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Showtime to Lob City; Lakers are playing second fiddle in LABasketball Betting Lines02/06/2012 - Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - For the first time you can make a very strong argument that the red-headed stepchild across the hall at Staples Center has more star power than the mighty Lakers. Adding Chris Paul to Blake Griffin has officially made Clippers basketball a happening in Hollywood for the first time. History and tradition still mean something and the Lakers will always play the role of big brother to the Clips, sort of like the Yankees, who own the backpage of New York's tabloids no matter what the Mets do. But, occasionally the lesser sibling can rise up and best big bro. Think the Darryl Strawberry/Doc Gooden-era in Queens. It's far too early to crown the Clippers in the Pacific but we are now past the one-third mark of the season and it's the Clips standing atop the division, not the Lakers. Kobe Bryant is still the best player to call Staples Center home and he arrived in his hometown of Philadelphia on Monday night 23 points shy of tying former teammate and nemesis Shaquille O'Neal (28,596 points) for fifth on the NBA's all-time scoring list. He passed Shaq midway through the second quarter making shot after shot with a degree of difficultly that would make an Olympic gymnast blush before Doug Collins decided to challenge his entire supporting cast in what turned out to be a 95-90 Sixers win. Collins ran the Army, Navy and Marines at Kobe every time he touched the basketball and to his credit, Bryant did what you are supposed to do -- move the ball. The Lakers got a ton of open looks and made some but missed more than their share. By the fourth quarter Kobe's legs were gone and the amazing fadeaways started to miss their mark. In the 25th game of the season John Kuester, who was piloting the team for a suspended Mike Brown, played Bryant 44 minutes and did not sit him at all in the second half. The result was a 1-for-10 fourth quarter as the dogged defense of Andre Iguodala and friends finally took its toll. "They just came after him immediately," Kuester said after the game, "and to Kobe's credit, what he did was try to get everyone involved. We had some great hits. When you are coming down to the end of the game, your margin of error is very small, and you have to take advantage of that. Things just didn't go our way." Talk about a lack of foresight -- remember as impressive as the milestone that Bryant passed tonight is, it's also a stark reminder that he is a lot closer to the end than the beginning. Whether there is enough tread left on the 33-year-old Bryant's tires to carry a flawed team on his back to another significant postseason run is up for debate. He's obviously still one of the top players in the game, averaging a league- best 29.4 ppg coming into tonight's contest despite playing with a torn lunotriquetral ligament in his right wrist. But something is missing with these Lakers -- even with Bryant. The same air of invincibility is simply not there. The Lakers certainly aren't the Washington Generals either but they no longer pack the kind of punch that scares anyone. The fact that the team is just 3-9 on the road should tell you all that you need to know. "I think we just need to relax," Metta World Peace said. "When you've got guys like Fish [Derek Fisher] and Kobe, we need to get on their level and not worry. Late in the fourth quarter we need to stay consistent and relax, and everything will be alright." Way too rosy an outlook if you ask me. With no Phil Jackson on the bench and no Lamar Odom coming off it, it's become payback time for a lot of routs that are still fresh in the minds of quite a few rivals. Brown has only been able to count on three players this season as he implements a more defensive-minded system, Bryant and his two 7-footers, Andrew Bynum and Pau Gasol. The rest of the team including battle-tested veterans Fisher and World Peace, has lacked consistency and offered little production. Tonight, Philadelphia's bench featuring big-time contributors like Lou Williams, Evan Turner and Thaddeus Young outscored the Lakers by a 49-16 margin. A well-rested Williams was Kobe-like in the fourth, netting 14 points and exploding in the last 3 1/2 minutes. The only young player that has stepped forward for LA this season is rookie guard Andrew Goudelock, a College of Charleston product that has flashed at times but has a very limited ceiling as a player. Like an aging but proud boxing champ, the Lakers still have a right hook that can quiver the liver and send just about anyone to the deck. They showed that by opening their current six-game Grammy trip but beating a far-deeper Denver Nuggets team in the Rockies. A day later, however, Utah was waiting to take advantage and did exactly that, topping the Lakers 96-87 despite 26 points Bryant, 24 points and 16 rebounds from Gasol and 21 points and 12 boards from Bynum. The rest of the Lakers' team scored a paltry 16 points in Salt Lake City on 6-of-24 shooting. They showed it again in the first half tonight when Bryant scored 24 and Bynum dominated the boards. But the fact that Kuester or Brown can't turn around and point to someone, anyone to give Bryant a breather for three or four minutes in the second half of a tightly contested game speaks volumes. The trust is simply not there. "It is pretty basic," World Peace said. "I didn't think we need to change much. We have the guys to finish games. Right now, there is not a lot of consistency, so once we start playing with a little more consistency , we will win more consistently." Perhaps but the Lakers lack of athleticism is glaring. LA had just two fast break points against the Sixers and forced only four turnovers. Jackson foreshadowed these type of struggles when he walked away after last season. The former Lakers' mentor, of course, had collected championship rings at an unprecedented pace during his career, winning two in New York during the early 1970s as a player, garnering six more in Chicago with Michael Jordan and adding an additional five during the Kobe-era in LA. "The ultimate winner," Jackson knows better than anyone what a winning environment looks like and when he retired after his club was run off by the Dallas Mavericks last season, it was an indictment of the organization and it's immediate future. You can believe Jackson was burned out or the back problems had finally gotten to him if you want but Phil wasn't going anywhere if he thought the 2011-12 Lakers had a legitimate chance to bounce back and win another title. His ego would have liked to have put more distance between himself and Bill Russell as well as Red Auerbach. The organization itself also flashed warning signs when it put together a high-profile deal to acquire Paul, one that would have sent both Odom and Gasol out of town before it was nixed by the NBA. Yep, even the Lakers don't believe their contenders -- just don't tell Kobe.
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Rosemont, IL (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Darius Johnson-Odom netted a game-high 23 points and all five Marquette starters finished in double figures, as the 18th-ranked Golden Eagles shook off a slow start and defeated DePaul, 89-76. Jamil
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FOOTBALL BETTING : Crabtree's base deal: six years, $32 millionIn the wake of the news that the 49ers have signed receiver Michael Crabtree after an extended holdout, there has been not a hint of the dollars to be paid to Crabtree. And since this means that his agent hasn't leaked the numbers, it means that his agent feels no specific motivation to do so. Possibly because his agent isn't all that thrilled to have his name on the deal. So the numbers will come from sources other than Crabtree's agent. And we've gotten our mitts into them. Per a league source, Crabtree has signed a six-year, $32 million contract. (The total includes guaranteed money, base salaries, and the one-time incentive based on achieving minimum playing time.) The deal also includes $17 million in guaranteed money. As reported elsewhere, the deal can void to five years based on performance triggers, wiping out a final year base salary of $4 million. But they won't be easily reached. The source tells us that, in his first four seasons (including 2009), Crabtree must either qualify for two Pro Bowls, or he must qualify for one Pro Bowl in one year and he must participate in 80 percent of the offensive snaps in a separate year in which the team makes the playoffs. In other words, if in 2010 he qualifies for the Pro Bowl and the team makes the playoffs and he participates in 80 percent of the snaps, he'll still need to make it to the Pro Bowl or achieve the 80-percent/playoffs in another season. Since the chances of Crabtree making the Pro Bowl or participating in 80 percent of the offensive snaps this year is roughly zero percent, he'll have three years to get it done. And it won't be easy. Frankly, he'll be hard pressed to make it to one Pro Bowl in three years with the likes of Larry Fitzgerald, Calvin Johnson, Anquan Boldin, Steve Smith, the other Steve Smith, Hakeem Nicks, DeSean Jackson, Johnny Knox, Percy Harvin, Greg Jennings, Roddy White, T.J. Houshmandzadeh in the same conference for sportsbook betting. So, by all appearances, it's a six-year deal. And at $17 million in guaranteed money, the per-year guarantee is a tepid $2.83 million per year. There's another problem with the deal -- it has no mid-tier incentive package. Instead, the additional $8 million that Crabtree can earn (pushing the max value to six years, $40 million) requires the kind of unrealistic, mega-star performances that no rookie is likely to ever achieve. So while the contract paid to Packers defensive tackle B.J. Raji covers five years and pays $22.5 million, he has the ability (if he's a solid player) to make up the difference between his base deal and Crabtree's five-year, $28 million haul via the mid-tier incentive package in Raji's deal. And unless Crabtree meets the performance thresholds necessary to void the sixth year, he'll be stuck under contract for another year at a base salary of only $4 million. There's one other area of concern with the deal. Crabtree, per the source, received no option bonus. Instead, he has significant money tied to a fairly new device known as a "discretionary salary advance," which unlike an opition bonus is subject to forfeiture if Crabtree decides in a year or two that he wants to hold out for a better deal. (We're also told that the 49ers have included language that would make certain escalators subject to forfeiture, too.) Meanwhile, the deal falls well short of the mark for which Crabtree and agent Eugene Parker were aiming -- the five-year, $38.25 million contract paid by the Raiders to receiver Darrius Heyward-Bey, the seventh overall pick in the draft. Even if Crabtree successfully voids the final year, he'll make more than $2 million per year less on average than Heyward-Bey. Thus, as we explained earlier in the day, this is a deal that Crabtree could have done in July, which would have given him a much better chance of making a contribution to the 49ers during his rookie year. So while the final outcome can be described as win-win, the broader view suggests that it's really a lose-lose situation. To visit this sportsbook go to MySportsbook.com for all your college football betting needs. American Idol Betting Odds: Season 6 The online gambling websites are in the process of deciphering each American Idol contestant and his or her chances of winning Season 6 to come up with the early American Idol betting lines. Tim Dalton of MySportsbook.com has been locked away in a soundproof room coming up with all the latest tallies, we are told. "American Idol has become one of the most significant betting events of the year," claims Jack Black of MySportsbook.com. "Last year, millions were bet during the season across the globe, not just in America.It's tough early on since we really do not have a glimpse as to how well each of these individuals will perform solo on a week-to-week basis. It's like Week 1 of the NFL. Pre-season means nada! We do know the 24 finalists however. Sanjaya Malakar is the young man whose sister failed to make it into the Top 24. He's very low key but - unless he totally flubs - will probably win over the young girlie vote for a few weeks anyway. He's too young to go all the way, according to Payton O'Brien. Chris Sligh - He's got the humor and in many ways he's the Anti-American Idol much like last year's winner Taylor Hicks was. And this is why he'll probably get pretty far in this competition. He's chubby, white with a big curly afro....but more importantly, a great voice! People love "real", not "real cute" to go all the way. "Blake Lewis should go far because of his uniqueness and looks. He's the boy next store with a twist - he beat boxes. But on top of this, he's a great singer, and I adore him," Payton O'Brien relayed. Paul Kim has caught our own roving reporter, Jenny Woo's eyes. "I love the fact that there is a Korean American on the show and he is bound to get more Asians tuning into the show," Woo said from her Miami Beach estate. "There has never been a major presence of Asian-Americans on American Idol in the past. He's a hottie with a nice voice so that should help to take him far. Expect heavy betting action from the Asian community." Sundance Head - He's not perfect, but he's got the personality that will take him through a few weeks, plus he's got the lineage (son of Roy Head - whose 1965 single, "Treat Her Right," hit No. 5 in the charts) And the others: Alena Alexander - Those tears (she never seems to stop bawling) should get her far. MySportsbook.com is offering a 20% signup bonus with an initial deposit (i.e. open your American Idol betting account with $300, receive another $60 in which to bet with). Last two contestants will be? 1 Male/1 Female +100 (a $10 bet pays $10 plus your initial $10) 2 Males +170 (a $10 bet pays $17 plus your initial $17) 2 Females +130 (a $10 bet pays $13 plus your initial $10) MySportsbook.com is an online sportsbook accepts Visa Credit Cards and online sportsbook accepts Mastercard Credit Cards for easy American Idol betting lines. |
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