I predict you’re going to hate this column.
Which means you’ll love it.
As an embarrassingly large number of readers often remind me, I own the Pulitzer Prize for Pitiful Prognostication.
Beginning with that fateful moment 25 years ago when I predicted Los Angeles was going to be a UCLA football town — Westwood Ho! — I have continually endured the crashing and burning of my perfectly inspired picks.
From cursing Dodgers hopes by guaranteeing a title in September … to prematurely crowning the Lakers champions after a single postseason victory … to missing on 11 straight Super Bowl picks … I have unwittingly become the prophet of doom.
Which brings us to the biggest whiff in a career full of them.
On Sunday, I penned a column predicting the star-studded Rams would go undefeated.
“The Rams are not losing a game,” I wrote.
Four days later, they lost the season opener.
I had them going 20-0 and they couldn’t even go 1-0, losing to the San Francisco 49ers in Australia. I picked them to win every game until the second week of February and they couldn’t even survive the 10th day of September.
This was bad. This was real bad. And I heard about it, in thundering waves of sarcasm and snark, from old fashioned emails to online comments, a tsunami of taunts.
No, I didn’t write the undefeated column for clicks. Sadly, I’ve been making these sorts of predictions long before the invention of clicks.
As always, I followed my heart and the mindless passion that lives there. I thought with that much talent and that soft schedule, the Rams wouldn’t lose, especially not with a coach who historically has them well prepared for each game.
Except the first one, apparently.
The game should have been a mismatch, but what I missed is that the Rams might not have placed much importance in it. It’s almost as if they viewed it as a necessary evil to be endured, not conquered. They flew to Melbourne unthinkably late, kept their best stuff in their travel bags and rushed home to a schedule they know still will put them in the playoffs.
The 49ers treated this game like a statement. The Rams, whose sights are set on much bigger moments, seemingly treated it like a practice.
And it was, of course, all my fault.
Just listen to the readers.
“I admire your chutzpah … and really question your analysis. … You can see the trees, but not the forest and hope the humble pie tastes good. … Your next prediction awaits. … I shudder as your credibility is shot.”
YOU shudder?
“You’re a lazy coward. But the NFC West thanks you. You’re a curse on the Rams.”
Lazy? I had to travel all the way to my inbox to report this column!
“What an absolute disaster! 20-0!? What an absolute dog … prediction and opinion to have. Have a good time watching football the rest of the weekend … you deserve to eat crow!”
Amid the many animal metaphors that invariably occupy reactions to my predictions, a dominant theme are dogs and crows.
“Mr. Know-It-All (20-0) fumbles the opener. Always a pleasure to see Plaschke eat crow.”
Told you.
“I just want to point out once more that you are an idiot.”
Point taken.
“Rams didn’t lose because of Plaschke’s prognostication of 20-0; they lost because the 49ers thoroughly beat them.”
Oh, a nice one.
“No, the Rams didn’t lose ‘because’ of Plaschke’s typically moronic prediction, but it was a typically moronic Plaschke prediction. He is always wrong.”
Spoke too soon.
“Willy Plaschke actually acknowledged his prediction was wrong? That’s it, I’m going to Church, the end is near.”
Just don’t ask me to predict when.
“Just resign already, Bill. Take the next buyout and free up some precious space in the paper for someone with insightful or interesting things to say.”
Boss, is this you?
“At some point, the editors need to sit down with Plaschke and explain that the future hasn’t happened yet, and it isn’t inevitable, and he needs to stop insulting readers and wasting space by pretending that it is. Of course, that would require The Times to have editors. Are there even any of those left?”
Thats a grate queston.
“He was writing this nonsense before The Times even had a website. Don’t give him credit for being savvy. He actually believes what he writes because he’s a simpleton.”
That’s better than being called an idiot.
“You are giving Plaschke too much credit by referring to him as a simpleton. As per his own words in his column, he is an idiot.”
(Sigh.)
“Anyone knowing Plaschke’s penchant for delivering laughable predictions has an easy way to make money: Kalshi. The easiest money you’ll ever make.”
The safest Kalshi bet is that I do not understand the first thing about Kalshi.
“Writing that the Rams wouldn’t lose a single game this year was a patently absurd prediction even by the standards of Plaschke who seems desperate for continued relevancy or is simply stupid … the only constant will remain Bill Plaschke’s predictions that are consistently and unerringly wrong.”
Rams will go 19-1.
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