11/12/2008 - New York, NY (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Infielder Pablo Ozuna was the only player to file for free agency on Wednesday.
Ozuna, 34, hit .260 with one home run and nine RBI in 96 at-bats over 68 games between the Chicago White Sox and Los Angeles Dodgers last season. A career reserve, Ozuna has logged more than 100 at-bats only twice in his seven-year career. His best season came in 2006, when he batted .328 with two homers and 17 RBI in 189 at-bats for the White Sox.
The Dominican Republic native is a career .282 hitter with three homers and 45 RBI in parts of seven seasons with the Florida Marlins, Colorado Rockies, White Sox and Dodgers.
<< Pats LB Thomas out for Thursday vs. Jets
Foxboro, MA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - New England Patriots linebacker Adalius Thomas
will not play in Thursday's key divisional contest with the New York Jets.
Reports have circulated this week that Thomas will miss the remainder of the
season
<< Around FCS: So long, Southland championship
Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - I have always held the opinion that
championships, however great or small, are won on the field of play. Don't
bother me with asterisks, or press releases about forfeits.
I don't want to hear teams having
<< Hansbrough "extremely doubtful" for UNC opener
Chapel Hill, NC (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - North Carolina senior forward Tyler
Hansbrough will likely miss the Tar Heels' season-opener Saturday against
Penn because of a stress reaction condition in his right shin.
UNC announced Wedne
<< Burke steps down as Ducks GM, Murray to step in
Anaheim, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Anaheim Ducks announced Wednesday that
executive vice president and general manager Brian Burke has stepped down,
and that former senior vice president of hockey operations Bob Murray will
replace
Atlanta recalls Wolves' goalie Pavelec >>
Chicago, IL (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Atlanta Thrashers have recalled goaltender
Ondrej Pavelec from their American Hockey League affiliate, the Chicago
Wolves, it was announced on Wednesday.
Pavelec, who has not appeared in any games
Penguins' top line has sights set on ultimate goal >>
Wilkes-Barre, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins' top
line of Chris Minard, Jeff Taffe and Janne Pesonen has been racking up goals
at an alarming rate through the first month of the American Hockey League
season,
Report: Culpepper to start for Lions >>
Detroit, MI (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Detroit Lions quarterback Daunte Culpepper
has reportedly been named the starter for Sunday's matchup with the Carolina
Panthers.
The Detroit Free Press cited Lions head coach Rod Marinelli as stating
Galaxy sign youth development player >>
Carson, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Los Angeles Galaxy signed forward Tristan
Bowen to a multi-year contract, the Major League Soccer club announced on
Wednesday.
The 17-year-old Bowen is the fist player in Galaxy history to be signe
“You play to win the game!”
Those are the words of notoriously intense head coach Herman Edwards. Unfortunately, from a bettors’ perspective, most coaches don’t feel that way about the NFL preseason. August is a time to evaluate young players, finalize the depth chart and pray your star players stay healthy.
The trick to making money during the exhibition schedule is identifying coaches – like Edwards – who can’t stand losing even when there's nothing on the line.
The New York Jets betting won 15 of 21 preseason games and went 14-7 against the spread (ATS) during Edwards’s five-year tenure with the club. In his first season as the Kansas City Chiefs field boss, the team improved from 0-4 to 2-2.
Identifying win-a-holics like Edwards is a good start if you plan betting the preseason – even though most say you shouldn’t ... but what the hell do they know anyway?
Here’s a brief rundown of two teams that have a habit of winning during the second-stringers’ season, and another club that has a good chance of exceeding this year.
Playing in the media hub of North America can be stressful but the press can’t write anything negative about the way Tom Coughlin’s boys play in the preseason. The Giants won and covered all four games last summer, improving their record to 7-1 both straight up (SU) and against the spread over the last two years.
Coughlin has shown he’s not afraid to give his starters more time in the second preseason game than most of his colleagues, no doubt one of the reasons his team has been so dominant.
Bettors can count on America’s team early on. The Cowboys are 14-6 both SU and ATS since 2002 in warm-up contests. Former coach Bill Parcells, the coach of the team the last four years, has an intimidating, in-your-face presence – surely a reason Dallas has had so much early success.
The Big Tuna won’t be strolling the sidelines with looks of disgust, but new coach Wade Phillips will be anxious to make a good first impression for owner Jerry Jones.
Dallas plays the Indianapolis Colts and the Denver Broncos before things get serious. They then face the Houston Texans in their third contest (the game starters see most game time) and finish off with the Minnesota Vikings.
Expect a Dallas team able to walk away with another 3-1 preseason record.
This team scored a league-worst 12 offensive touchdowns last season, so the rookies and veterans each have something to prove. There’s a bounty of first-unit jobs up for grabs and plenty of bodies competing for those slots.
First-time head coach Lane Kiffin will be eager to impress an owner who employs the philosophy, “Just win, baby!”
The 32-year-old Kiffin has to command respect from a locker room full of players older than him. All of these factors should lead to purpose in preseason.
Don’t forget: before playing like a team that belonged in NFL Europe, Oakland went 4-1 (both SU and ATS) in exhibition games.
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Las Vegas Sports Consultants (LVSC) is the world’s premier oddsmaking company and the most respected authority on making the lines. Mike Seba is a Senior Oddsmaker at LVSC and has been making lines for the last six years. In our extended interview, Seba explained that there are 4-5 oddsmakers assigned to make lines for each of the major sports (pro & college football and basketball; MLB, NHL, boxing, golf). Each of these oddsmakers bring unique opinions, strengths and weaknesses to the process. Oddsmakers at LVSC are professional sports junkies who love what they do and would probably do it for nothing if you asked them, but they do get paid for it. By necessity their approach is very research-oriented and concise, since with millions of dollars at risk there is little margin for error.
“You either have a passion for it or you don’t,” Seba said.
“The #1 thing for us is to make a line for each game that creates good two-way action. We do this by drawing from past experiences and applying them to current situations. People think it’s much more complicated, but it’s not. “Divided action means the sportsbook is guaranteed a profit on the game because of the fee charged to the bettor (called juice or vig – typically $11 bet to win $10).
Power ratings are the oddsmaker’s value of each team and are used as a guide to calculate a "preliminary" pointspread on an upcoming game. The power ratings are adjusted after each game a team plays. Examples of non-game factors that would require an adjustment to a team's power rating are key player injuries and player trades.
Once a game’s power rating based pointspread is determined, the oddsmaker will make adjustments to that line after considering each team's most recent games played and previous games played against that opponent. Also, adjustments are made after reading each team’s local newspapers to get a sense of what the coaches & players are thinking going into the game.Since the oddsmaker’s ultimate goal is equally dividing the sports betting action, public perception and sportsbook betting patterns must be taken into account. For example, the public might have heavy betting interest week after week on a popular college football betting team such as USC. If an oddsmaker comes up with a preliminary line of USC -7, then an adjustment up to -7.5 or -8 would be made in response to the public’s expected USC bias.
The last step in the line-making process for each oddsmaker is taking one final look to determine whether or not the line "feels right." This is where common sense and past experience with how games are bet enters into the picture.A round-table discussion among the 4-5 oddsmakers involved in making the line for each sport is then conducted and a consensus line is decided upon by the Odds Director before it is released to the sportsbooks. Of the 4-5 oddsmakers, generally the 2 most respected opinions are weighed more heavily by the Odds Director before he decides on the final line.
Experts working for the individual books having a strong opinion on the game
Individual books having players who consistently bet with certain tendencies (such as an extreme bias toward favorites or toward a certain popular team like USC)The purpose of these adjustments, like all line adjustments, is to more equally divide the betting action.
Once betting begins, sportsbooks can adjust the line at any time. In doing so they attempt to make more attractive the team that is getting less action. By moving the line, sportsbooks can influence how the public bets on a particular game.For example, if the pointspread on a game is 7 and most of the money is coming in on the underdog (taking the +7), sportsbooks will then move the number down to 6 ½ to try and attract money on the favorite.
Moving the line is the oddsmaker's effort to balance betting action, and often times such moves can have a major impact on a bettor’s decision. Oddsmakers can also change the line depending on various event-related factors such as player injuries or weather. Obviously, if the line comes out a week ahead of the event (which is the case in football), there is much that could happen during the week leading up to the event that could affect the line. Oddsmakers have to determine if any changes are necessary and send out an "adjusted line."“The main objective is that our clients get equal action on both sides,” Seba said. “We’re not trying to pick the team that covers the spread, we’re trying to make it a coin flip, a tough decision (for the bettor). If we’ve done that, we’ve done our job.”
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