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08/27/2010 - University Place, WA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Defending champion Byeong-Hun An defeated Max Homa, 1-up on Friday to advance into the semifinals of the U.S. Amateur Championship.
An's quarterfinal victory at Chambers Bay on Friday keeps hope for alive for the repeat. He was the youngest U.S. Amateur champion in history last year at Southern Hills and if he can successfully defend, An would become the first repeat winner since Tiger Woods captured three in a row from 1994-96.
An's semifinal opponent will be David Chung, who knocked out NCAA individual champion Scott Langley, 1-up. It's a rematch of last year's quarterfinals.
This semifinal match features a Stanford guy (Chung) versus a Cal guy (An). The two saw much of each other in Pac 10 action, but Saturday's match is for a spot in Sunday's final.
"Well, it's my luck, I guess, playing a Stanford guy," said An. "We were playing each other a lot of times this year in college, too. If I play well, I'll beat Stanford again."
The other semifinal on Saturday will feature Patrick Cantlay, a 1-up winner over Jed Dirksen in 20 holes, and Peter Uihlein, a 1-up winner over Oklahoma State teammate Morgan Hoffmann.
An was in control through most of his match, building a 3-up lead through 12. Homa chipped away and after an An bogey at 17, An's lead was only 1-up with one to go.
Neither player played the 18th very well and both left with pars. An left with another win and with a win on Saturday, no matter what happens on Sunday, a return visit to Augusta National next year for the Masters.
"I just want to forget about that," An said. "Tomorrow's another match. I have two more matches to go. But if I win tomorrow, I go back to Masters. I'm trying not to think about going back to the Masters. I have to win first."
Chung had an up and down battle with the NCAA champion from Illinois. The match was all-square through 13 holes, but Chung won 14 with a par to go 1-up. Chung birdied the 246-yard, par-three 15th to move 2-up.
Langley went down fighting. He birdied the 17th to cut the deficit to 1-down with one to go, but both birdied the last to give the match to Chung.
Cantlay led after the turn, but Dirksen won 11 with a birdie and took the lead with a par at 14. Dirksen stayed 1-up through 17 holes, but a bogey at the last forced extra holes.
Both players parred the first playoff hole, but a Dirksen bogey at the second put Cantlay into the semifinals.
Uihlein, who could celebrate a U.S. Amateur title Sunday on his 21st birthday, will be waiting for him.
Uihlein and his college teammate battled throughout the match with neither player grabbing more than a 1-up lead.
Hoffmann squared the match at the 14th hole, but Uihlein inched in front with a birdie at 16. Both golfers parred out and it was Uihlein off to the semifinals.
<< Rams WR Avery has significant knee injury
St. Louis, MO (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - St. Louis Rams wide receiver Donnie Avery
suffered an apparently serious knee injury during Thursday night's 36-35
preseason win over New England.
Avery, who departed after recording two catches f
<< Lions place DE DeVries on IR
Allen Park, MI (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Detroit Lions placed defensive end Jared
DeVries on injured reserve Friday, officially ending his 2010 season.
DeVries has been dealing with knee problems all training camp and he had
arthroscopic
<< Briscoe captures third straight Chicagoland pole
Joliet, IL (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Ryan Briscoe will start on the pole for an IZOD
IndyCar Series race at Chicagoland Speedway for the third year in a row after
winning Friday's qualifying for the PEAK AntiFreeze and Motor Oil Indy 300.
With In
<< Fire's Ljungberg set for first trip to Seattle
Seattle, WA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Freddie Ljungberg will return to Seattle on
Saturday for first time since being the first designated player ever traded in
Major League Soccer, as his new club Chicago visits Qwest Field.
Ljungberg joined S
La. Tech football suspends four >>
Ruston, LA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Louisiana Tech head football coach Sonny Dykes
announced indefinite suspensions Friday for four players due to a violation of
team rules.
The four in question, wide receivers Tim Molton, R.P. Stuart and Cruz W
BYU to use two starting QBs >>
Provo, UT (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Brigham Young University will have two starting
quarterbacks for the upcoming season.
Cougars head coach Bronco Mendenhall made the announcement on Friday that the
two-quarterback system will be used, feat
Kaiserslautern shocks Bayern Munich >>
Kaiserslautern, Germany (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Ivo Ilicevic and Srdjan Lakic
scored in a one-minute span late in the first half and Kaiserslautern shocked
Bayern Munich, 2-0, on Friday at Fritz Walter Stadium.
Ilicevic scored in the 36th
Alouettes QB Calvillo rules self out for B.C. game >>
Toronto, ON (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Montreal Alouettes quarterback Anthony
Calvillo will not play on September 3 against the British Columbia Lions.
TSN of Canada and CFL.ca both reported on Friday that Calvillo ruled himself
out for
Is there such a thing as a trap game in the NFL?
I once asked that question to Pete Korner, who at the time was office manager and a senior linesmaker for Las Vegas Sports Consultants.
Korner almost ripped my head off. There is no such thing as a trap game, he loudly berated me. It’s a myth. The numbers are made using power ratings, he said.
There are trap games, though. They just might not be what you think. The perception is of a good team, say Philadelphia, laying a small number against New Orleans.
Using the highly-respected power ranking from The Gold Sheet, you’d find the Eagles with a power rating of 4 and the Saints at 8. When you factor the game being played in New Orleans, you could see why the line opened so short at less than a field goal.
For some, this makes it enticing to take the Eagles. That’s not a real trap game, though.
A real trap game, says professional gambler Dave Malinsky, is thinking you’re getting value betting a bad team, which brings us to the Oakland Raiders-Denver Broncos matchup.
The Raiders are +15 in this long-standing division rivalry. Denver is on a short week having dispatched Baltimore Monday. However, the Raiders haven’t covered the spread their last 10 games.
Many bettors don’t trust the Raiders to give a full effort. Few think much of Art Shell and his Oakland’s coaching staff.
So oddsmakers have to do something to make Oakland attractive if they hope to get equal action.
Now Malinsky is a value shopper. But he won’t touch the Raiders even getting more than two touchdowns.
“I try to eliminate the undisciplined, unfocused teams because they’re the ones most likely to suffer the bad beats,” he said.
Near the top of Malinsky’s list of stay-away teams is the Miami Dolphins, who have yet to cover a spread this season.
“Whatever you think of Nick Saban, you have to look at the penalties and turnovers,” Malinsky said.
It’s easy to point out the Dolphins failed to get the money this past week against New England because Olindo Mare missed a field goal and had another field goal blocked. But even though the Dolphins outgained the Patriots, 283-213, they committed eight penalties.
Bad teams not only cost themselves victories, but pointspread covers as well. The Arizona Cardinals and Green Bay Packers are two more examples.
The Cardinals couldn’t have been in a better position this past Sunday, up 14-0 at home against a mediocre Kansas City Chiefs squad. But they couldn’t hold it. The Packers got a push against St. Louis, but also could have won losing by three when Brett Favre fumbled at the St. Louis 11-yard line with 44 seconds left.
“The Packers were in a position to beat Philadelphia, too,” Malinsky said. “But they couldn’t even cover double digits.
“These teams just make mistakes and it costs you … they always will look good from a value standpoint. They really will. But that’s the trap.”
Houston and Tennessee rank among the six-worst teams. Malinsky wouldn’t be afraid to take either of these teams, however, if the price were high enough.
The Texans are bad, Malinsky said, but they have some discipline. The Titans showed they could not only come up with an outstanding game plan, but execute it as well, losing by one to the Colts on the road as an 18 ?-point underdog this past Sunday.
“Jeff Fisher is a worker,” Malinsky said of the Titans coach. “I’m not sure how hard Art Shell wants to work when he gets out of bed.”
Fisher, though, could be out as Tennessee coach after this season. Is he still worth backing in the right spot, with the right price, as a lame duck coach?
“It’s in his nature to keep working hard and not worry about any possible lame duck status,” Malinsky said. “He’s coaching for his resume.”
Note: Monday night game will be picked Monday. Lines used are from football betting lines.
“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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