Written by Mike Perry

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As a young man one of my favorite moments of the day came when the newspaper would arrive. I would feverishly cast aside the front section and the local garbage, who really cares about that? I would find the sports section and rifle through it, looking for one particular thing.

I was obsessed with seeing what Bob “The Railbird” Roberts had done the night before, if his horse racing picks had panned out or if his “kitty” had taken it on the chin yet again.

Horse racing has never been an interest of mine. In fact, maybe five times in his life has this writer made the trip to one of the local tracks to bet on the ponies. Horses just aren’t my thing. In fact, since my days as a small toddler in diapers my allergic reaction to horses, horse hair, clothes that had been around horses or anything that could have remotely come into contact with a horse has been a closely-regarded part of my family’s life.

So, why would a young, horse-hating person with no actual interest in horse racing want to check out how The Railbird did every day? No idea, but it was always hysterical to me to see how poorly he would usually do.

The way this feature worked was this; The Railbird started the season with a certain amount of fictional money to bet on the ponies at Thistledown. He would publish his wagers for that night’s action and give a rundown of how he did the previous night. And for some reason there is not one time in my memory that The Railbird was actually ahead for the season. It seemed like the guy always lost, and it turned into one of those situations like driving by a car wreck…you know there is something really bad going on there but you can’t help but to steal a sideways glance as you drive by.

Well, consider me your Mid-American Conference Railbird.

My plan is to start with a fictional $1,000 and see what I can do with it the rest of the way by making fictional wagers on MAC contests. There have been two weeks worth of picks already published on STOhd.com, so each of those games will have assumed $50 wagers on them (and, trust me, looking at how I did last week my Railbird status should be fairly certain. I won two and lost five last weekend).

My first week of published picks saw me go 3-3-1, so that would have been a total of minus $15 dollars when you figure the juice on my lost bets. Then, after this week’s debacle, my “kitty” dropped $165, putting me at $820 for the season (Week One: -$15, Week Two: -$165).

Here is the slate of games I have to choose from this week: Northern Illinois -8 at Western Mighigan; Akron +28 at Temple; Ball State +10.5 at Kent; Bowling Green +11.5 at Central Michigan; Miami -2.5 at Buffalo; Toledo -10.5 at Eastern Michigan and Louisiana-Lafayette +14 at Ohio. I will study these games intently and, Saturday morning, you can wake up, log on to STOhd.com and see what the Railbird thinks.