(Do you have to be so smug about my misfortune, Henderson? Photo courtesy WEC.tv)

Potato Nation, let me level with you here.  The old Gambling Addiction Enabler had himself one hell of a bad night on Sunday.  As in, he has spent all day talking himself out of cutting his wrists with shards of the beer bottle he smashed against the wall just after Jeff Curran lost.  The fact that this horrible gambling outing came after his great success at UFC Fight Night 18, that just makes it hurt so much more.  The highs are high indeed, and the lows so miserably low.  The Snoop Dogg posters I bought with my UFC 96 winnings, they mock me even as I write these words.  

On to the sad particulars, and let’s see if we can’t learn from this disaster.

The Bet: $20 on Shane Roller
The Result: Lost, due to possibly bullshit stoppage
Thoughts: I refuse to beat myself up for this bet.  Roller had Henderson hurt early and nearly finished him with a guillotine.  Alas, it wasn’t to be.  I have to admit, this fight does make me rethink my betting philosophy for WEC events.  When two relatively inexperienced guys both drop each other within the first two minutes of the fight, picking the winner is basically a crapshoot.  Lesson learned?

The Bet: $20 on Jeff Curran
The Result: Lost, again
Thoughts: I couldn’t see Curran, who had suffered back-to-back losses to Urijah Faber and Mike Brown, dropping a third straight fight to Faber’s young protégé.  And yet that’s exactly what he did.  So did I underestimate Benavidez or overestimate Curran?  Probably a little of both.  Curran’s not exactly washed up, but when he can’t get the fight to his comfort zone he runs out of weapons too quickly.  Give Benavidez credit, he showed he can hang with the big boys.  I can appreciate that, even if it cost me.

The Bet: $20 Parlay on Torres + Tapia + Fabiano + Yahya
The Result: Lost…thanks, Tapia
Thoughts: Damn, even the Official Cage Potato Parlay didn’t pan out.  It was only Manny Tapia’s decision loss to Akitoshi Tamura that kept me from salvaging the night.  Maybe that beating from Miguel Torres did more damage to Tapia than I realized, because Tamura really isn’t that good.  If you’re wondering whether there’s any solace in only losing the parlay because of one wrong pick, the answer is no.  No solace at all.

So what have I learned from this horrible gambling experience?  Not much, except maybe that I should tread lightly with WEC bets from here on in.  And that I should go sell my plasma and/or sperm so I have cash to bet on Strikeforce and UFC 97.  I gotta win that money back somehow, right?