The Key for the week of October 20, 2025
Seems you CAN teach an ol—I mean mature—dog new tricks
Joe Flacco doesn’t want us to tall it the Icy-Hot Bowl, although it would have been a great marketing ploy, but his showdown with Aaron Rodgers last Thursday was one for the history books. Yes, a pair of over-40 quarterbacks have faced off before, most recently Tom Brady and Drew Brees, but maybe not with this much drama. Flacco, of course, had just over a week and one game under his belt to get ready for this division rivalry, but he slung the football around like he’d been in camp since July. The division is extremely winnable, what with Baltimore facing quarterback injury issues of its own, and all of a sudden Bengals fans have new optimism for the rest of the season, with or without the “other” Joe. Stay tuned.
Hell is Really Real
The good news is, FC Cincinnati is back in the MLS playoffs. The not-so-good news, the orange and blue face their nemesis from the north, Columbus, in the best-of-three first round. Yes, FC finished second in the conference, and Columbus finished seventh, but this season the Crew won the July matchup with FC and tied 1-1 with Cincinnati back in May. And in the one that really hurt, the Crew won the 2023 Eastern Conference final 3-2 in extra time after coming back from a 2-0 deficit at TQL Stadium. The Crew went on to win the MLS Cup that year, in a season when FC Cincinnati won the Supporters Shield with the best record in the MLS. It all starts next Monday—Hell is Real, indeed.
Can anyone beat the Dodgers?
All of a sudden, the Reds’ exit from the playoffs doesn’t sting so much. The Dodgers have won 9 of their 10 playoff games heading to the World Series, and the three teams they’ve faced (Reds, Phillies, Brewers) have scored an average of 2.8 runs a game. The Brewers, who had the best record in the NL, managed only one run in each game against the Dodgers. And Milwaukee’s batting average against Los Angeles was .118, the lowest in a series of at least three games in postseason history. And that doesn’t even take into account Shohei Ohtani’s game for the ages, with three home runs and a shutout on the mound through 6+ innings with 10 strikeouts. It’ll be hard to stop them from winning a second straight World Series title.
Ben’s Best Bet
Speaking of, the odds going into Friday night’s Game 1 have Los Angeles at around -210 to repeat as champions, with some odds as short as -225. For those of you who are mathletes, that works out to nearly a 68% chance of the Dodgers taking the series. If you want to win, Ben says take the sure bet. If you want to play the odds, take the underdog—and watch what Mary Hart wears to Dodger home games—sadly, no formal bet is available on that.