars.
Gratuitous Simpsons Quote
“I've discovered the perfect business! People swarm in, empty their pockets, and scuttle off. Nothing can stop me now!… except microscopic germs. But we won't let that happen, will we Smithers?”
Enjoy the games, everyone.
