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Braves send Hanson to hill in finale with CubsBaseball Betting Lines04/08/2010 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Jason Heyward has already made his presence felt during his very brief time in the major leagues. Another of the Atlanta Braves' young phenoms will be trying to make a quick impact when the team concludes its season-opening three-game series with the visiting Chicago Cubs tonight at Turner Field. Taking the mound for Atlanta this evening will be Tommy Hanson, who like Heyward, broke into the majors amidst a ton of hype when he debuted last season. The 23-year-old certainly didn't disappoint, as he won his first five decisions in an Atlanta uniform and finished the year with an 11-4 record and a sensational 2.89 earned run average. The gifted right-hander also struck out 116 batters in 127 innings and allowed two runs or fewer in 14 of his 21 starts. Hanson, who will be taking on the Cubs for the first time, went 7-2 with a 3.13 ERA in 11 Turner Field starts during his rookie campaign. The Braves had an 8-3 record in those contests. He'll be attempting to give Atlanta a sweep of this set, with Heyward playing a key role in each of the team's first two victories. The 20-year-old outfielder smacked a three-run homer in his first big league at-bat during Monday's 16-5 shellacking of the Cubs, then delivered an RBI double that helped lift the Braves to a 3-2 decision in Wednesday's second game. Heyward, rated the game's No. 1 overall prospect by Baseball America in the preseason, has gone 3-for-8 with five RBI over the first two games of this series. One of the longtime Braves turned out to be the hero in Wednesday's win, however, as veteran third baseman Chipper Jones belted a two-run homer off John Grabow in the bottom of the eighth that put Atlanta up by one. "I took a chance [with the count] 3-1 that [Grabow] was going to throw a changeup, and I got a pitch up in the zone and put a great swing on it," said Jones of the blast. Billy Wagner, signed over the winter to serve as Atlanta's closer, picked up his first save in a Braves uniform with a scoreless ninth. Peter Moylan got the win after keeping the Cubs off the scoreboard in the top of the eighth. Chicago had taken a 2-1 edge with two unearned runs off Atlanta starter Jair Jurrjens in the fifth, with Alfonso Soriano scoring on a bases-loaded error by Braves first baseman Troy Glaus and Ryan Theriot following with a go-ahead sacrifice fly. Cubs starter Ryan Dempster was in line for the win after limiting the Braves to just one run and three hits over the first six innings. He struck out nine Atlanta hitters before exiting. Chicago's Randy Wells, also coming off a very good first full year in the majors, will take the mound for the visitors in tonight's series finale. The right-hander was one of the few bright spots of the Cubs' disappointing 2009 season, putting together a 12-10 record with a 3.05 ERA in 27 starts after being called up from Triple-A Iowa in early May. He surrendered two or less runs in 17-of-27 outings following the promotion. One of Wells' wins came against the Braves in Chicago last July, with the Illinois native firing six innings of two-run ball. He also pitched well in a no-decision at Turner Field a month earlier, holding Atlanta to a pair of runs -- one earned -- and only two hits over a strong seven frames. Atlanta won four of the six 2009 meetings between these teams and took two of three from the Cubs in Chicago's lone visit to Turner Field.
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SPORTS BETTING - Tennis is an underrated and under-utilized bettors' sport.Ten years ago, at just about this time, I called Alan Boston in Vegas and left him a voicemail that went something like this (abridged version): "Hey Alan, Chad Millman from ESPN The Magazine calling. I want to do a book about wise guys, you in?" A couple weeks later I got a message back (abridged version): "I don't know, maybe," Boston said. "Call me and we'll talk about it. But not later today. I got $1,000 on Andre Agassi to win the French Open at 40-1, and he's in the finals."
Here's what happened next (abridged version): Agassi won his tourney. Boston won his $40,000. I wrote sportsbook. In the ten years since, how much has been wagered on the big-time tennis events? Put it this way: The Nevada Gaming Commission doesn't even track the number year by year because it's so small. "Tennis makes up about one-tenth of one percent of our take," says Lucky's bookmaking boss Jimmy Vaccaro. "The last big golf major we probably had $100,000 worth of bets. In tennis, we might have written two big tickets." But Wimbledon? Doesn't exactly reel in the whales. "Seriously, it's the nuts as an event," says Boston. "But who even knows when it's on?" Here's another reason that helps explain why golf gets traction, something I call "The Bubbe Theory." My Bubbe is pushing 95 and has cataracts so bad that, to her, even the most crystalline Chicago day is mostly cloudy. But she still listens to the Cubs games, and she still calls me in a fit if she disagrees with something Rick Telander writes in the Chicago Sun Times. She's a sports fan. If she doesn't know you, you're just filling a niche. And niche players, even historically good ones like Roger and Raf, don't drive betting volume. Only the highest profile names attract square money, which inflates wagering totals like a shot of saline to the lips. Bubbe, and the public, loved Agassi, tennis' last cross-the-rubicon, mainstream draw. She also has a crush on Tiger. She's given me standing orders to put a sawbuck on the big cat whenever I walk through a sports book (or mistakenly tap into one via my Internet machine.) That explains why the Masters is getting $100K in action at some books while the four tennis majors might not get that combined this year. This isn't a case of tennis being a difficult sport to bet. In fact, in Europe, it's probably the second most popular sport for gambling after soccer. Granted, as the WSJ football betting last week and The Mag's Shaun Assael examined in even greater depth last year, that might be because gamblers across the pond see it as an easy game to fix. But it could also be because, over there it holds the kind of sway the big two do over here. Street corners in Spain are peppered with public courts and kids doing their best Raffy impressions. In some war torn parts of Eastern Europe poverty-stricken kids view tennis as an escape route, like football or basketball here. A couple years ago The Mag's Lindsay Berra wrote a great piece about Belgrade's Jelena Jankovic, Ana Ivanovic and Novak Djokovic. They learned the game as kids while bombs were raining down on their homeland. They practiced in drained swimming pools. Not exactly Nick Bolletierri conditions. In the United States, casual fans think tennis is played four times a year. But on the tightly packed European continent, national interest in homegrown talent runs deep every weekend. Of the ATP's current top 20 players, only two, tennis betting and James Blake, are American. Fourteen are from Europe, representing six different countries. No wonder fans from Lisbon to Bhudapest get jacked up for the net game, whether it's Wimbledon or a low-level tourney like the Estoril Open in Portugal (congrats to Spain's Albert Montanes for winning that one, btw). Chances are good that someone representing their flag will not only be playing, but have a shot at winning. And that's all any bettor can ask for. To visit this sports book go to MySportsbook.com for all your football betting needs. |
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