The game of tiddlywinks requires good hand-eye coordination and is much more fun than any of the games and sports you watch on TV. If you haven’t ever played it, you should. If you don’t know what it is, look it up. After you do, you will probably say, “Oh, sure, I know that game. Used to play it in my high school cafeteria.”

Compare it with football and basketball. People take up those sports because they expect something good to come of it – a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. On the other hand, people pay tiddlywinks for fun. Just what is the probability of a high school footballer or basketball player striking it rich? Here are some statistics.

452, 929 young women played high basketball. Percentage of them who went on to play in the NCAA – 3.3% Percentage of NCAA college athletes to the professional ranks – 1.0%. Percentage of high school athletes who ended up playing professionally – 0.02%. Men did better 3.0%, 1.2% and 0.03%. That’s out of 546,336 starters. As for football, 1.071,775 stalwarts took to the field in high school. 5.7% of them went on to the college ranks. 1.8% graduated from college to the pros. Final disposition: of 1,071,775 dreamers, 0.08% ended up as professionals.

But the pot of gold is there. Darko Milicic, a player without a shred of talent, has played 4 years in the NBA and for every point he has scored he has made $18,251. Loving club owners have given him $37.8 million and untrusting coaches have kept his playing time down to the minimum. Even Lebron James does not do as well as Darko. In fact, dollars per point and dollars per minute, James is a cream puff. He plays too much and scores too little. Over the course of his six year career, King James has made only $4,067 per point. He is nowhere near the top 25 moneymakers..

Poor guy and nobody loves him. On the other hand, for 5 consecutive years, Tiger W has ranked as America’s #1 loveboat, not withstanding (and perhaps due to) his peccadillos. Another king of the bedroom, Kobe Bryant is in a virtual dead heat with Tiger.

And how would they do if they took up tiddlywinks? My guess is that they would transform the game into a major revenue producer, and if they pop those winks as well I would expect them to, there would be a rush on to play the game with as many as 1/2 of 1% of high school potters going on to make $millions. Nothing is more colorful than a good blitz shot unless, of course, it is a carnovsky.