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Hornets make themselves at home in blowout win over ThunderBasketball Betting Lines11/22/2008 - Oklahoma City, OK (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - David West scored 19 points and Chris Paul scored 17 to go with six assists and six rebounds as the New Orleans Hornets returned to a familiar venue for a 105-80 blowout over the Thunder. The Hornets played 71 home games at the Ford Center in the 2005-06 and 2006-07 seasons in the wake of the destruction of Hurricane Katrina before returning back to the Big Easy. While toiling in Oklahoma City, the Hornets averaged over 18,000 fans per game and the NBA was so impressed by the local faithful that the city rose to the top of the list for a future expansion team or as a possible destination for a relocation. That came to fruition in the offseason as the Seattle SuperSonics moved to Oklahoma, and the Thunder were born. However, this season has been a brutal one thus far for Oklahoma City, which fell to 1-12. Their current skid stands at 10 games. Devin Brown scored 16, while Hilton Armstrong and Peja Stojakovic each had 13 for the Hornets in the front end of the home-and-home series. Kevin Durant scored 17 points, while Nick Collison tallied 16 points and 13 rebounds for the Thunder. Russell Westbrook scored 15. New Orleans didn't trail the entire game. Brown's three-pointer expanded the advantage to 22-12 late in the first, with the bucket ending a 9-0 spurt. Ahead by nine after the first quarter, the Hornets pulled away late in the second, using a 20-2 spurt. Armstrong's layup capped it for a 48-24 difference and it was 60-39 at the half. It was 83-57 after three periods. Game Notes The Hornets have won six straight over the Seattle/Oklahoma City franchise...Oklahoma City had 26 turnovers, leading to 32 New Orleans points.
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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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