During my Sears delivery driver days, the game was football cards. They were sold each week by one of the drivers who had a Sicilian name which I shall omit. The cards had ten games with spreads on them and you just picked your teams for ten games, paid as much as you wanted to bet and, IIRC, started winning money with seven or more correct picks. Ten got you a very nice return maybe something like 50X.They always looks deceptively easy to pick, but weren't.

The card seller was a really sweet guy that everybody liked, so he never had to worry about getting outed. His son, who was my age and just as nice as his old man, got hired on but soon left to become a full time bookie. I think he made his papa proud.

A lot of these games got demonized for being mob run etc. but, at ground level, they were just some guy making a few extra bucks for his family and filling a need that the state outlawed.They weren't thugs and it was all very personal. He would even invite his top customers to his house every year for a nice super bowl party as a thank you gesture.

The only Giacalone I knew was a third brother Charlie who was an aging but good handball player at the old downtown YMCA when I started the game. The story was that he was not in the family 'business' but did well as a union leader for the riggers at Cobo Hall.