Lincecum blows out candles, blows away Mets

Baseball Betting Lines

07/16/2010 - San Francisco, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Tim Lincecum shut out the Mets, becoming the second-fastest Giants pitcher to win 50 games, as San Francisco posted a 2-0 victory in the opener of a four-game set at AT&T Park.

It took the hard-throwing right-hander 109 games to reach the 50-win plateau, second in club annuals to Juan Marichal, who accomplished the feat in 97 pitching appearances.

Lincecum (10-4) scattered six hits with five strikeouts and one walk on his 26th birthday. Buster Posey went 2-for-4 with a run scored and an RBI and Pablo Sandoval drove in a run for the Giants, who have won three straight and seven of eight overall.

R.A. Dickey (6-3) was stellar in defeat, yielding just the one run on five hits with three strikeouts and one walk over seven frames.

Carlos Beltran returned to the lineup, batted in the cleanup spot and finished 1-for-4. He returned from the 60-day disabled list and played his first game of the 2010 season after undergoing knee surgery back in January. No Met had more than one hit as the club lost for the fourth time in five games.

The Giants pushed across a run in the second as Posey led off with a single to right, moved to second on a groundout, scampered to third on a wild pitch and walked home on Sandoval's two-out double.

New York threatened in the fifth as Jason Bay walked and Josh Thole singled to center. After a Ruben Tejada flyout, Dickey moved both runners on a sacrifice bunt, but Angel Pagan skied a shallow fly ball to right to end the threat.

The Giants tried to make something happen on the basepaths in the home sixth as Aubrey Huff singled and Posey followed with a base hit to left. Huff tried to take third on the play, but overslid the bag and David Wright applied the tag for the out to snuff out the threat.

San Francisco added an insurance run in the eighth as Lincecum helped himself with a single before Aaron Rowand's base hit. Freddy Sanchez's bunt was not soft enough, allowing the Mets to erase the pitcher running to third. Huff walked to load the bases and new pitcher Bobby Parnell induced a slow roller to first off the bat of Posey. It was so slow, however, that Ike Davis' throw home to nab Rowand was late for a 2-0 game.

Game Notes

Lincecum last pitched on July 7, when he struck out 10 batters and gave up one run in seven sharp innings during a victory over Milwaukee. The right-hander picked up his first victory against the Mets...New York won two-of-three meetings with the Giants may in early May...The Giants improved to 13-6 versus the National League East...Lincecum threw his seventh career complete game and fourth career shutout.

Myracetracks Baseball Betting News

<< ChiSox win ninth straight, edge Twins
Minneapolis, MN (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Gordon Beckham hit a solo home run and drove in two as the Chicago White Sox took an 8-7 win over the Minnesota Twins to begin the second half of the season. Juan Pierre went 3-for-4 with an RBI and tw

<< Ramirez, Cubs clobber Phils
Chicago, IL (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Aramis Ramirez wiped the slate clean from a dreadful first half, driving in four to set the tone of Chicago's 12-6 victory over Philadelphia in the first of four games at Wrigley Field. The second half st

<< Carpenter masters Dodgers again
St. Louis, MO (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Chris Carpenter pitched eight strong innings and remained unbeaten against the Dodgers, and the St. Louis Cardinals started the post All-Star break with a 7-1 win in the opener of a four-game series. Carpent

<< Nuggets sign Harrington
Denver, CO (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Denver Nuggets have signed free agent forward Al Harrington. Terms of the deal weren't released, but it's believed to be a five-year, $34 million contract. Harrington averaged 17.7 points, 5.6 rebounds and 1

<< Goldberg leads Canadian Tour's Players Cup
Winnipeg, MB (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Aaron Goldberg shot a six-under 65 to take the first-round lead Thursday at The Players Cup. Goldberg had six birdies in a flawless round on the Pine Ridge course to build a one-stroke lead over Brady Stockto

Pineiro beats former team, Angels down Mariners >>
Anaheim, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Joel Pineiro threw seven solid innings to win his seventh straight decision and the Angels got three RBI apiece from Erick Aybar and Bobby Abreu in a 8-3 win over the Seattle Mariners to start the post All-Sta

Twins put Morneau on DL >>
Minneapolis, MN (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Minnesota Twins first baseman Justin Morneau was put on the 15-day disabled list following Thursday's 8-7 loss to the White Sox due to a concussion. The move is retroactive to July 8. Morneau suffered the i

Lincecum blanks Mets >>
San Francisco, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Tim Lincecum shut out the Mets, becoming the second-fastest Giants pitcher to win 50 games, as San Francisco posted a 2-0 victory in the opener of a four-game set at AT&T Park. It took the hard-th

Oosthuizen moves in front at St. Andrews >>
St. Andrews, Scotland (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - South African Louis Oosthuizen carded a five-under 67 Friday to move to the top of the leaderboard in the early stages of the second round at the British Open. His two-round total of 12-under-pa

Line of Scrimmage: NFL GameChangers '10: Running Backs >>
Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - In addition to being three people who have never been in my kitchen, former NFL running backs Troy Hambrick, Greg Hill, and Neal Anderson all share another important commonality - they all followed legends.

Sportsbook Betting Lines

Who Makes the Sportsbook Betting Lines?

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. “

What are the Football Betting Lines Trying to Accomplish?

There is a common misconception that point spreads represent the oddsmakers’ prediction of how many points the favorite will win by. That is not the case at all – their intent is NOT to evenly split the ATS result between the teams; rather, their goal is to attract equal betting action on both sides. Stated another way, they want to create a line that half the people find appealing to bet one way while the other half find it appealing to bet the other way (known as ‘dividing the action’).

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).

How the Opening Line Is Made

The opening line is the first line created by the oddsmakers, which is then sent out to sportsbooks. Of course there is an entire method to the madness on how the opening line is created. Seba explained that it all starts with each oddsmaker creating a line on each game based upon their own personal approach. This usually includes having up-to-date power ratings on each team.

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.

Why Sports Betting Lines Change

Once the opening line is released by LVSC, the individual sportsbooks decide if they want to make any adjustments before offering it to the public. Reasons for such adjustments include:

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.”

To visit this internet sportsbook got to MySportsbook.com for all your sports betting needs and World Series odds.

Marlins could start season without No. 2 starter Johnson

JUPITER, Fla. -- The Foorida Marlins are preparing for the likelihood that right-hander
Josh Johnson won't be ready when the season starts April 2.

Grapefruit League action starts Wednesday, but Johnson, penciled in as the No. 2 starter, hasn't even thrown off a mound at full speed since September. He's experienced some soreness in his right forearm.

MySportsbook.com have the Marlins listed with baseball betting lines at +800 to win the NL East this season .

''You guys know the math. If he's not on the hill then he becomes an opening day roster issue,'' manager Fredi Gonzalez said Saturday. ''We're borderline now.''

Johnson, who finished 12-7 with a 3.10 ERA in 2007, was supposed to throw on flat ground Saturday. That was canceled when he woke up with pain.

He played catch on Wednesday with no pain but felt discomfort in a throwing session on Thursday. He's expected to try again Sunday.

''Like we always said from the very beginning, we're going to take it easy on him,'' Gonzalez said. ''He didn't feel right, so we shut him down. We're going to take it back to step one and see where we're at.''

Among the candidates to take Johnson's spot in the rotation are left-hander Chris George and right-handers Yusmeiro Petit and Jose Garcia.

Right-hander Sergio Mitre, who missed most of last season with arm and shoulder problems, also is behind.

With Johnson's status doubtful, Gonzalez said right-hander Ricky Nolasco will stay in the rotation and no longer will be considered a candidate for closer.

Additional basbeall odds can be found at: www.MySportsbook.com

To visit this online sportsbook got to MySportsbook.com - this sportsbook accepts credit cards.