The Match: Rodgers Favored for First Birdie, Curse Word
GREEN BAY, Wis. – Green Bay Packers coach Matt LaFleur on Tuesday said he was “100 percent” confident that Aaron Rodgers would be on the winning side of The Match.
Sportsbooks aren’t quite as confident.
At SI Sportsbook, the team of Rodgers and Tom Brady are -175 to beat Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen in The Match, a made-for-TV golf event that will be played on Wednesday in Las Vegas. That’s an implied probability of 63.64 percent.
The Match will tee off at 5:30 p.m. on TNT.
Last year, Rodgers and PGA pro Bryson DeChambeau beat Brady and golf superstar Phil Mickelson. This year, it’s a pair of living-legend quarterbacks against a pair of young gunslingers.
“I know they tried to make it old guys versus young guys, but I said it when we were doing our chipping [contest] that they showed yesterday,” Rodgers said last week. “I said, ‘Who thought about this, you want to put the two best guys against the two worst guys?’ And that's not just conjecture, that's, like, facts.”
The 44-year-old Brady, the winner of seven Super Bowl championships, and the 38-year-old Rodgers, owner of four MVPs, have combined to win eight NFL championships and seven MVPs. Mahomes and Allen, both of whom are 26, are two of the NFL’s young stars. Mahomes has one Super Bowl win and one MVP on his resume.
The banter might be more entertaining than the golf.
“When we started [in the NFL], definitely when [Brady] started and when I started playing, there was actual, real trash talk,” Rodgers said. “Guys trash-talked each other and there was a lot of good s--- talk, and we knew who they were around the league.
“And now, it's more buddy-buddy. Social media following each other, memes, this emoji s---, and it's not the same. So, when you talk about Kermit the Frog [Mahomes] and Josh [Allen] trying to s--- talk me and Tom, a couple old-school, grizzled vets, come on.”
At FanDuel Sportsbook, Rodgers and Brady are -184 to win. They are the favorites in the nearest-the-hole bets and are -122 to be the first team to lead 1-up. Rodgers is +25000 to get a hole-in-one.
At SportsBetting.ag, Rodgers is the favorite to utter the first curse word (+125), hit the longest drive (+110) and record the first birdie (+120). MVP (-140) is the favorite to be said before Super Bowl (+100) and the over/under on total balls in the water is 3.5.
