With the 2024 Opening Ceremony getting underway on July 26, it's time to dust off the old laptop and get some work done.
In fact, "Cocktail Christi" has been embarrassingly slacking in her cocktail and betting article game.
It’s just too hot to function this summer, so I've been hiding inside my home down south/Ninth Circle of Dante's Inferno slowly killing all of my outdoor plants.
No one tells you that when you turn 40 you're actually turning into a 90-year-old plant lady.
"But Christi, if you're home all the time, shouldn't you be doing something other than single-handedly buying out all of the plants at the local nursery and slowly killing them?"
No thanks, I'm good.
But let us move past my concerning lack of motivation and get to the meat of this stew.
With the Olympics making its summer debut on Friday, I'm starting to think about all of the bet-able sports that didn't make it to the games this year.
Just think of all the lost gambling opportunities that could have been — and let me tell you, there could have been millions.
Or maybe four.
So, which sports would I magically add to the 2024 Olympics simply for their attractiveness to bettors?
I have the answer to that question!
4 Sports to Add to 2024 Olympic Games
1. Baseball
I just threw up a little in my mouth.
If you know anything at all about me (which you don't because that would be weird), you know how big of a deal this is.
I hate baseball. I've hated baseball my whole life.
One time I put Dijon mustard on my hotdog during a cold, rainy game at Fenway Park.
What kind of psychopaths fill containers with Dijon mustard at a ball park? I was hungry, I was soaked because Boston weather is miserable and I had to eat a hotdog with Dijon mustard and ketchup.
Gahhhhbage I tell ya.
Not shortly thereafter, I got my extra large pregnant booty stuck in one of the smallest seats known to man, again at Fenway Park.
Those seats are made for jockeys, Kevin Hart and no one else.
The last time I went to a baseball game it was 92 degrees outside and I almost died … of boredom. That’s right, boredom.
I refused to watch baseball, much less learn anything about it.
I referred to runs as "points" and the only reason I now know they're called runs is because my husband and sister-in-law made fun of me for it.
Now I use the wrong terms for every baseball game just to annoy the them. It's a small piece of happiness that I take for myself.
However, I'm going to admit something to all of you that I haven't fully admitted to myself yet: I kinda, sorta, like baseball now.
When sports betting was legalized in North Carolina in March, I realized that anything is fun to watch if you're gambling on it.
Strikeouts? Don't know what those are, but I'm in!
RBIs? You got it.
NRFI? Uh, what? Sure, why not?
And ever so slowly, I turned into the kind of person I never wanted to be: A person who watches baseball.
Baseball became an official Olympic sport at the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona and then was played at each Olympiad through the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.
After 2008, it wasn't played in the Olympics until a one-off in 2020.
And now it's gone again. Un-freaking-believable.
And while I'm surprisingly sad that it's not a part of 2024 Olympic Games, it's expected to be back in 2028. That's a small win for gamblers.
2. Cornhole
I mean, clearly I'm using the term “sports” loosely here, but it’s still a valid option — a valid option that is amazing.
I didn’t know I needed a cornhole competition in my life until I was three beers deep watching a live tournament with four guys named Billy, Bob, Rick and Tommy, sponsored by Busch’s Baked Beans.
No, I don't know if those are their real names, though I'm willing to bet I'm pretty close.
The guys are way too serious, and the women are terrifying. It was love at first … bag?
3. Motorsports
Imagine a race through the streets of Paris.
OK, so that's a truly terrible idea, but I love betting on auto racing and I think it would be a perfect addition the Olympics.
Nothing gets your blood pumping like watching your betting dreams get crushed in less than a second because Ricky Stenhouse Jr. likes to play bumper cars and can't stay in his lane, literally and figuratively.
*The above statement is intended only as a joke and in no way reflects the true love and admiration that I have for someone who punched Kyle Busch in the face.
I'm cool with NASCAR, IndyCar or even Formula 1, but let's not invite Max Verstappen.
I'm one more Verstappen win away from plunging a fork in my eyeball. I just can't watch that anymore.
4. Texas Hold'em
There is absolutely nothing I would like to see more than Phil Hellmuth lose a poker hand and have the mother of all meltdowns in the middle of the universally-televised Paris Olympics.
The Poker Brat just dropping F-bombs left and right, then telling everyone at the table that they can't spell P-O-K-E-R.
10 out of 10 … I would recommend.
And there you have it ladies and gentleman, the four missing pieces to the Olympic betting puzzle.
Now someone grab me a beer, I've got more plants to kill.
