Predicting the 2025 Season: Greek Style

Our esteemed handicappers from the Windy City are back with the Rivers Lake Yacht Club to pick games this season. Abram Sexson and Panayiotis Mamalis will be writing a weekly column that will be published every Friday incorporating their love of folklore, mythology, good food, and football. We've opened up the picks segment so look for more angles on games that don't necessarily feature the Chargers too.

Just like Hercules trapped the Nemean Lion, so have we also trapped the Rivers Lake Yacht Club into giving us our old spot back picking games.

We were drinking our morning coffee talking about the Chargers prospects this season and saw the coffee grinds spill out of the cup in the shape of an arrow, a bad omen. It reminded us of a story from many years ago, when the drachmae was still the coin of the realm.

Fat Spiro had just come into some money. He had the jeweler make a ring for his Kapsoura Marika and proposed. Marika consented, but had a migraine for days even the torpedo fish (electric ray) could not cure.

With a pit in her stomach and a throb in her temple, she sought out Theia Koula, the village soothsayer/tasseographist. The coffee grinds were her medium as the local “Kafetzou” whom most solicited for a word, direction or prognostication. When Koula’s copper briki had rendered its creamy gold, Marika hastily guzzled her coffee, made the sign of the cross and placed the saucer on top of the coffee cup.

She flipped it over and waited the mandatory 130 cricket calls for the sediment to speak its truth.

Theia Koula’s forehead read like a map of the dire prognosis before her grave, but meticulous examination came to an end. The sediment had painted foreboding arrows and mountains everywhere, the only silver lining, the circle on the front rim assuring economic security.

Despite the premonition a few months later she succumbed to familial and social pressures marrying Spiro at Saint Andreas’ Church. Albeit comfortable financially, her life has been a miserable concoction of ugly, stubborn kids and a philandering partner.

Moral of the story? Listen to the coffee, listen to ancient wisdom, listen to the Greek Uncles.

This morning, the coffee grounds were not kind to the Chargers. We saw mountains, backward arrows, and the arch, which is the sign for travel (São Paulo, Brazil, anyone?).

The Bolts may samba tomorrow night, but the season long view is foreboding based on the coffee images on the rim of the cup. The offensive line lost its best player (LT Rashawn Slater) and didn't add major upgrades. The team hopes to improve the running game with rookie Omarion Hampton, but can his talent overcome the blocking issues that have kept the team from being the sledgehammer running team coach Jim Harbaugh envisions?

Will they be able to score against good teams this year? Is Justin Herbert just an average QB, or are the football nerds going to be proven right that he can lift his team to victory in games that matter? Can the defense continue to play at last year's level?

Jim Harbaugh, is undefeated (5-0) on opening day as an NFL head coach. It is a record he shares with former Patriots coach, Raymond Berry, who never lost an opener. Though he won his final season opener, Berry's 1989 Patriots went 5-11 which resulted in his firing. The lesson being you have to win some of the games that come after that.

If Harbaugh is going to break the record he shares with Berry then he will travel over 6,000 miles to do it. The Chargers will "host" a regular season kickoff event in São Paulo, Brazil as part of the NFL's international game series against division rivals Kansas City. The Chiefs are -3 (-166 on the moneyline).

Assuming that the field isn't another ice rink, Uncle Pano has them winning against the Chiefs tonight 20-17. The Chargers are +140 if you think the Bolts will win outright. One other prop to look for is Omarion Hampton rushing attempts. We have seen this as low as 11.5. Take the over.

The Chargers always play the Chiefs tough regardless of their records.

Even though the lasting memory of the Chiefs is their disastrous appearance in Super Bowl LIX the Chargers will have their work cut out for them. Before the Chargers can break the Chiefs' stranglehold on the division (nine straight AFC West titles) they will have to provide proof of concept by actually beating them on the field—something that has not happened since former coach Brandon Staley's third game .

The last time they defeated the Chiefs in a game hosted by Los Angeles, you ask? New Year's Eve 2013—in San Diego! The Greek Parliament had just approved laying off 25-thousand public servants, so it was a bleak time to for gambling. Anyway, let's just say the Chargers feel due.

As for the playoffs, the coffee grounds are really murky this year:

AFC:

1)Ravens

2)Bills

3)Texans

4)Broncos

Wildcards

5)Bengals

6)Titans

7)Patriots

NFC:

1)Packers